Meetings with Costly Participation: An Empirical Analysis

Using data from the Mid-Atlantic surf clam and ocean quahog fishery, we find that firms with a preference for extreme, rather than moderate, policies are much more likely to participate in public meetings where regulation is determined. We also find that participation rates are higher for larger, closer, and more influential firms. These results; (1) improve our understanding of a very common institution for resource allocation, 'meetings with costly participation', (2) they refine our intuition about regulatory capture, (3) they provide broad confirmation of the recent theoretical literature predicting that polarization and bipartisanship should emerge under a variety of democratic institutions, and finally, (4) they may help to explain management problems in US fisheries.

Meetings with Costly Participation: An Empirical Investigation

Despite their importance in economic life, meetings with costly participation are little studied. This paper is an empirical analysis of participation at public meetings. We investigate basic and previously unaddressed questions about meetings with costly participation. Who goes? Does attendance vary with observable characteristics? Do meeting attendees represent the interested population? We find that (1), the opinions of participants do not represent the opinions of the entire regulated population, (2) that the opinions of participants are extreme relative to the whole population, (3) that private information does not affect participation decisions in an important way, and (4), that small changes to meeting protocols have the potential to manipulate the sample of participants. These results lay a foundation for the problem of tailoring meeting protocols to achieve particular welfare objectives.

Fisheries Management with Stock Growth Uncertainty and Costly Capital Adjustment: Extended Appendix

This Appendix is supplemntary to "Fisheries Management with Stock Growth Uncertainty and Costly Capital Adjustment".

Current issues in empirical trade estimation

The study of empirical trade estimation has been a staple in international economics literature since the early 1960s. I focus on three current topics in empirical trade estimation. In chapter 1, I use a time-series approach and in the context of the effect of exchange-rate volatility on trade, provide both theoretical and empirical explanations for positive volatility effects. My results show a clear pattern; when the effect of exchange-rate uncertainty on trade volume is positive [negative] for importers, the effect for exporters is negative [positive]. In addition, the U.K. provides evidence that trade balance is an important factor in determining the effect of volatility. If changes in the sign of trade balance are not taken into account, the effect of volatility may go undetected. Finally, the sensitivity of imports and exports to exchange-rate volatility is affected similarly by changes in market conditions; trade is more sensitive to volatility when the trade terms are expected to improve. In chapter 2, I turn to cross-sectional analysis and following a growing trend in the literature, I examine the impact of adding nonstandard variables, ones that measure cultural or ideological differences, to the basic gravity model. In the context of United States trade with Latin America, I show that in the case of Brazil, Nicaragua, and El Salvador, as the number of foreign-born peoples in the United States increases, U.S. exports to their country of origin increases. This finding sheds important light on the fact that the determinants of trade may go beyond standard economic and descriptive variables. In Chapter 3 I compare the Hausman-Taylor method for estimating the unrealized US-Cuban trade potential to the OLS, fixed-effects, and random-effects methods using the out-of-sample approach. The Hausman Taylor method is ideal because it allows for the inclusion of time-invariant variables in trade projections and circumvents the problem of an ad hoc estimation of the country-specific dummy variable needed for a projection based on the fixed-effects estimator. In addition, it removes the correlation between the error term and included variables which often plagues random-effects estimation

Multilevel Metalization

A multilevel metal testchip which analyzes a first level metal, interlevel dielectric, and second level metal has been designed. The test structures will be used to detect opens or shorts in conducting lines, measure via resistance, measure sheet resistance, and determine linewidth or linespace

Magnetic Resonance Imaging of Iron in Early Multiple Sclerosis at 3 Tesla

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is the most common neurological disease in young Canadians, yet its etiology remains obscure. Two possibly related findings in MS are brain iron deposition and the presence of small veins in white matter lesions. This thesis concerns the development and application of 3 Tesla magnetic resonance imaging tools to image iron and veins in early multiple sclerosis. To facilitate measurements of iron concentration as well as production of cerebral venograms, we first optimized multi-echo susceptibility weighted imaging (SWI), using numerical simulations and input from physicians. We validated measurements of R2*, an MRI parameter that scales linearly with iron concentration. Subsequently, we proposed quantification of the caliber of the internal jugular veins (IJVs) from magnetic resonance venograms. IJVs are implicated in the chronic cerebrospinal venous insufficiency model of MS, an increasingly disputed theory that attributes iron deposition in MS to venous abnormalities. We report that the coefficient of variation of measurements of average cross-sectional area of the IJVs is on the order of 7%. We performed quantitative investigations of iron concentration in a cohort of patients at risk of MS diagnosis, compared to healthy controls. We report increased R2* (putative iron) in deep as well as cortical grey matter in patients. We subsequently measured IJV area, finding a trend for reduced total IJV caliber in patients; however, we found no correlation between R2* changes and IJV area. We investigated the ability of multi-echo SWI to detect central veins within white matter hyperintensities (WMHs). We found that patients who converted from clinically isolated syndrome (CIS) to MS had a larger fraction of lesions with central veins compared to patients with non-converted CIS and healthy controls. Moreover, all patients who received a diagnosis of MS within the study window had \u3e40% lesions with central veins at their CIS baselines, suggesting there may be predictive value in this biomarker. The subjects from these last two studies represent a subset of our cohort in an ongoing longitudinal study. Using methodology described herein, we are equipped to further investigate different biomarkers of disease to better understand early pathology in MS

Report on Bellshazar mining property

The property of the Belshazzar Gold Mine is located in the Granite Creek Mining District of Boise County, State of Idaho. This district forms the northern boundary of the famous Boise Basin which has produced over two hundred million in placer gold. The Balshazzar property is about three and a half miles from the town of Quartzburg and about four miles from the town of Placerville. A good wagon road connects the property with both towns --Description of the District, page 3

Multimodal interventions to enhance adherence to secondary preventive medication after stroke: a systematic review and meta-analyses

Summary: Introduction: Nonadherence to secondary preventative medications after stroke is common and is associated with poor outcomes. Numerous strategies exist to promote adherence. We performed a systematic review and meta-analysis to describe the efficacy of strategies to improve adherence to stroke secondary prevention. Methods: We created a sensitive search strategy and searched multiple electronic databases (MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, PsycINFO, CENTRAL, and Web of Knowledge) for studies of interventions that aimed to enhance adherence to secondary preventative medication after stroke. We assessed quality of included studies using the Cochrane tool for assessing risk of bias. We performed narrative review and performed meta-analysis where data allowed. Results: From 12,237 titles, we included seventeen studies in our review. Eleven studies were considered to have high risk of bias, 3 with unclear risk, and 3 of low risk. Meta-analysis of available data suggested that these interventions improved adherence to individual medication classes (blood pressure-lowering drugs – OR, 2.21; 95% CI (1.63, 2.98), [P < 0.001], lipid-lowering drugs – OR, 2.11; 95% CI (1.00, 4.46), [P = 0.049], and antithrombotic drugs – OR, 2.32; 95% CI (1.18, 4.56, [P = 0.014]) but did not improve adherence to an overall secondary preventative medication regimen (OR, 1.96; 95% CI (0.50, 7.67), [P = 0.332]). Conclusion: Interventions can lead to improvement in adherence to secondary preventative medication after stroke. However, existing data is limited as several interventions, duration of follow-up, and various definitions were used. These findings need to be interpreted with caution

An Urban Myth? New Evidence of Equity, Adequacy and the Efficiency of Educational Resources

In this article, we offer an empirical rejoinder to the oft-told story that large urban districts, like Philadelphia, are inefficient. We situate our study during the very short period in Pennsylvania’s recent history when efforts were dedicated to addressing the inequitable distribution of resources through a fair funding formula and to increasing the amount of resources available for education spending. Even in the presence of a funding formula, school districts like Philadelphia (SDP) with its large percentage of low-income students and English language learners were disproportionately burdened. Unsurprisingly, the SDP, like many districts across the nation, did not receive sufficient resources to educate its students. However, we find that contrary to conventional wisdom, SDP did more per pupil with the resources at its disposal than the average peer district in terms of student poverty and achievement