Pollution Tax under Lobbying Duopolists

We study a model which explains a politically determined pollution tax outcome under asymmetric duopoly. We assume an asymmetry of firms in the pollution emissions per unit of output. The polluting duopoly and three-stage political game are considered. We derive the equilibrium tax rate and show that it might excess the marginal external damages, even without an environmental group. The politically determined tax rate is decomposed to the marginal external damages, the imperfect competition effect, and the lobbying effect. Under linear demand and cost functions, we derive the condition that Pigouvian taxation is politically determined. The effect on the equilibrium tax of firm heterogeneity is discussed.Cournot duopoly, firm heterogeneity, lobbying activity, political economy, pollution tax

Did International Trade Become Dirtier in Developing Countries? On the Composition Effect of International Trade on the Environment

Utilizing the world panel dataset for the pollution emission embedded in international trade for the period between 1988 and 2009, we investigated whether the composition of international trade of a country moved away from pollution-intensive industries as its income level rises. The empirical evidence suggests that the income levels of countries are negatively related to export pollution intensity, but we also find that income is negatively related to import pollution intensity. Thus, the composition effect of international trade on the environment is only consistent with the pollution haven hypothesis on the export side, which predicts that developing countries export more of dirtier industries and import more of cleaner industries after trade liberalization. Further investigation reveals that the lower-middle income countries experienced an increase in the pollution emission of exports and a decrease in the pollution emission of imports, whereas the countries in the lowest income group experienced increases in the pollution emission embodied in both exports and imports.Composition effect; Environment; International trade; Pollution emission; Pollution haven hypothesis.

Industry-level Total-factor Energy Efficiency in Developed Countries

This study computes and analyzes the total-factor energy efficiency (TFEE) of 11 industries in 14 developed countries during the period of 1995-2005 using the data envelopment analysis (DEA) approach. There are four inputs: labor, capital stock, intermediate inputs other than energy, and energy. The value added is the only output. The most inefficient industry is the metal industry, which has an average TFEE of 40.6%. Australia is the most inefficient country, with the lowest weighted TFEE in every year except for 1996 and 1998. The most efficient countries are the United States from 1995 to 1998, Denmark from 1999 to 2002, and Netherlands from 2003 to 2005. Given that the number of efficient industries decreases over time, it is clear that most industries have room to improve their energy efficiency as time goes by. Moreover, based on the total-factor framework, this study finds no support for the convergence of energy efficiency levels.Data envelopment analysis (DEA); Total-factor energy efficiency; Industry-level analysis

Janus field theories from multiple M2 branes

Based on the recent proposal of N=8 superconformal gauge theories of the multiple M2 branes, we derive (2+1)-dimensional supersymmetric Janus field theories with a space-time dependent coupling constant. From the original Bagger-Lambert model, we get a supersymmetric field theory with a similar action to the N D2 branes, but the coupling varies with the space-time as a function of the light-cone coordinate, g(t+x). Half of the supersymmetries can be preserved. We further investigate the M2 brane action deformed by mass and Myers-like terms. In this case, the final YM action is deformed by mass and Myers terms and the coupling behaves as exp(\mu x) where \mu is a constant mass parameter. Weak coupling gauge theory is continuously changed to strong coupling in the large x region.Comment: 16 pages; v2 a new subsection added to discuss more general cases where the coupling 'constant' is a locally dynamical quantity, references added; v3 typos corrected, reference added, version to be published in Phys.Rev.

Scaling limit of N=6 superconformal Chern-Simons theories and Lorentzian Bagger-Lambert theories

We show that the N=8 superconformal Bagger-Lambert theory based on the Lorentzian 3-algebra can be derived by taking a certain scaling limit of the recently proposed N=6 superconformal U(N)xU(N) Chern-Simons-matter theories at level (k, -k). The scaling limit (and Inonu-Wigner contraction) is to scale the trace part of the bifundamental fields as X_0 -> \lambda^{-1} X_0 and an axial combination of the two gauge fields as B_{\mu} -> \lambda B_\mu. Simultaneously we scale the level as k -> \lambda^{-1} k and then take \lambda -> 0 limit. Interestingly the same constraint equation \partial^2 X_0=0 is derived by imposing finiteness of the action. In this scaling limit, M2-branes are located far from the origin of C^4/Z_k compared to their fluctuations and Z_k identification becomes a circle identification. Hence the scaled theory describes N=8 supersymmetric theory of 2-branes with dynamical coupling. The coupling constant is promoted to a space-time dependent SO(8) vector X_0^I and we show that the scaled theory has a generalized conformal symmetry as well as manifest SO(8) with the transformation of the background fields X_0^I.Comment: 21 pages; v2 a subsection added to discuss Generalized Conformal Invariance; v3 discussions on gravity dual added; v4 published version in PR

H2O maser motions and the distance of the star forming region G192.16-3.84

We present the results of astrometic observations of H2O masers associated with the star forming region G192.16-3.84 with the VLBI Exploration of Radio Astrometry (VERA). The H2O masers seem to be associated with two young stellar objects (YSOs) separated by \sim1200 AU as reported in previous observations. In the present observations, we successfully detected an annual parallax of 0.66 \pm 0.04 mas for the H2 O masers, which corresponds to a distance to G192.16-3.84 of D = 1.52 \pm 0.08 kpc from the Sun. The determined distance is shorter than the estimated kinematic distance. Using the annual parallax distance and the estimated parameters of the millimeter continuum emission, we estimate the mass of the disk plus circumstellar cloud in the southern young stellar object to be 10.0+4.3M\cdot. We also estimate the galactocentric distance and the peculiar motion -3.6 of G192.16-3.84, relative to a circular Galactic rotation: R\star = 9.99 \pm 0.08 kpc, Z\star = -0.10 \pm 0.01 kpc, and (U\star,V\star,W\star)=(-2.8\pm1.0,-10.5\pm0.3,4.9\pm2.7)[kms-1]respectively. The peculiar motion of G192.16-3.84 is within that typically found in recent VLBI astrometric results. The angular distribution and three-dimensional velocity field of H2O maser features associated with the northern YSO indicate the existence of a bipolar outflow with a major axis along the northeast-southwest direction.Comment: 9 pages, 2 figures and 4 tables. Accepted for publication on PAS

Convergence in pollution terms of trade

Technical ReportBy implementing the world input-output tables for 40-countries by 35-industries to account for intermediate trade, we constructed the pollution terms of trade (PTT) on the basis of CO2 emissions between 1995 and 2009. We examine whether the PTTs have converged among the 40 countries in the past 15 years. The empirical evidence supports PTT convergence; PTT growth is negatively related to its initial level, and this empirical result is robust to various control variables.CRR Discussion Paper, Series A, No. A-29, pp. 1-49technical repor

Generalized Conformal Symmetry and Recovery of SO(8) in Multiple M2 and D2 Branes

We investigate conformal symmetries of the Aharony-Bergman-Jafferis-Maldacena (ABJM) theory for multiple M2 branes and the Lorentzian Bagger-Lambert-Gustavsson (L-BLG) theory which can be obtained by taking a scaling limit k (>>N) -> \infty of the ABJM theory. The conformal symmetry is maintained in the L-BLG by considering general space-time varying solutions to the constraint equations. The dual geometry is reduced to d=10 AdS4 x CP3 in the scaling limit and has the same conformal symmetry. The curvature radius R satisfies l_{11p} << l_{10p} << R << l_s (l_{dp} and l_s are the d-dimensional Planck lengths and the string scale), and the theory is in a region where an \alpha' expansion is not valid. We also study how the SO(8) covariance is recovered in the AdS4 x CP3 geometry by taking the scaling limit.Comment: 27 page