Comparison between different methods of estimating of the relaxation times in the FPU model

After a brief review of the Fermi-Pasta-Ulam (FPU) conservative system of N nonlinearly coupled oscillators, this paper addresses two problems: first, comparing two indicators for the equipartition, showing that the results are essentially identical; second, finding a method that allows fast integration to reach the long integration times required in this area. In particular this work proposes a symplectic algorithm based on the Fast Fourier Transform

A Bayesian approach to analyze regional elasticities

This paper presents a bayesian approach to analyze regional elasticity distributions with a regular translog cost function. It is known that a proper statistical analysis concerning elasticities can be performed only with the bayesian approach. Morover we can take advantage of this methodology to form reasonable priors using national data. This way we can produce sounder inferences without much elicition by the analyst. To compare results, this approach is applied to a cost function for the main regions in Italy with a diffuse prior too. Price and substitution elasticities are derived conditional on factor shares or covariates. The low posterior probability than inequality constraints hold with an noninformative prior shows how bayesian methods can be fruitfully employed to assess regional elasticities with a proper prior obtained from national data.

Economic Literacy: An International Comparison

Many studies show that most people are not financially literate and are unfamiliar with even the most basic economic concepts. However, the evidence on the determinants of economic literacy is scant. This paper uses international panel data on 55 countries, merging indicators of economic literacy with a large set of macroeconomic and institutional variables. Results show that there is substantial heterogeneity of financial and economic competence across countries, and that human capital indicators (PISA test scores and college attendance) are positively correlated with economic literacy. Furthermore, inhabitants of countries with more generous social security systems are generally less literate, lending support to the hypothesis that the incentives to acquire economic literacy are related to the amount of resources available for private accumulation.Economic Literacy, Human Capital, Social Security

The Age-Wealth Profile and The Life-Cycle Hypothesis: a Cohort Analysis with a Time Series of Cross-Sections of Italian Households

In this paper I estimate the age-wealth profile under two different identification assumptions about age, cohort and time effects. According to the life-cycle model, the two set of assumptions should yield similar age-wealth profiles. Using the 1984-1993 Italian Survey of Household Income and Wealth, the estimated average annual rate of wealth decumulation in old age is found to be between 3 and 6 percent. As in the life-cycle model, the cohort effect increases with year of birth. However, the results uncover also considerable population heterogeneity: the rates of wealth decumulation are much lower for rich households and households headed by individuals with higher education.Subjective expectations, precautionary saving, excess sensitivity

The Life-Cycle Hypothesis, Fiscal Policy, and Social Security

The paper reviews some of the most important results of the Life Cycle Hypothesis for understanding individual and aggregate saving behaviour. It then turns to the implications for fiscal policy and social security, highlighting Modigliani’s seminal contributions. Over time competing theories have emerged, and some empirical findings are difficult to reconcile with LCH; chiefly aspects of inertia, myopia, and irrational behaviour documented by the recent behavioural literature. But the LCH is still the benchmark model to think about individual saving decisions, the aggregate evidence and policy issues.

Investment in financial literacy and saving decisions

We present an intertemporal consumption model of consumer investment in financial literacy. Consumers benefit from such investment because their stock of financial literacy allows them to increase the returns on their wealth. Since literacy depreciates over time and has a cost in terms of current consumption, the model determines an optimal investment in literacy. The model shows that financial literacy and wealth are determined jointly, and are positively correlated over the life cycle. Empirically, the model leads to an instrumental variables approach, in which the initial stock of financial literacy (as measured by math performance in school) is used as an instrument for the current stock of literacy. Using microeconomic and aggregate data, we find a strong effect of financial literacy on wealth accumulation and national saving, and also show that ordinary least squares estimates underestate the impact of financial literacy on saving. JEL Classification: E2, D8, G1, J24 Keywords: Financial Literacy, Cognitive Abilities, Human Capital, Savin

Investment in financial literacy, social security and portfolio choice : [version may 21, 2013]

We present an intertemporal portfolio choice model where individuals invest in financial literacy, save, allocate their wealth between a safe and a risky asset, and receive a pension when they retire. Financial literacy affects the excess return and the cost of stock market participation. Since literacy depreciates over time and has a cost related to current consumption, investors simultaneously choose how much to save, the portfolio allocation, and the optimal investment in literacy. This last depends on households' resources, its preference parameters and on how much financial literacy affects the returns on risky assets and the stock market participation cost, and the returns on social security wealth. The model implies one should observe a positive correlation between stock market participation (and risky asset share, conditional on participation) and financial literacy, and a negative correlation between the generosity of the social security system and financial literacy. The model also implies that the stock of financial literacy accumulated early in life is positively correlated with the individual's wealth and portfolio allocations later in life. Using microeconomic cross-country data, we find support for these predictions

Intertemporal choice and consumption mobility

The theory of intertemporal consumption choice makes sharp predictions about the evolution of the entire distribution of household consumption, not just about its conditional mean. In the paper, we study the empirical transition matrix of consumption using a panel drawn from the Bank of Italy Survey of Household Income and Wealth. We estimate the parameters that minimize the distance between the empirical and the theoretical transition matrix of the consumption distribution. The transition matrix generated by our estimates matches remarkably well the empirical matrix, both in the aggregate and in samples stratified by education. Our estimates strongly reject the consumption insurance model and suggest that households smooth income shocks to a lesser extent than implied by the permanent income hypothesis. Klassifikation: D52, D91, I3

Awareness and stock market participation

The paper documents lack of awareness of financial assets in the 1995 and 1998 Bank of Italy Surveys of Household Income and Wealth. It then explores the determinants of awareness, and finds that the probability that survey respondents are aware of stocks, mutual funds and investment accounts is positively correlated with education, household resources, long-term bank relations and proxies for social interaction. Lack of financial awareness has important implications for understanding the stockholding puzzle and for estimating stock market participation costs. Klassifikation: E2, D8, G

Which Kind of Two-Particle States Can Be Teleported through a Three-Particle Quantum Channel?

The use of a three-particle quantum channel to teleport entangled states through a slight modification of the standard teleportation procedure is studied. It is shown that it is not possible to perform successful teleportation of an arbitrary and unknown two-particle entangled state, following our version of the standard teleportation procedure. On the contrary, it is shown which, and in how many different ways, particular classes of two-particle states can be teleported.Comment: 11 pages, Latex, to appear in Found.Phys.Let