Effects of the Free Trade Area of the Americas on Forest Resources

The effects of the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) agreement on the forest sectors and resources of member countries are investigated. A model of wood supply within the spatial partial-equilibrium Global Forest Products Model is developed to link international trade and deforestation. The direct effects of tariff changes and the indirect effects of income changes induced by trade liberalization are considered. The FTAA has a small positive impact on the region's forest resources. Higher harvests of industrial roundwood in most countries are offset by increased afforestation due to the income effect of trade liberalization (captured by the environmental Kuznets curve).trade liberalization, international trade, forest resources, forest sector trade model, International Relations/Trade, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

The Post-Medellin Case for Legislative Standing

After the terrorist attacks against the United States on September 11, 2001, the balance of power between the executive and legislative branches of government in this country shifted. President Bush expanded the executive’s unilateral authority in international affairs and war powers. Both President Bush and President Obama have extended executive power, and then staunchly protected their expansion of authority from limitation by the legislative and judicial branches. Further, Bush’s use of presidential signing statements to undermine legislative intent suggests that the executive’s power to avoid legislative input may be virtually limitless. The Supreme Court’s 2008 Medellín v. Texas decision appeared to be an example of the judiciary reversing that trend by countering an additional assertion of executive power. In Medellín, the Court rejected the President’s efforts to force Texas to comply with an International Court of Justice (ICJ) decision ordering reconsideration of Jose Medellín’s original conviction. However, while the Court facially limited the executive’s power in that instance, it also opened a new avenue for the President to exercise his authority with regard to treaty interpretation. Since its earliest days, the Court has recognized a distinction between treaty terms that are automatically binding (“self-executing”) and those that require additional legislative attention (“non-selfexecuting”). However, early rulings were inconsistent and created confusion in applying this distinction. In Medellín, the Court attempted to clarify this area of the law by endorsing a strict text-based approach to treaty interpretation. Relying on that approach, the majority asserted the novel concept that a treaty term is not domestically enforceable without further action unless the language in the treaty clearly indicates that the parties intended the term to be self-executing. This Comment argues that this approach to treaty interpretation creates a presumption of non-self-execution and effectively grants the executive the final say in deciding whether to enforce treaty obligations within the United States, thereby increasing executive power. This Comment further argues that this increase in executive power could undermine the constitutional role of legislators in the treaty-making process. Additionally, this Comment uses a hypothetical scenario to explore how the imbalance of power created by Medellín may lead to a situation where senators have standing to sue in their institutional capacity. This is more challenging than it initially appears because legislators have more hurdles to overcome than private parties. However, if senators can show that the executive’s interpretation of a treaty is inconsistent with their intent, they could claim that their votes to ratify the treaty were rendered completely ineffective, thus establishing a claim of vote nullification. Vote nullification, an issue not often addressed by the Supreme Court, is the only injury that the Court has recognized as sufficient to create legislative standing. Further, the senators must show that the issue is a legal one instead of a matter that is better suited for the political branches of the government. Thus, this Comment discusses the implications of Medellín on treaty interpretation, separation of powers, and legislative standing. Part I of this Comment discusses the development of the distinction between self-executing and non-self-executing treaties and the evolution of legislative standing. Part II presents a scenario raised by the Medellín holding where the executive could refuse to enforce a treaty obligation based on his unilateral interpretation that the relevant treaty terms were non-self-executing. Part III argues that the Court created a presumption of non-self-execution in the Medellín decision and explains how that presumption creates new executive powers. Part IV argues that if a president’s interpretation is inconsistent with Congress’s action on the treaty, members of Congress would have standing to sue in their institutional capacity. Additionally, this Part provides alternate recommendations to prevent the President from asserting unchecked power in treaty interpretation

Net Operating Working Capital, Capital Budgeting, And Cash Budgets: A Teaching Example

Many introductory finance texts present information on the capital budgeting process, including estimation of project cash flows.  Typically, estimation of project cash flows begins with a calculation of net income.  Getting from net income to cash flows requires accounting for non-cash items such as depreciation.  Also important is the effect of changes in net operating working capital on cash flow.  While students readily understand how to account for depreciation when calculating cash flow, they typically have much more difficulty understanding how and why changes in working capital affect cash flows.  This paper develops a teaching example to show exactly how and why changes in net operating working capital affect cash flows.  The example shows how to derive operating cash flows for a proposed project using the accrual accounting method and then shows a cash budget for the same project.  Finally, the example shows that the discrepancy between the cash flows shown in the cash budget and the operating cash flows can be resolved by accounting for changes in working capital.  A survey of students in an MBA managerial finance course indicates student satisfaction with the teaching example and gives evidence that students prefer the teaching example to explanations of the effect of working capital on project cash flows given in the assigned text

Net Operating Working Capital, Capital Budgeting, And Cash Budgets: A Teaching Example

Many introductory finance texts present information on the capital budgeting process, including estimation of project cash flows.  Typically, estimation of project cash flows begins with a calculation of net income.  Getting from net income to cash flows requires accounting for non-cash items such as depreciation.  Also important is the effect of changes in net operating working capital on cash flow.  While students readily understand how to account for depreciation when calculating cash flow, they typically have much more difficulty understanding how and why changes in working capital affect cash flows.  This paper develops a teaching example to show exactly how and why changes in net operating working capital affect cash flows.  The example shows how to derive operating cash flows for a proposed project using the accrual accounting method and then shows a cash budget for the same project.  Finally, the example shows that the discrepancy between the cash flows shown in the cash budget and the operating cash flows can be resolved by accounting for changes in working capital.  A survey of students in an MBA managerial finance course indicates student satisfaction with the teaching example and gives evidence that students prefer the teaching example to explanations of the effect of working capital on project cash flows given in the assigned text

Valuing Avoided Soil Erosion by Considering Private and Public Net Benefits

The population in New Zealand is expected to increase to over five million by the mid 2020’s from the current level of 4.3 million (Statistics New Zealand, 2009). An increasing demand for primary produce as a result may put pressure on marginal land to be farmed. Understanding the economic value of avoided erosion in New Zealand is therefore an important factor in policy making to optimise the soil related activities in the economy. Establishing a methodology for estimating the economic value of avoided soil erosion is the first step in assessing the problem. This study uses the future forest scenarios developed by Scion to identify potential afforestation areas and thereby compare the current erosion/sedimentation status under current land-use (non woody vegetation) with potential future afforestation. The study aims to quantify the incremental public and private net benefits from the change in scenario. The notion has come under different headings in the literature, such as on-site and off-site erosion effects or sediment and soil erosion effects, all of which recognize the importance of separation of effects to avoid double-counting. The separation into public and private benefits and costs in this case, while avoiding double-counting, will also help identify appropriate policy instruments to avoid soil erosion damage using the private and public net benefit framework (Pannell, 2008).Environmental Economics and Policy, Land Economics/Use,

Thermal kinetic inductance detectors for ground-based millimeter-wave cosmology

We show measurements of thermal kinetic inductance detectors (TKID) intended for millimeter wave cosmology in the 200-300 GHz atmospheric window. The TKID is a type of bolometer which uses the kinetic inductance of a superconducting resonator to measure the temperature of the thermally isolated bolometer island. We measure bolometer thermal conductance, time constant and noise equivalent power. We also measure the quality factor of our resonators as the bath temperature varies to show they are limited by effects consistent with coupling to two level systems.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures. Submitted to Journal of Low Temperature Physic

Exploring Short-Term Responses to Changes in the Control Strategy for Chlamydia trachomatis

Chlamydia has a significant impact on public health provision in the developed world. Using pair approximation equations we investigate the efficacy of control programmes for chlamydia on short time scales that are relevant to policy makers. We use output from the model to estimate critical measures, namely, prevalence, incidence, and positivity in those screened and their partners. We combine these measures with a costing tool to estimate the economic impact of different public health strategies. Increasing screening coverage significantly increases the annual programme costs whereas an increase in tracing efficiency initially increases annual costs but over time reduces costs below baseline, with tracing accounting for around 10% of intervention costs. We found that partner positivity is insensitive to changes in prevalence due to screening, remaining at around 33%. Whether increases occur in screening or tracing levels, the cost per treated infection increases from the baseline because of reduced prevalence

Intelligent Queries over BIRN Data using the Foundational Model of Anatomy and a Distributed Query-Based Data Integration System

We demonstrate the usefulness of the Foundational Model of Anatomy (FMA) ontology in reconciling different neuroanatomical parcellation schemes in order to facilitate automatic annotation and “intelligent” querying and visualization over a large multisite fMRI study of schizophrenic versus normal controls