Capital goods imports and long-run growth: Is the Chinese experience relevant to developing countries?

In this paper, we analyze the role played by capital goods imports in the long-run growth of developing countries. We focus in the case of the Chinese economy in the last few decades. We find evidence that the ratio of imported to domestic capital goods, that is, the composition of investment, as well as the capital accumulation (both physical and human), was key determinants of the long-run growth rate of per capita GDP over the analyzed period. Furthermore, our results are also consistent with the hypothesis that the link between trade openness and long-run growth operates mainly through imports. This finding supports some recent developments of Schumpeterian models of growth, and the very specific economic policy recommendations arising thereof. In short, these models state that, in the early stages of growth, government intervention to encourage an investment-based strategy, with emphasis on large investment efforts and the adoption of foreign technology, could be an appropriate strategy for development.V. Orts gratefully acknowledge financial support from the Spanish Ministry of Education and Science and FEDER (project ECO2011-28155), from the Generalitat Valenciana (PROME- TEO/2009/068) and Fundació Caixa Castelló-Bancaixa (P1-1B2010-17). The usual disclaimer applies

The Driving Forces behind China’s Growth

The main objective of this paper is to disentangling the determinants of the Chinese economic growth that occurred from 1965 to 2000. We have explored, first, the time series properties of the growth rates of GDP and labour productivity with an extended battery of unit root tests. Then, in a multivariate setting, we use the VAR model methodology to provide evidence that physical and human capital accumulation, R&D expenditure, openness and competitiveness are the main drivers of output, labour productivity and total factor productivity growth in the long run. Additionally, we also show that although China has not yet converged to its long-run equilibrium, it is in the process of catching up. These results are more consistent with some versions of the endogenous growth models than with Solow-type models of growth, since they support active strategies of economic policy to stimulate economic growth and catching up with more advanced economies

Equipment investment, output and productivity in China

At the beginning of the 1990s, J. Bradford De Long and Lawrence H. Summers highlighted in a series of influential articles that there were good reasons and quantitative evidence to support the point of view that machinery and equipment investment might be strongly associated with economic growth. China along with its enormous investment effort over recent decades constitutes an interesting case study with which to analyse the role played by equipment investment in its recent economic performance and its interaction with other sources of growth, i.e. openness, R&D, human capital and infrastructure. Our results provide evidence that equipment investment and exports are two of the most important determinants of both labour productivity and output in the long run even after controlling for other sources of growth in China. Furthermore, when human capital and infrastructure are included, the authors find that they have a positive effect on economic activity in the long run

Una aproximación a Falange en la provincia de Lugo (1936-1942)

En noviembre de 1942 la Falange de Lugo pasa por uno de los momentos más críticos de su historia. El Gobernador Civil y Jefe Provincial del Movimiento, Ramón Ferreiro Rodríguez, se ve obligado a cesar en el ejercicio de sus cargos, por una “grave falta de indisciplina”, a buena parte de la plana mayor de la organización, un total de cuatro delegados provinciales y tres secretarios.Universidade de Santiago de Compostela. Consello da Cultura Galega. Real Academia Galeg

Analysis of the adoption of irrigation technologies under uncertain water availability

This paper analyses the adoption process of water-conserving irrigation technologies by a risk averse farmer in a context of uncertain water availability. Firstly, it is analytically shown that the increase in water efficiency that the new technology allows results in a decrease in the cost of the effective irrigation water applied, as well as in an increase in both effective water applied and crop production. It is also concluded that the optimal amount of irrigation water applied depends on individual risk preferences of the producer, on the variance and asymmetry of the cost of water applied, and on the elasticity of the marginal productivity of the effective water applied. Lastly, it is theoretically shown that an increase in the level of uncertainty regarding water availability incentives the adoption of modern irrigation technologies only if this allows for a reduction in the amount of water applied

Feminist Rewritings of “Bluebeard”: Angela Carter’s “The Bloody Chamber” and Nalo Hopkinson’s “The Glass Bottle Trick”.

Mi disertación se basa en el análisis de dos versiones de “Barba Azul”, dos reescrituras que ofrecen una perspectiva feminista y una versión de la historia de “Barba Azul”, que reflejan, en cada caso, lo que significó el feminismo para cada autora en el momento de su escritura. En el caso de Angela Carter, con su obra “La cámara sangrienta” se involucra en la lucha feminista para desacreditar los roles de género tradicionalmente asignados a las mujeres. Por otro lado, “El truco de la botella de vidrio” de Nalo Hopkinson, da un paso más en sintonía con el desarrollo que tuvo el feminismo con su tercera ola y posteriores, puesto que refleja preocupaciones feministas mas amplias como la discriminación racial, contando ya con las abarcadas por Carter.<br /

Band-pass filtering of the time sequences of spectral parameters for robust wireless speech recognition

In this paper we address the problem of automatic speech recognition when wireless speech communication systems are involved. In this context, three main sources of distortion should be considered: acoustic environment, speech coding and transmission errors. Whilst the first one has already received a lot of attention, the last two deserve further investigation in our opinion. We have found out that band-pass filtering of the recognition features improves ASR performance when distortions due to these particular communication systems are present. Furthermore, we have evaluated two alternative configurations at different bit error rates (BER) typical of these channels: band-pass filtering the LP-MFCC parameters or a modification of the RASTA-PLP using a sharper low-pass section perform consistently better than LP-MFCC and RASTA-PLP, respectively.Publicad

Uncertainty decoding on Frequency Filtered parameters for robust ASR

The use of feature enhancement techniques to obtain estimates of the clean parameters is a common approach for robust automatic speech recognition (ASR). However, the decoding algorithm typically ignores how accurate these estimates are. Uncertainty decoding methods incorporate this type of information. In this paper, we develop a formulation of the uncertainty decoding paradigm for Frequency Filtered (FF) parameters using spectral subtraction as a feature enhancement method. Additionally, we show that the uncertainty decoding method for FF parameters admits a simple interpretation as a spectral weighting method that assigns more importance to the most reliable spectral components. Furthermore, we suggest combining this method with SSBD-HMM (Spectral Subtraction and Bounded Distance HMM), one recently proposed technique that is able to compensate for the effects of features that are highly contaminated (outliers). This combination pursues two objectives: to improve the results achieved by uncertainty decoding methods and to determine which part of the improvements is due to compensating for the effects of outliers and which part is due to compensating for other less deteriorated features.Publicad

Energy intensity and investment ownership across Chinese provinces

The main objective of this paper is to investigate whether openness and investment ownership are key factors in explaining the diffusion of energy-saving technologies in China. Compared with previous studies, the novel aspect of this work is the use of a rich dataset at provincial level, which allows the high level of regional heterogeneity to be taken into consideration. The unbalanced regional growth has been translated into differences in the need for energy resources across the vast territory of China. A detailed analysis of these issues may provide new insights into the energy situation in this country. The analysis is also disaggregated by type of energy: coal, electricity and petroleum. We estimate the models by panel-corrected standard errors, developed by Beck and Katz (1995), over the period 1985–2008. Results obtained confirm the hypothesis that both foreign and non-state investments play a leading role in the decline of energy intensity across Chinese regions, whereas there is no evidence of a positive contribution of state investment. The findings also reveal differences in energy intensity across regions, thus confirming the importance of accounting for the regional dimension when analyzing energy consumption in China

Construcció i explotació d'un magatzem de dades per a l'anàlisi d'informació immobiliària

L'empresa immobiliària Sostre per tothom ens ha fet l'encàrrec de construir un magatzem de dades a partir d'un fitxer de dades en format text amb la informació del seu mercat immobiliari durant un cert període de temps, amb la finalitat d'explotar aquesta informació, mitjançant consultes i eines de business intelligence.La empresa inmobiliaria Sostre per tothom nos ha hecho el encargo de construir un almacén de datos a partir de un fichero de datos en formato texto con la información de su mercado inmobiliario durante un cierto periodo de tiempo, con el fin de explotar esta información, mediante consultas y herramientas de business intelligence