Shooting on a Moving Target: Eyplaining European Bank Rates during the Interwar Period

This paper describes the monetary policy response of countries during the inter-war period. How did central banks react to the Great Depression? How did countries balance the externals demands of the gold standard with domestic policy pressures? What was the optimal level of international policy coordination? We use weekly data over the period 1925-1936 to estimate central bank rate reaction functions for a panel of 22 countries during the inter-war gold standard. The estimates suggest to us changing objectives for monetary policy. Countries moved away from the sole objective of convertibility and towards a more ‘modern’ monetary policy based on exchange rate stabilization, but not yet output stabilization or even modern price level targeting. Importantly, this move to exchange rate stabilization was accompanied by the formation of monetary policy blocs around pre-existing economic relations. Countries’ interwar policy choices offer lessons for countries remaining in or choosing to join the European Monetary Union today.monetary policy, great depression, reaction functions

The Colors of the Rainbow in Snorri’s Edda

In the second part of his Edda, the Gylfaginning, Snorri Sturlusongives a systematic account of Norse mythology from the creation of theworld to its end. The story is presented in the form of a dialogue, whichinvolves three kings, who answer questions put to them by a certainKing Gylfi of Sweden, who wishes to find out about the Æsir.One of Gylfi’s many questions concerns the way to heaven fromearth. It is explained to him that Bifrƒst, the rainbow, is what linksearth and heaven, that is has three colors, and that one of the colorsis red (rau›r). The two other colors are not named in Snorri’s Edda norare they specified anywhere else in Old Norse-Icelandic literature withthe exception of Hauksbók, which describes the appearance of therainbow in rather unclear terms.The article seeks to determine through an examination of OldNorse-Icelandic color terminology and an analysis of studies of therainbow by medieval writers what Snorri might have had the threekings tell Gylfi, if Gylfi had asked for an identification of the other twocolors of the rainbow. It is demonstrated that Snorri’s idea of the threecolors of the rainbow is most likely derived ultimately from Aristotle’sMeteorologica and that the two unidentificed colors in the Edda areprobably green (groenn) and blue (blár)

“Engi er allheimskr, ef þegja má”: Women and Silence in the Sagas and þættir of Icelanders

It is well known that women in medieval Iceland had limited opportunity to take part in political and legal affairs, but that often they were able to somewhat influence the political and legal structures affecting their lives by being quite verbal. While acknowleding the importance of women’s words and, by extension, the fact that power is routinely exercized through speech, this article draws attention to the fact that, paradoxically, silence was also an important tool available to women in medieval Iceland. An examination of the Sagas and þættir of Icelanders reveals that women used and relied on non-verbal expression in their interactions with men in order to achieve their goals.University of Wisconsin—Madiso

Scheduling with Setup Costs and Monotone Penalties

We consider single processor preemptive scheduling with job-dependent setup times. In this model, a job-dependent setup time is incurred when a job is started for the first time, and each time it is restarted after preemption. This model is a common generalization of preemptive scheduling, and actually of non-preemptive scheduling as well. The objective is to minimize the sum of any general non-negative, non-decreasing cost functions of the completion times of the jobs -- this generalizes objectives of minimizing weighted flow time, flow-time squared, tardiness or the number of tardy jobs among many others. Our main result is a randomized polynomial time O(1)-speed O(1)-approximation algorithm for this problem. Without speedup, no polynomial time finite multiplicative approximation is possible unless P=NP. We extend the approach of Bansal et al. (FOCS 2007) of rounding a linear programming relaxation which accounts for costs incurred due to the non-preemptive nature of the schedule. A key new idea used in the rounding is that a point in the intersection polytope of two matroids can be decomposed as a convex combination of incidence vectors of sets that are independent in both matroids. In fact, we use this for the intersection of a partition matroid and a laminar matroid, in which case the decomposition can be found efficiently using network flows. Our approach gives a randomized polynomial time offline O(1)-speed O(1)-approximation algorithm for the broadcast scheduling problem with general cost functions as well

Lamotrigine therapeutic thresholds

SummaryPurposeTo evaluate therapeutic drug monitoring (TDM) of lamotrigine (LTG) with establishment of individual therapeutic thresholds (TT) in outpatients of a tertiary epilepsy centre on monotherapy.MethodsIn the outpatient clinic of the Danish Epilepsy Centre, Dianalund, all patients treated in 2004 with LTG monotherapy were identified. Patients who had not reported seizures or adverse reactions in the last 6 months were considered seizure free and well-medicated on LTG monotherapy, and were further evaluated. Plasma levels from routine LTG TDM obtained by reversed-phase high-pressure liquid chromatography (HPLC) during up-titration were used to calculate the TT for each patient as the mean of the highest subtherapeutic and the lowest therapeutic level.ResultsEighty-two patients undergoing LTG monotherapy were reported seizure free as defined above. In 34 the TT could not be calculated because they became seizure free on the first chosen dose. TTs of the remaining 48 patients ranged from 4.0 to 42.0μmol/l. There were no differences between children and adults, and between generalized and localization-related epilepsies. The therapeutic levels of patients with undefined TT tended to be lower. The level–dose ratio in both groups varied only moderately indicating absence of major exogenous influences.ConclusionEven in patients of a tertiary referral centre only a minority had high TTs and needed therapeutic levels in a range where toxicity is increasingly observed. TDM appears useful in LTG treatment both for the establishment of individual reference ranges and for the identification of the individual level-to-dose ratio

Breaking the transactional mindset: A new path for healthcare leadership built on a commitment to human experience

Numerous health care publications have focused on the compelling need to improve patient experience and the associated improvements necessary to address workforce well-being. The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated and illuminated long-standing problems in health care including workforce shortages, inequity in health care delivery outcomes, care provider burnout, and overall societal structural racism.1,2 The Beryl Institute’s Nursing Executive Council (NEC) manuscript Rebuilding a Foundation of Trust: A Call to Action in Creating a Safe Environment for Everyone3 focused on actions and behaviours to heal relationships and build trust between care providers and leaders with commitments to safety, empathy, shared decision making, transparency, growth and development. Research studies abound offering new frameworks and interventions intending to strengthen systems of care that respect whole person needs. The nursing profession has always been anchored in holistic person-centered care yet continues to be challenged in work environments laden with fragmentation and barriers to human caring. The purpose of this paper is to review the dominance of transactional business mindsets and practices today that may foster those challenging environments and assert that the use of Service-Dominant Logic (SDL) demonstrates the importance of human relations in developing effective and sustainable organizational performance. Ultimately it can help us lead differently at all levels as we work to transform the human experience in healthcare. Experience Framework This article is associated with the Culture & Leadership lens of The Beryl Institute Experience Framework (https://theberylinstitute.org/experience-framework/). Access other PXJ articles related to this lens. Access other resources related to this lens

Correlation between Geometric Component Properties and Physical Parameters of an Aerodynamic Feeding System

In previous research, an aerodynamic feeding system was developed, which autonomously adapts to different components by using a genetic algorithm that controls the physical parameters of the system (e.g. angle of inclination, nozzle pressure). The algorithm starts with two individuals with random values, generated within the boundaries of the parameters set by the user. Due to this, the setting time - the time that passes until a satisfactory orientation rate is reached - is hard to predict. The aim of this work is to identify basic interactions of geometric component properties with the physical parameters of the aerodynamic feeding system to determine in which areas of the workspace a satisfactory solution can be expected. By doing so, the initial population of the genetic algorithm can be generated based on certain geometric properties and would therefore no longer be random, presumably reducing setting time. To identify interactions of component properties and system parameters, exemplary components were developed. They represent relevant single properties that have significant impact on the aerodynamic orientation process. These components were then fed into the aerodynamic orientation process and their behavior was documented. To identify correlations between certain geometric properties and physical parameters of the feeding system, the tests were planned and carried out using Design of Experiments methods. The results of the tests were also used to determine the direct interrelations of said properties and the suitability for aerodynamic orientation