768 research outputs found
Fiscal transparency and policy rules in Poland
This paper assesses the current stance and desirable progress in the implementation of fiscal transparency and rules in Poland. An index of transparency based on Report on the Observance of Standards and Codes (ROSC), with some modifications, is also constructed in this paper, followed by proposals for making transparency and fiscal rules more efficient within Poland's fiscal policy. This study attempts to answer the following questions: Firstly, to what extent is fiscal policy transparent in the context of the standards set by the EU's regulations and the IMF's ROSC? Secondly, have the fiscal rules adopted by Poland proved to be successful in establishing fiscal policy discipline? Finally, what still needs to be changed to make both transparency and fiscal rules more efficient for the conduct of fiscal policy? To set the work in context we also provide an overview of recent advances in both the theoretical and empirical literature on fiscal transparency and rules
Twenty-five years of German unity - a success story? [25 Jahre Deutsche Einheit: eine Erfolgsgeschichte?]
TwentyÂfive years after reunification, economic fundamentals between East Germany and West Germany continue to differ. Massive financial transfers could not close the significant "prosperity gap" between the two former countries, but they did reduce it noticeably. This is most obvious with respect to indicators such as GDP per capita and unemployment. Fast convergence is unlikely to occur, as economic development is strongly driven by technology that might generate economies of scale, thereby favouring regions which are already well developed. Therefore, economic policy should no longer aim at convergence but rather at economic growth. Despite considerable progress, more structural change will be necessary for further convergence. Furthermore, the decadesÂlong division generated fundamental political and psychological differences, which continue to be felt. One important factor in the continued economic disparity between the two is that East Germany has had to follow the West German development path, which only makes the catching up process more difficult
Ten Years after Accession: State Aid in Eastern Europe
In the early phase of transition that started with the 1990s, Central and Eastern European Countries (CEEC) have pursued far-reaching vertical and individual industrial policy with a focus on privatisation and restructuring of traditional industries. Foreign investment from the West and the facilitation of the development of a market economy also involved mas- sive injections of State support. With their accession to the European Union (EU), levels and forms of State aid came under critical review by the European Commission. Now that a first decade has passed since the first Eastern enlargement in 2004, this inquiry investigates how State aid policy in the CEECs has developed during the last ten years and whether the inte- gration of the new Member States operates on a level playing field with respect to State aid. The findings suggest that once having entered the EU as full members, the new members from the East appear to have been converging into rather stringent competition cultures
Deletion of IL-4Rα on CD4 T Cells Renders BALB/c Mice Resistant to Leishmania major Infection
Effector responses induced by polarized CD4(+) T helper 2 (Th2) cells drive nonhealing responses in BALB/c mice infected with Leishmania major. Th2 cytokines IL-4 and IL-13 are known susceptibility factors for L. major infection in BALB/c mice and induce their biological functions through a common receptor, the IL-4 receptor α chain (IL-4Rα). IL-4Rαâdeficient BALB/c mice, however, remain susceptible to L. major infection, indicating that IL-4/IL-13 may induce protective responses. Therefore, the roles of polarized Th2 CD4(+) T cells and IL-4/IL-13 responsiveness of non-CD4(+) T cells in inducing nonhealer or healer responses have yet to be elucidated. CD4(+) T cellâspecific IL-4Rα (Lck(cre)IL-4Rα(â/lox)) deficient BALB/c mice were generated and characterized to elucidate the importance of IL-4Rα signaling during cutaneous leishmaniasis in the absence of IL-4âresponsive CD4(+) T cells. Efficient deletion was confirmed by loss of IL-4Rα expression on CD4(+) T cells and impaired IL-4âinduced CD4(+) T cell proliferation and Th2 differentiation. CD8(+), γΎ(+), and NKâT cells expressed residual IL-4Rα, and representative nonâT cell populations maintained IL-4/IL-13 responsiveness. In contrast to IL-4Rα(â/lox) BALB/c mice, which developed ulcerating lesions following infection with L. major, Lck(cre)IL-4Rα(â/lox) mice were resistant and showed protection to rechallenge, similar to healer C57BL/6 mice. Resistance to L. major in Lck(cre)IL-4Rα(â/lox) mice correlated with reduced numbers of IL-10âsecreting cells and early IL-12p35 mRNA induction, leading to increased delayed type hypersensitivity responses, interferon-Îł production, and elevated ratios of inducible nitric oxide synthase mRNA/parasite, similar to C57BL/6 mice. These data demonstrate that abrogation of IL-4 signaling in CD4(+) T cells is required to transform nonhealer BALB/c mice to a healer phenotype. Furthermore, a beneficial role for IL-4Rα signaling in L. major infection is revealed in which IL-4/IL-13âresponsive non-CD4(+) T cells induce protective responses
Search for charged Higgs decays of the top quark using hadronic tau decays
We present the result of a search for charged Higgs decays of the top quark,
produced in collisions at 1.8 TeV. When the charged
Higgs is heavy and decays to a tau lepton, which subsequently decays
hadronically, the resulting events have a unique signature: large missing
transverse energy and the low-charged-multiplicity tau. Data collected in the
period 1992-1993 at the Collider Detector at Fermilab, corresponding to
18.70.7~pb, exclude new regions of combined top quark and charged
Higgs mass, in extensions to the standard model with two Higgs doublets.Comment: uuencoded, gzipped tar file of LaTeX and 6 Postscript figures; 11 pp;
submitted to Phys. Rev.
Inclusive jet cross section in collisions at TeV
The inclusive jet differential cross section has been measured for jet
transverse energies, , from 15 to 440 GeV, in the pseudorapidity region
0.10.7. The results are based on 19.5 pb of data
collected by the CDF collaboration at the Fermilab Tevatron collider. The data
are compared with QCD predictions for various sets of parton distribution
functions. The cross section for jets with GeV is significantly
higher than current predictions based on O() perturbative QCD
calculations. Various possible explanations for the high- excess are
discussed.Comment: 8 pages with 2 eps uu-encoded figures Submitted to Physical Review
Letter
Measurement of Dijet Angular Distributions at CDF
We have used 106 pb^-1 of data collected in proton-antiproton collisions at
sqrt(s)=1.8 TeV by the Collider Detector at Fermilab to measure jet angular
distributions in events with two jets in the final state. The angular
distributions agree with next to leading order (NLO) predictions of Quantum
Chromodynamics (QCD) in all dijet invariant mass regions. The data exclude at
95% confidence level (CL) a model of quark substructure in which only up and
down quarks are composite and the contact interaction scale is Lambda_ud(+) <
1.6 TeV or Lambda_ud(-) < 1.4 TeV. For a model in which all quarks are
composite the excluded regions are Lambda(+) < 1.8 TeV and Lambda(-) < 1. 6
TeV.Comment: 16 pages, 2 figures, 2 tables, LaTex, using epsf.sty. Submitted to
Physical Review Letters on September 17, 1996. Postscript file of full paper
available at http://www-cdf.fnal.gov/physics/pub96/cdf3773_dijet_angle_prl.p
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