DIMENSÃO CULTURAL DO LAZER NO COTIDIANO ESCOLAR - 6

CADERNOS INTERATIVOS - REDE CEDESPerguntemos a um grupo de pessoas que passam distraídas pela rua, em direção ao seu trabalho, escola ou qualquer outro compromisso cotidiano: o que para você é lazer? É muito provável que muitos imediatamente respondam que se trata de algo relacionado à diversão; alguns podem mobilizar a ideia de prazer; não poucos o relacionarão a atividades no tempo livre ou fora do trabalho; em menor número serão aqueles que afirmarão que é um direito social. Essas noções que majoritariamente estão presentes no imaginário da população não estão de forma alguma descoladas dos conceitos com os quais os estudiosos e pesquisadores do assunto têm trabalhado: diversão, tempo livre, busca do prazer, direito social são mesmo dimensões centrais na configuração e definição do fenômeno lazer. Se assim o é, devemos começar por nos perguntar: que relação tem o tema com a escola, espaço que em grande medida possui grande proximidade com a lógica do trabalho (com seus rígidos horários, divididos pelas disciplinas), obrigação cotidiana de crianças e jovens, não poucas vezes tarefa encarada como árdua, enfadonha, descolada da realidade dos que a frequentam? Se insistirmos nessa representação do espaço escolar, nada seria mais antagônico do que o lazer. É necessário, assim, desnaturalizar alguns olhares, começando pela própria conceituação do que seja a escola. Será que toda estrutura escolar é ou deve ser conforme acima descrevemos? Por que não a concebê-la, como em muitos casos já o é, como espaço da alegria, da descoberta, do prazer? Nesse caso, isso a traria imediatamente para próximo do conceito de lazer? Ou seria esse conceito que estaria tensionando seus limites tradicionais? Aliás, quem disse que no tempo de lazer só existe espaço para a felicidade? Nesse Caderno Interativo, tentaremos responder essas e outras questões, tendo um eixo central de discussão: a relação entre lazer e escola. Em linhas gerais, tentaremos abordar os seguintes temas: • As relações entre lazer e escola na história • A escola que prepara para o trabalho, também prepara para o lazer • A escola enquanto espaço físico de lazer • Os conteúdos escolares enquanto conteúdos culturais • O esporte: conteúdo escolar, conteúdo de lazer ATIVIDADE SUGERIDA Comecemos a fazer um diagnóstico. Pergunte a alguns professores, colegas ou conhecidos: que relação há entre o lazer e a escola? A partir das respostas, podemos ter um primeiro panorama dos desafios que teremos para construir um novo olhar sobre o tema.REDE CEDES/MINISTÉRIO DO ESPORT

Regional Inflation Dynamics within and across Euro Area and a Comparison with the US

We investigate co-movements in inflation dynamics within and across euro area regions and find it important for monetary policy to monitor regional inflation dynamics to enhance the understanding of aggregate inflation. We employ a model where regional inflation dynamics are explained by common euro area and country specific factors and an idiosyncratic regional component. We find substantial common area wide component, that can be related to common euro area monetary policy, to exchange rate and oil prices changes. The effects of the area wide factors differ across regions, however. We also find a substantial national component. Our findings do not differ substantially before and after EMU. Analysing US regional inflation developments yields similar results regarding the relevance of common US factors.regional inflation dynamics, euro area and US, common factor models

Markov-Switching MIDAS Models

This paper introduces a new regression model - Markov-switching mixed data sampling (MS-MIDAS) - that incorporates regime changes in the parameters of the mixed data sampling (MIDAS) models and allows for the use of mixed-frequency data in Markov-switching models. After a discussion of estimation and inference for MS-MIDAS, and a small sample simulation based evaluation, the MS-MIDAS model is applied to the prediction of the US and UK economic activity, in terms both of quantitative forecasts of the aggregate economic activity and of the prediction of the business cycle regimes. Both simulation and empirical results indicate that MSMIDAS is a very useful specification.Business cycle, Mixed-frequency data, Non-linear models, Forecasting, Nowcasting

MONOTONICITY IMPLIES STRATEGY-PROOFNESS FOR CORRESPONDENCES

We show that Maskin monotone social choice correspondences on sufficiently rich domains satisfy a generalized strategy-proofness property, thus generalizing Muller and Satterthwaite''s (1977) theorem to correspondences. From the point of view of Nash implementation theory, the result yields a partial characterization of the restrictions entailed by Nash implementability. Alternatively, the result can be viewed as a possibility theorem on the dominant-strategy-implementability of monotone SCCs via set-valued mechanisms for agents who are completely ignorant about the finally selected outcome. It is shown by examples that stronger strategy-proofness properties fail easily.

Modelling shifts in the wage-price and unemployment-inflation relationships in Italy, Poland, and the UK

The relationship between wages, prices, productivity, inflation and unemployment in Italy, Poland, and the UK between the 1960s and the early 1990s is modelled as a cointegrated vector autoregression subject to regime shifts. For each of these economies there is clear evidence of a change in the underlying equilibria of this sector of the economy. Hypotheses concerning the similarity of the transition from a rigid to a flexible labour market are tested.

The Forecasting Performance of Real Time Estimates of the EURO Area Output Gap

This paper provides real time evidence on the usefulness of the euro area output gap as a leading indicator for inflation and growth. A genuine real-time data set for the euro area is used, including vintages of several alternative gap estimates. It turns out that, despite some difference across output gap estimates and forecast horizons, the results point clearly to a lack of any usefulness of real-time output gap estimates for inflation forecasting both in the short term (one-quarter and one-year ahead) and the medium term (two-year and three-year ahead). By contrast, we find some evidence that several output gap estimates are useful to forecast real GDP growth, particularly in the short term, and some appear also useful in the medium run. A comparison with the US yields similar conclusions.Output gap, real-time data, euro area, inflation forecasts, real GDP forecasts, data revisions.

Factor-MIDAS for Now- and Forecasting with Ragged-Edge Data: A Model Comparison for German GDP

This paper compares different ways to estimate the current state of the economy using factor models that can handle unbalanced datasets. Due to the different release lags of business cycle indicators, data unbalancedness often emerges at the end of multivariate samples, which is sometimes referred to as the "ragged edge" of the data. Using a large monthly dataset of the German economy, we compare the performance of different factor models in the presence of the ragged edge: static and dynamic principal components based on realigned data, the Expectation-Maximisation (EM) algorithm and the Kalman smoother in a state-space model context. The monthly factors are used to estimate current quarter GDP, called the "nowcast", using different versions of what we call factor-based mixed-data sampling (Factor-MIDAS) approaches. We compare all possible combinations of factor estimation methods and Factor-MIDAS projections with respect to now-cast performance. Additionally, we compare the performance of the nowcast factor models with the performance of quarterly factor models based on time-aggregated and thus balanced data, which neglect the most timely observations of business cycle indicators at the end of the sample. Our empirical findings show that the factor estimation methods don't differ much with respect to nowcasting accuracy. Concerning the projections, the most parsimonious MIDAS projection performs best overall. Finally, quarterly models are in general outperformed by the nowcast factor models that can exploit ragged-edge data.nowcasting, business cycle, large factor models, mixed-frequency data, missing values, MIDAS

A Comparison of Methods for the Construction of Composite Coincident and Leading Indexes for the UK

In this paper we provide an overview of recent developments in the methodology for the construction of composite coincident and leading indexes, and apply them to the UK. In particular, we evaluate the relative merits of factor based models and Markov switching specifications for the construction of coincident and leading indexes. For the leading indexes we also evaluate the performance of probit models and pooling. The results indicate that alternative methods produce similar coincident indexes, while there are more marked di.erences in the leading indexes.Forecasting, Business cycles, Leading indicators, Coincident indicators, Turning points

A THEORY OF RATIONAL CHOICE UNDER COMPLETE IGNORANCE

This paper contributes to a theory of rational choice under uncertainty for decision-makers whose preferences are exhaustively described by partial orders representing ""limited information."" Specifically, we consider the limiting case of ""Complete Ignorance"" decision problems characterized by maximally incomplete preferences and important primarily as reduced forms of general decision problems under uncertainty. ""Rationality"" is conceptualized in terms of a ""Principle of Preference-Basedness,"" according to which rational choice should be isomorphic to asserted preference. The main result characterizes axiomatically a new choice-rule called ""Simultaneous Expected Utility Maximization"" which in particular satisfies a choice-functional independence and a context-dependent choice-consistency condition; it can be interpreted as the fair agreement in a bargaining game (Kalai-Smorodinsky solution) whose players correspond to the different possible states (respectively extermal priors in the general case).

Factor-MIDAS for now- and forecasting with ragged-edge data: a model comparison for German GDP

This paper compares different ways to estimate the current state of the economy using factor models that can handle unbalanced datasets. Due to the different release lags of business cycle indicators, data unbalancedness often emerges at the end of multivariate samples, which is sometimes referred to as the 'ragged edge' of the data. Using a large monthly dataset of the German economy, we compare the performance of different factor models in the presence of the ragged edge: static and dynamic principal components based on realigned data, the Expectation-Maximisation (EM) algorithm and the Kalman smoother in a state-space model context. The monthly factors are used to estimate current quarter GDP, called the 'nowcast', using different versions of what we call factor-based mixed-data sampling (Factor-MIDAS) approaches. We compare all possible combinations of factor estimation methods and Factor-MIDAS projections with respect to nowcast performance. Additionally, we compare the performance of the nowcast factor models with the performance of quarterly factor models based on time-aggregated and thus balanced data, which neglect the most timely observations of business cycle indicators at the end of the sample. Our empirical findings show that the factor estimation methods don't differ much with respect to nowcasting accuracy. Concerning the projections, the most parsimonious MIDAS projection performs best overall. Finally, quarterly models are in general outperformed by the nowcast factor models that can exploit ragged-edge data. --MIDAS,large factor models,nowcasting,mixed-frequency data,missing values