The economic valuation of water from the Ashburton River : implications for allocation : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Masters of Agricultural Science in Resource Economics at Massey University

Recent legislative changes in New Zealand allow much greater flexibility in the procedures used by regional authorities to allocate water resources. In certain river catchments where competition for water in alternative uses is high, estimates of the economic value of water could prove useful in designing an allocation scheme. In this study two methods were used to value the water from the Ashburton River. First, a mathematical programming approach to estimate the value of water to farmers in the Ashburton catchment. This value is about $0.62 million. Second, a contingent valuation approach to estimate the value of in­ stream flows of the Ashburton to the residents of the Canterbury region. This value is estimated at between$2.47 million and $5.15 million. We assess the methods and the results for implications in allocating Ashburton water between irrigators and in-stream flows

Higher-Order Memory Schema and Conscious Experience

In the interesting and thought-provoking article Grazziano and colleagues argue for their Attention Schema Theory (AST) of consciousness. They present AST as a unification of Global Workspace Theory (GWT), Illusionism, and the Higher-Order Thought (HOT) theory. We argue it is a mistake to equate 'subjective experience,' ad related terms, with dualism. They simply denote experience. Also, as presented, AST does not accurately capture the essence of HOT for two reasons. HOT is presented as a version of strong illusionism, which it isn't, and HOT requires that one be aware of one's mental life, and postulates that his consists in a re-representation of what is occurring at at the lower-order levels. However, the authors deny that AST involves re-representing visual stimuli. We close by proposing an alternative unification: GWT and AST provide crucial accounts of how lower-order states are assembled and maintained, but higher-order theory provides the account of subjective experience

New Frontiers in Cosmology and Galaxy Formation: Challenges for the Future

(Abridged) Cosmology faces three distinct challenges in the next decade. (1) The dark sector, both dark matter and dark energy, dominates the Universe. Key questions include determining the nature of both. Improved observational probes are crucial. (2) Galaxy formation was initiated at around the epoch of reionization: we need to understand how and when as well as to develop probes of earlier epochs. (3) Our simple dark matter-driven picture of galaxy assembly is seemingly at odds with several observational results, including the presence of ULIRGS at high z, the `downsizing' signature, chemical signatures of alpha-element ratios and suggestions that merging may not be important in defining the Hubble sequence. Understanding the physical implications is a major challenge for theorists and refiniing the observational uncertainties a major goal for observers.Comment: To appear in "Structure Formation in the Universe", ed. Chabrier, G., Cambridge University Press. High resolution version on http://www.astro.caltech.edu/~rse/chamonix.pd

A Higher-Order Theory of Emotional Consciousness

Emotional states of consciousness, or what are typically called emotional feelings, are traditionally viewed as being innately programed in subcortical areas of the brain, and are often treated as different from cognitive states of consciousness, such as those related to the perception of external stimuli. We argue that conscious experiences, regardless of their content, arise from one system in the brain. On this view, what differs in emotional and non-emotional states is the kind of inputs that are processed by a general cortical network of cognition, a network essential for conscious experiences. Although subcortical circuits are not directly responsible for conscious feelings, they provide non-conscious inputs that coalesce with other kinds of neural signals in the cognitive assembly of conscious emotional experiences. In building the case for this proposal, we defend a modified version of what is known as the higher-order theory of consciousness

CSR, Contracting and Socially Responsible Investment : Opportunities for Pakistani Firms

The purpose of our paper is to explore two ways in which Pakistani firms can take advantage of the growing corporate social responsibility movement so as to improve their own economic performance. First, the presence of MNCs in Pakistan, the vast majority of which have made significant CSR undertakings, means that Pakistani firms seeking to do business with them will often have to meet CSR tests themselves. Second, the increasing financial clout of so-called Socially Responsible Investement (SRI) funds means that Pakistani firms have an incentive to comply with CSR standards so as to become eligible investment instruments. We begin by canvassing briefly the history of CSR movement and what are by now relatively well-known CSR principles and standards. We then explore some examples of how Pakistan-based multinationals as well local firms are currently engaging in CSR practices. We argue that Pakistan can and should acquire the reputation for being a leader in this domain.corporate social responsibility movement, economic performance, CSR

Capitalization of federal taxes, the relative price of housing, and urban form: density and sorting effects.

The authors investigate the impact of the tax treatment of owner-occupied housing on urban form in an economy in which high- and low-income households choose among city and suburban communities. Because housing tax policies differentially affect the relative, after-tax price of housing for high- and low-income households, and because the extent of capitalization of housing tax policies can differ across city and suburban communities, their analysis finds that housing tax policies can affect not only the density of the metropolitan area, but also can influence where rich and poor households choose to live.> > The authors also show that the impacts of housing tax policies differ depending upon whether land use constraints such as suburban large lot zoning exist. If there are no land use constraints present, increasing a subsidy to home ownership that is positively correlated with the income of the owner tends to lead to the decentralization of both rich and poor, although there are conditions under which the rich would choose to concentrate in the central city. The ambiguity of the effect on the choices of high income households suggests that impacts of the federal tax treatment of housing may differ across metropolitan areas.> > In the presence of binding large lot zoning in the suburbs, the rich have a greater incentive to decentralize while the poor are constrained to the city. Thus, housing tax policy that affects the relative price of land differentially for the rich and poor could have helped exacerbate the intense residential sorting by income that we see in many parts of the United States. Importantly, our analysis of community choice is not driven by different preferences for city or suburb that may be associated with the income elasticity of housing demand. Rather, it results from changes in relative after-tax housing prices faced by poor and rich households. Determining the empirical relevance of prices versus preferences in this matter should be an urgent task for future research.Housing ; Taxation

Does the U.S. tax treatment of housing promote suburbanization and central city decline?

This paper examines the role of U.S. housing-related tax expenditures in creating incentives for decentralization and encouraging residential sorting by income and central city decline. Tax expenditures associated with the deductibility of mortgage interest and property taxes make housing less expensive relative to other goods and, hence, increase the quantity of housing and residential land purchased and lower the density of urban areas. Because the tax expenditures increase with income and the consumption of housing services, they lower the cost of geographic sorting by income typically associated with exclusionary zoning and other land- market imperfections. A direct consequence of this sorting process is that housing-related tax expenditures are concentrated in communities with the highest incomes and house values. These effects do not arise simply because of housing-tax policies alone, but rather from the interaction of these policies and other factors that affect local real e state markets, such as zoning or fixed housing capital stocks. Three models are developed to formally analyze these issues. In the authors' base case model in which there are no land-use constraints and local amenities are fixed, tax deductions related to home ownership result in population decentralization within the metropolitan area and a less dense central city, but do not induce sorting by income. Moreover, land prices in the city increase because the subsidy increases the aggregate demand for housing in all communities. Thus, the mere presence of the federal housing tax expenditures increases decentralization, but cannot generate America's patterns of income sorting and central city decline. These conclusions change in an important way in the authors' second model in which a land-use constraint, such as the type of minimum lot-size zoning prevalent in the suburbs, is introduced. In this case, the housing subsidies foster the separation of the rich from the poor. Inco me sorting results, and consequently, there is an increasing concentration of the poor in the central city. However, there still is no weakening of prices in city land markets in this model. The third and final model endogenizes the production of local amenities in the sense that they are made an increasing function of community income. In this case, three characteristics common to American urban form result: population decentralization within the metropolitan area, increased concentration of the poor in the urban core, and weak city land markets. These results indicate that America's current urban form reflects, at least in part, incentives arising from the interaction of the national tax and local zoning systems, rather than unique American tastes for low-density living environments.Cities and towns ; Housing ; Taxation

The Welfare Economics of Moral Hazard

This paper shows that, except in certain limiting cases, competitive equilibrium with moral hazard is constrained inefficient. The first section compares the competitive equilibrium and the constrained social optimum in a fairly general model, and identifies types of market failure. Each of the subsequent sections focuses on a particular market failure.

Equilibrium in Competitive Insurance Markets with Moral Hazard

This paper examines the existence and nature of competitive equilibrium with moral hazard. The more insurance an individual has, the less care will he take. Consequently, insurance firms attempt to restrict their clients' aggregate insurance purchases. If individuals' aggregate insurance purchases are observable, each firm will ration the amount of insurance its clients can purchase and insist that they purchase no insurance from other firms. This paper focuses on the alternative situation where firms cannot observe their clients' aggregate insurance purchases. We show that firms will still attempt to restrict their clients' aggregate purchases, but now they must do so indirectly. One possibility is that all firms sell only policies with a sufficiently large amount of coverage that individuals choose to purchase insurance from only one firm. Another possibility is that each firm offers a latent policy in addition to its regular policy. Latent policies are not purchased in equilibrium, but serve to restrict entry. If an entering firm offers a supplementary policy, an individual will purchase not only this policy plus his previous policy but also the latent policy. The latent policy is designed so that the individual reduces effort by enough to render any entering policy unprofitable.