Foreign direct investment. A bid for progress?

Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) is not a unique explanation for growth and progress, but is one of the more useful indicators of the open opportunities. It reveals preferences of the developed countries’ private sector, while the emerging economies seem to participate in a global bid. That bid is for capital, for the technology and know-how normally associated to investments, and for the final award, progress and development. Besides policies, politics and initial conditions, the economy matters. An estimation of economic determinants to FDI is done, and to take into account best relative results, an econometric frontier is calculated in order to determine how do the more efficient in attracting FDI. Some new perspective is added to conventional wisdom: there are countries, which are in some sense “more efficient producers” of FDI. The efficient frontier approach could shed some light of the link from sowing to reaping. Some shocking results were attained, when we tried to ask the question “Which are the best harvesters?” The more “sexiest” countries are not the more efficient producers of FDI in our ranking.Foreign Direct Investment, efficiency frontiers, growth

Inequality of opportunity and growth

Theoretical and empirical studies exploring the effects of income inequality upon growth reach a disappointing inconclusive result. This paper postulates that one reason for this ambiguity is that income inequality is actually a composite measure of at least two different sorts of inequality: inequality of opportunity and inequality of returns to effort. These two types of inequality affect growth through opposite channels, so the relationship between income inequality and growth is positive or negative depending on which component is larger. We test this proposal using inequality-of-opportunity measures computed from the PSID database for 23 states of the U.S. in 1980 and 1990. We find robust support for a negative relationship between inequality of opportunity and growth, and a positive relationship between inequality of returns to effort and growth.income inequality; inequality of opportunity; economic growth.

Inequality of opportunity in Europe: Economic and policy facts

In this paper we consider the main factors that have influenced inequality of opportunity (IO) in Europe. Based on the EU-SILC database, we find that the various levels of development, education and social protection expenditure in 23 European countries significantly affect IO. Dropping out from school, reaching at least secondary levels of education, social spending to promote social integration and child care are the most important variables of those analyzed. The functioning of the labor market and the tax structure, on the other hand, do not have a significant bearing on IO. Lastly, we note that IO and total inequality exhibit differentiated explanatory patterns, which signifies that means of redistribution that serve to reduce overall inequality do not necessarily reduce IO.inequality of opportunity; growth; education; public expenditure; labor market.

Las enseñanzas de don Carlos y la antropología

Fil: Rodríguez, Pablo Gustavo. Cátedra de Métodos y técnicas de investigación en Antropología Sociocultural; Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo; Universidad Nacional de La Plat

Gerencia social y desarrollo humano : La influencia de los organismos internacionales en el diseño de la política social del Consejo Provincial de la Familia y Desarrollo Humano de la provincia de Buenos Aires (1995-1999)

Fil: Rodríguez, Pablo Gustavo. Cátedra de Métodos y técnicas de investigación en Antropología Sociocultural; Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo; Universidad Nacional de La Plat

Estrategias discursivas de construcción de los pobres como otros

Fil: Rodríguez, Pablo Gustavo. Cátedra de Métodos y técnicas de investigación en Antropología Sociocultural; Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo; Universidad Nacional de La Plat

La criminalización discursiva de los hackers en los medios de prensa

Fil: Rodríguez, Pablo Gustavo. Cátedra de Métodos y técnicas de investigación en Antropología Sociocultural; Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo; Universidad Nacional de La Plat

El desarrollo humano como ideología y tecnología del yo : Una aproximación cognitiva

Fil: Rodríguez, Pablo Gustavo. Cátedra de Métodos y técnicas de investigación en Antropología Sociocultural. Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo. Universidad Nacional de La Plata; Argentin

Anti-Trypanosoma cruzi action of a new benzofuran derivative based on amiodarone structure

Chagas disease is a neglected tropical affection caused by the protozoan parasite Trypanosoma cruzi. There is no current effective treatment since the only two available drugs have a limited efficacy and produce side effects. Thus, investigation efforts have been directed to the identification of new drug leads. In this context, Ca2+ regulating mechanisms have been postulated as targets for antiparasitic compounds, since they present paramount differences when compared to host cells. Amiodarone is an antiarrhythmic with demonstrated trypanocidal activity acting through the disruption of the parasite intracellular Ca2+ homeostasis. We now report the effect of a benzofuran derivative based on the structure of amiodarone on T. cruzi. This derivative was able to inhibit the growth of epimastigotes in culture and of amastigotes inside infected cells, the clinically relevant phase. We also show that this compound, similarly to amiodarone, disrupts Ca2+ homeostasis in T. cruzi epimastigotes, via two organelles involved in the intracellular Ca2+ regulation and the bioenergetics of the parasite. We demonstrate that the benzofuran derivative was able to totally collapse the membrane potential of the unique giant mitochondrion of the parasite and simultaneously produced the alkalinization of the acidocalcisomes. Both effects are evidenced by a large increase in the intracellular Ca2+ concentration of T. cruzi.Fil: Pinto Martinez, Andrea. instituto de Estudios Avanzados; VenezuelaFil: Hernández Rodríguez, Vanessa. instituto de Estudios Avanzados; VenezuelaFil: Rodríguez Durán, Jessica Jenireth. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Instituto de Investigaciones en Ingeniería Genética y Biología Molecular "Dr. Héctor N. Torres"; Argentina. instituto de Estudios Avanzados; VenezuelaFil: Hejchman, Elżbieta. Medical University of Warsaw; PoloniaFil: Benaim, Gustavo. Universidad Central de Venezuela; Venezuel