The Minamata Convention and the future of mercury abatement

This repository item contains a single issue of Issues in Brief, a series of policy briefs that began publishing in 2008 by the Boston University Frederick S. Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range Future.Pardee Faculty Fellow Henrik Selin examines the new Minamata Convention on Mercury, a global agreement intended to “protect human health and the environment from anthropogenic emissions and releases of mercury and mercury compounds.” Selin argues that the new convention is “more legally and politically important than environmentally significant.” To achieve truly meaningful reductions in mercury releases to the environment and threats to human health, he says collaborative measures must be enacted across global, regional, national, and local scales of governance, with support from inter-governmental organizations, non-governmental organizations and industry associations

Flexibility of Various Nickel-Titanium Rotary Endodontic Files

Introduction: Nickel-titanium rotary files were originally developed to allow for greater flexibility when instrumenting root canals. The increased flexibility of nickel-titanium instruments allowed operators to negotiate canal curvatures with greater ease. File design is continually changing. Manufacturers are trying to produce files that will work more efficiently and safely. Knowing the properties of files marketed is especially important in helping to choose an appropriate file system. Current ISO standards require force measurements at a static point along the file. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the flexibility of four different nickel-titanium files at three different points along the file. Materials and Methods: Flexibility of four different nickel-titanium rotary files (EndoSequence, ProFile, Vortex, and Vortex Blue) was measured. Each file was clamped at 3mm, 5mm, or 7mm (n = 10/length/file) and a universal testing machine was used to bend the files to a maximum deflection of 4.5mm. All data were statistically analyzed by two-way analysis of variance and post-hoc Tukey test (P = 0.05) to determine any significant differences. Results: Statistically significant (P \u3c 0.05) differences were present. In general, ProFile was the stiffest, displaying the greatest force and bending moment values. Vortex Blue was significantly more flexible, with lower force needed for deflection and bending moments. Conclusion: Vortex Blue files showed greater flexibility compared with the other nickel-titanium rotary files studied

Case study report The perception of the EU cultural and science diplomacy in Turkey. EL-CSID Working Paper Issue 2018/14 • April 2018

The study is undertaken in the framework of the European Leadership in Cultural, Science and Innovation Diplomacy (EL-CSID) project. This project has the ambition to codify and articulate the relevance of cultural, science and innovation diplomacy for EU external relations as part of a systematic and strategic approach. It aims to identify how the Union and its member states might collectively and individually develop a good institutional and strategic policy environment for extraregional culture and science diplomacy. The overarching objectives of this project are threefold: 1. To detail and analyse the manner in which the EU operates in the domains of cultural and science diplomacy in the current era; comparing its bilateral and multilateral cultural and science ties with other states, regions, and public and private international organisations. 2. To examine the degree to which cultural, science and innovation diplomacy can enhance the interests of the EU in the contemporary world order and specifically, to identify: a) How cultural and science diplomacy can contribute to Europe’s standing as an international actor; b) Opportunities offered by enhanced coordination and collaboration amongst the EU, its members and their extra-European partners; c) Constraints, both existing and evolving, posed by economic and socio-political factors affecting the operating environments of both science and cultural diplomacy. 3. To identify a series of mechanisms/platforms to raise awareness among relevant stakeholders of the importance of science and culture as vehicles for enhancing the EU's external relations. The research generates both scholarly work and policy-oriented output, which is disseminated through an extensive and targeted dissemination programme

Maintenance of a gambling monopoly in the EU: Finland’s gambling policy as a case

The EU Member States in general have striven to comply with Court of Justice of the European Union rulings while holding on to their national regulatory power as far as possible. The Finnish gambling policy is an example. The analysis is based on case law and policy documents. The results of the analysis point to the interpretation that Finland has successfully contained the EU’s politico-legal influence on its national gambling policy and to a great extent kept regulatory power in its own hands. It is suggested that the development of the Finnish gambling policy in relation to the EU from the early period of Finland’s accession to present day can be productively interpreted as having been formulated from national starting points but with ‘EU in mind’. Finland has managed to secure its national competence regarding its gambling policy. The national discretion has even increased and it is hard to perceive much EU influence in the decision to merge the three gambling monopoly operators into one in 2017. It is concluded that it seems likely that EU will in the future allow more national discretion for Member States

China’s Economic Outlook after 30 Years of Reform

China’s recent emergence as a major global partner has been one of the most remarkable facts of the past decades. Over the last 30 years of reform, Chinese economy exhibited unprecedented sustainable economic growth and the country has gradually transformed its structure from a self-reliant, state dominated to a market based economy. The aim of this paper is to yield a baseline for the comprehension and interpretation of the empirical analysis on Chinese economy. China’s recent economic rise are discussed through six major axes, namely economic reforms and growth, ownership composition and productivity, financial and banking system reforms, opening-up to the world, human capital and research & development; and unbalanced regional development.

The Rise in Female Employment and the Role of Tax Incentives - An Empirical Analysis of the Swedish Individual Tax Reform of 1971

Sweden reached the 2007 OECD average level of female labor force participation already in 1974. Before, but not after, 1971 the average tax rate facing the housewife was a function of the income of her husband. By exploiting a rich register based data source I utilize the exogenous variation provided by the individual tax reform to analyze the evolution of female employment in Sweden in the beginning of the 1970’s. Simulations suggest that employment among married women would have been 10 percentage points lower in 1975 if the 1969 statutory income tax system still had been in place in 1975.female labor supply, income tax reforms

Total Factor Productivity Growth in Chinese Industry: 1952-2005

This paper presents a timely assessment of Chinese industrial productivity performances over the period 1952-2005. The total factor productivity (TFP) growth analysis is based on a Cobb-Douglas specification with aggregated annual data set. This study tackles some theoretical and methodological issues raised by critics of previous studies. First of all, the use of economic tools allows us to relax some restrictive hypothesis of the neoclassical growth framework such as competitive market behaviour, constant returns to scale production technology and Hicks neutral technological change. In addition, our TFP growth estimates are adjusted for business fluctuations. The paper also deals with the autocorrelation issue prevailing in most previous studies. Our major findings are: (i) In Chinese industry, between 1952 and 2005 capital accumulation has been the main engine of economic takeoff. (ii) During the post-reform period, TFP growth contributed significantly to economic growth. (iii) TFP gains have exhibited a sharply increasing pattern since the late 1980’s, along with the accelerated integration of China into the world economy.

Marginal Tax Rates and Tax-Favoured Pension Savings of the Self-Employed - Evidence from Sweden

In recent years, the study of how individuals respond to policies that aim at promoting pension savings has emerged as a vital area of economic research. This paper adds to this literature by estimating the tax price elasticity of contributions to tax-favoured pension savings accounts on a population of self-employed individuals. I exploit a unique total data base over the Swedish population that covers the years 1999 to 2005. Using instrumental variables, I obtain a tax price elasticity estimate of –0.51 and an income elasticity estimate of 0.13, whereas OLS produces estimates that conflict with consumer theory.income taxation, fringe benefits, individual pension savings, self-employment