The not-so-great moderation? Evidence on changing volatility from Australian regions

In this paper we examine Australian data on national and regional employment numbers, focusing in particular on whether there have been common national and regional changes in the volatility of employment. A subsidiary objective is to assess whether the results derived from traditional growth rate models are sustained when alternative filtering methods are used. In particular, we compare the results of the growth rate models with those obtained from Hodrick-Prescott models. Using frequency filtering methods in conjunction with autoregressive modeling, we show that there is considerable diversity in the regional pattern of change and that it would be wrong to suppose that results derived from the aggregate employment series are generally applicable across the regions. The results suggest that the so-called great moderation may have been less extensive than aggregate macro studies suggest.Regional employment, State business cycle, Structural change, Volatility

Models of Labour Services and Estimates of Total Factor Productivity

This paper examines the manner in which labour services are modelled in the aggregate production function, concentrating on the relationship between numbers employed and average hours worked. It argues that numbers employed and hours worked are not perfect substitutes and that conventional estimates of total factor productivity which, by using total hours worked as the measure of labour services, assume they are perfect substitutes, will be biased when there are marked changes in average hours worked. The relevance of the theoretical argument is illustrated using data for the United States and the United Kingdom.Labour Services, Production Function, Total Factor Productivity

The Cyclical Dynamics and Volatility of Australian Output and Employment

In this paper we examine the volatility of aggregate output and employment in Australia with the aid of a frequency filtering method (the Butterworth filter) that allows each time series to be decomposed into trend, cycle and noise components. This analysis is compared with more traditional methods based simply on the examination of first differences in the logs of the raw data using cointegration-VAR modelling. We show that the application of univariate AR and bivariate VECM methods to the data results in a detrended series which is dominated by noise rather than cyclical variation and gives break points which are not robust to alternative decomposition methods. Also, our conclusions challenge accepted wisdom in relation to output volatility in Australia which holds that there was a once and for all sustained reduction in output volatility in or around 1984. We do not find any convincing evidence for a sustained reduction in the cyclical volatility of the GDP (or employment) series at that time, but we do find evidence of a sustained reduction in the cyclical volatility of the GDP (and employment) series in 1993/4. We also find that there is a clear association between output volatility and employment volatility. We discuss the key features of the business cycle we have identified as well as some of the policy implications of our results.Business cycles, volatility, inflation targeting, Australia

Understanding soil nitrogen supply: organic matter quality and quantity

The soil organic matter (SOM) contents of organic and conventionally farmed soils were compared. Whilst the quantity of SOM was found to be similar with both systems, the quality of SOM differed in respect of higher amounts of N released by the organic soils under anaerobic incubation. This indicated a greater potential rate of mineralization and suggested that the inherent fertility of the organic soils had been improve

Poisson point process models solve the "pseudo-absence problem" for presence-only data in ecology

Presence-only data, point locations where a species has been recorded as being present, are often used in modeling the distribution of a species as a function of a set of explanatory variables---whether to map species occurrence, to understand its association with the environment, or to predict its response to environmental change. Currently, ecologists most commonly analyze presence-only data by adding randomly chosen "pseudo-absences" to the data such that it can be analyzed using logistic regression, an approach which has weaknesses in model specification, in interpretation, and in implementation. To address these issues, we propose Poisson point process modeling of the intensity of presences. We also derive a link between the proposed approach and logistic regression---specifically, we show that as the number of pseudo-absences increases (in a regular or uniform random arrangement), logistic regression slope parameters and their standard errors converge to those of the corresponding Poisson point process model. We discuss the practical implications of these results. In particular, point process modeling offers a framework for choice of the number and location of pseudo-absences, both of which are currently chosen by ad hoc and sometimes ineffective methods in ecology, a point which we illustrate by example.Comment: Published in at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/10-AOAS331 the Annals of Applied Statistics (http://www.imstat.org/aoas/) by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org

How the Sando Search Tool Recommends Queries

Developers spend a significant amount of time searching their local codebase. To help them search efficiently, researchers have proposed novel tools that apply state-of-the-art information retrieval algorithms to retrieve relevant code snippets from the local codebase. However, these tools still rely on the developer to craft an effective query, which requires that the developer is familiar with the terms contained in the related code snippets. Our empirical data from a state-of-the-art local code search tool, called Sando, suggests that developers are sometimes unacquainted with their local codebase. In order to bridge the gap between developers and their ever-increasing local codebase, in this paper we demonstrate the recommendation techniques integrated in Sando

Structural trends in clusters of quadrupolar spheres

The influence of quadrupolar interactions on the structure of small clusters is investigated by adding a point quadrupole of variable strength to the Lennard-Jones potential. Competition arises between sheet-like arrangements of the particles, favoured by the quadrupoles, and compact structures, favoured by the isotropic Lennard-Jones attraction. Putative global potential energy minima are obtained for clusters of up to 25 particles using the basin-hopping algorithm. A number of structural motifs and growth sequences emerge, including star-like structures, tubes, shells and sheets. The results are discussed in the context of colloidal self-assembly.Comment: 8 pages, 6 figure

Noah\u27s Beasts Were the Stars : Arthur Melbourne Cooper’s Noah’s Ark (1909)

More than one hundred years ago, a now largely forgotten pioneer of the British cinema, Arthur Melbourne Cooper, shot and exhibited Noah’s Ark (Alpha, 1909), the world’s first cinematic depiction of Noah, his ark and the deluge from which it delivered him. This study highlights this remarkable film’s anticipation of later animated biblical pictures and seeks to contextualize the film’s production and exhibition within both Melbourne Cooper’s oeuvre, and within British religious and visual culture of the late Victorian period

The royal dictatorship in Yugoslavia, 1929-1934: as seen from British sources

In January 1929, King Alexander of Yugoslavia proclaimed a Royal Dictatorship over his country. He believed that such strong action was necessary because there was a very real danger of civil war, for the animosity and disagreement which had existed between the Serbs and the Croats since the inception of the Kingdom had reached the point of open murder with the killing of the Croat leader and two of his colleagues in the Yugoslav Parliament. Alexander believed that national unity was his chief responsibility and he hoped that, by removing the party political system, he might inspire his people to think of themselves as Yugoslavs rather than as Serbs or Croats. But despite his efforts to improve the quality of government, to streamline the methods of administration and to eliminate corruption, he failed - not only because of an entrenched hostility towards absolutism amongst an intensely democratic people, but also because of the dearth of men with any capacity for sound government or inspired leadership. During the course of his Dictatorship, he came to realize that even if he secured a viable settlement between his people at home, there could be no sure future for his Kingdom unless he took steps to secure its international position. To this end, he attempted to come to terms with Mussolini recognizing these men as Yugoslavia's most immediate opponents. (Only when his efforts failed – through no fault of his own - did he seek to strengthen Yugoslavia's existing treaties with the Little Entente and to complement this alliance in the north with a similar Entente in the Balkan peninsula. It was precisely because of his successes abroad, rather than his failures at home, that his enemies arranged his assassination. His death united the Yugoslav nation but greatly weakened its position abroad

11QAramaic Job: the Qumran Targum as an ancient Aramaic version of Job

The first point of departure for the present thesis is the observation that the Ara¬ maic translation of Job found at Qumran (11Q10) sits uncomfortably in the genre of the 'classical' targum despite the original editors' classification of the text as '1 lQtargumJob'. A second stimulus for the study arises from the author's review of scholarly discussion on 11Q10 in which its comparison with the Targum and Syriac ver¬ sions of Job has been either anecdotal or extremely limited in scope. In light of the obvi¬ ous relationship between these two observations, and in the hope that the investigation of the latter will shed light on the former, the author attempts to take up the question of the classification of the Qumran text through a synoptic comparison of 11Q10 with the Targum and Syriac versions.Moving beyond static definitions of literalness, questions of dating and the de¬ pendence of the Syriac on the targum tradition, the author makes use of recent work in Targumic and Syriac studies which has attempted to come to grips with issues of genre through an assessment of modes of representation and the formal treatment of the He¬ brew text. Having noted that preliminary investigations of the relationship between these Aramaic versions have been limited to a study of addition and substitution, the present investigation attempts to assess the respective translators' attitudes toward the Hebrew text through an analysis of omission and transposition. Following on from these investigations, the Aramaic versions' treatment of that smallest of Hebrew lexemes—the waw conjunction—is analysed as a further index by which the attitudes of the various translators toward their Hebrew source may be assessed.Having investigated the attitude of the respective translators to their source text, the author locates his findings both within the context of the Qumran translation's classi¬ fication as targum and, more broadly, within the study of the Aramaic versions. The author concludes that, in terms of its representation of the Hebrew text, the Aramaic translation from Qumran shares certain fundamental features with the Peshitta of Job rather than with its nominal cousin, the Rabbinic Targum of Job