Determining Factors of the Czech Foreign Trade Balance: Structural Issues in Trade Creation

Using panel data for 29 industries, we test alternative specifications of Czech export and import functions. The balance of trade is primarily influenced by the real exchange rate, aggregate demand and tariff changes. Reduced growth of the Czech economy after 1996 was an important factor that has kept the balance of trade at a sustainable level in the medium-term, contributing even to the appreciation of the real exchange rate. The secondary fundamental factors, relevant for structural adjustments, a sustainable trade balance and an equilibrium exchange rate, rest, however, on supply-side characteristics such as changes in endowments of physical and human capital, inflows of FDI and growing competitiveness of domestic production. We can argue that appreciation of the real exchange rate is a handicap to Czech exports, especially to exports to non-EU countries. Nevertheless, in the EU case, the appreciation of koruna was countervailed by tariff concessions, improved quality, switchover to commodities with higher contents of value added, gains associated with FDI and growing foreign demand absorption. At the same time, appreciation of the real exchange rate has significantly opened the Czech market to imports but the unconstrained import penetration remained blocked by the growing competitiveness of Czech products in costs, prices and quality.export and import specialisation; international trade; panel data estimation; production factor intensities; sectoral trade balance.

Determining Factors of Trade Specialization and Growth of a Small Economy in Transition: Impacts of the EU Opening-up on Czech Exports and Imports

In this paper we discuss and estimate the factors of growth and structural adjustment in small open economies in transition. Our theoretical considerations are empirically tested on Czech exports and imports in exchanges with two regions: the European Union and the rest of world. By using the export and import functions, we estimated the determining factors of trade intensities relative to the changes in aggregate demand, competitiveness, factor endowments and policy measures. It was of our special interest to analyze the outcome of the massive liberalization of trade with the EU during 1990-99. We worked with the commodity breakdown into 61 industries. The factors acting universally in all four of our tests were the aggregate demand of the destination countries and the structure of the foreign direct investment, representing the human capital. The competitiveness of Czech imports was based generally on quality, while Czech exports to the EU competed in prices. Factor endowments, tariffs and subsidies had also their specific role in shaping the Czech specialization pattern. The appreciation of real exchange rate had only a marginal net effect on the trade balance. Further structural adjustments can be expected not only in further deepening of the Czech export commodity specialization but, due to spillovers of both exports and imports, also in the domestic production for domestic market. The intensive structural and growth incentives associated with the EU accession will bring about pressures for a new wave of restructuring of enterprises, further reallocation of existing resources and a provision of production factors that become the constraints to growth. It is the nature of transition economies that their development, associated with fast growth and convergence to the EU GDP per capita average, will remain for a long time subjected to periodical (though attenuating) waves of adjustments. The economic volatility caused by adjustments to external shocks will be for long more intensive in transition economies than in stabilized economies. The core of fundamental adjustments rests in the changing conditions for the specialization in trade between accession and the EU incumbent countries. The degree of resistance of enterprises to pressures for restructuring coming from the trade potential is therefore reflected in the proneness of the economies in transition to macroeconomic instability (slow growth, budget deficit, structural unemployment and external imbalance). These politically sensitive developments are closely related to decision-making on a choice of macroeconomic and structural policies

Athletic identity and aggressive behavior: A cross-cultural analysis in contact and collision sports.

Research independently examining athletic identity and aggressive sport behavior is quite extensive; however, the relationship between these variables has yet to be explored. Findings from the sport fandom literature regarding team identification and aggressive fan behavior provides a foundation on which to hypothesize about the potential role athletic identity may have in the expression of athlete aggression. Therefore, the purposes of the study were to: (a) further explore the utility and psychometric properties of the Athletic Identity Measurement Scale (AIMS) and the Competitive Aggressiveness and Anger Scale (CAAS), (b) examine the relationships between athletic identity, anger, and aggression in competitive athletes, (c) assess cross-cultural differences, and (d) test hypothesized pathways between variables predicted to contribute to sport aggression. A total of 569 male athletes participating in contact and collision sports in the United States (n = 362) and Hong Kong (n = 207) completed the AIMS, CAAS, and a modified version of the Context Modified Webb Scale. Results of the study showed support for future use of the AIMS and CAAS as sound measures of athletic identity, anger, and aggressiveness in both American and English-speaking Hong Kong Chinese athlete populations. Results also indicated small to moderate positive relationships between athletic identity, anger, and aggressiveness with differences in those variables found with respect to sport type (contact versus collision) and culture. Interestingly, group comparisons yielded significant differences between highly identified and lowly identified athletes in both anger and aggressiveness. Path analyses examined the influence of years of sport participation, perceived athletic ability, athletic identity, professionalization, and anger in aggressive sport behavior. Lastly, results indicated a good fit between the data and the proposed theoretical model accounting for 43.1% of the total variance in aggressiveness in American athletes and 56.5% of the variance in Hong Kong athletes

Structure and Dynamics of Trade in a Small Economy in Transition before the EU Accession: The Case of Czech Exports and Imports

The basic objective of this paper is to design an appropriate structural model based on economic behavioral foundations and test it on data representing the determining factors of Czech trade specialization and growth. Policy recommendations based on the functioning of some policy instruments relevant to monetary policy decisions are also a part of the study. In the empirical part of the analysis, we use alternative specifications of export and import functions estimated as panels for the EU and non-EU countries, disaggregated into 29 industries for 1993-2001. It is evident from our tests that the future of the Czech trade balance and GDP growth will hinge on ow the Czech economy substitutes its present comparative advantage in labor by building up its capital endowments, most notably its human capital endowments. Although our tests confirm that the balance of trade was fundamentally influenced by the exchange rate, aggregate demand and tariff changes, the underlying fundamental factors relevant for a sustainable trade balance and an equilibrium exchange rate rest on supply-side capacities (such as changes in factor endowments, inflows of foreign direct investment (FDI), developments in productivity and wage rates, pricing policy of enterprises and the nature of competitiveness of domestic production), which are extremely closely related to export and import performance. It seems evident that industrial policies (such as support for FDI, capital availability, the building-up of human capital or labor mobility and the promotion of domestic import substitution) can lead to significant changes in the nature of Czech exports and international competitiveness. We can induce from our analysis that the fundamental restructuring of Czech enterprises in the period 1993 -2001 was driven by openness to trade, especially with the EU. While exports offered growth and employment, accelerating import penetration required the downsizing of many industries, which burdened the whole Czech economy with high adjustment costs. Now, in a period of economic structural stabilization and EU accession, the prospects for accelerated economic growth are much higher. The seemingly low or even reversed response of trade intensities to real exchange rate appreciation can be explained by supply-side gains in the quality of products, productivity improvements, the buildup of human capital associated with FDI and the fast dynamics of intra-industrial trade, which had a low sensitivity to exchange rate fluctuations. Relative to the unwieldy performance of the state sector or the domestic production of the non-traded commodities, Czech export sector made a tremendous progress in competitiveness during 1993- 2001, showing high dynamics of growth, intensive level of structural adjustments and an accelerated seed of integration with the EU

A fair comparison of CO2 and propane used in light commercial applications featuring natural refrigerants

Light commercial refrigeration units exist for a large variety of different applications and include beverage coolers, ice machines, chilled drink dispensers, and merchandizers and storage units for food items. Among the natural refrigerants available, only propane (R290) and carbon dioxide (CO2, R744) are realistic candidates to replace currently used HFC refrigerants. While many of the thermodynamic and transport properties of R290 are favorable over R744, propane is listed as an ASHRAE A3 refrigerant and therefore bears an inherent flammability risk even when the refrigerant charge is limited to 150 g or less as required by applicable safety standards. While it seems possible to design and implement safe, low-charge hydrocarbon refrigeration systems, some manufacturers prefer solutions that completely eliminate the flammability risk and therefore focus on R744, which is a non-flammable, non-toxic, natural refrigerant listed as ASHRAE A1. The challenges encountered with R744 are mostly due to lower performance at elevated ambient temperatures requiring a transcritical cycle, which often makes R744 systems more expensive for designs that are aimed at providing comparable cooling capacity and energy efficiency. Therefore, the component and system design challenges encountered with the two fluids are very different, which drives design solutions in very different directions. This study elaborates on the different fluid-specific challenges that are inherent to the each of the two refrigerants and demonstrates the resulting consequences in terms of system and component design. Since the cooling target is the same in both cases, the pros and cons of R290 and R744 can be fairly compared and meaningful conclusions can be drawn

Conversion of cold beverage dispenser\u27s refrigeration system to R744 refrigerant

Cold beverage dispensers belong to the group of light commercial refrigeration machines that includes beverage coolers, ice machines and storage units for food items. Beverage dispensers use a vapor compression system to charge a thermal storage, usually an ice bank, which is used to indirectly cool tap water and beverage concentrate. For these machines, R290 (propane) and R744 (carbon dioxide) are among the favorite candidates to completely replace high GWP HFC refrigerants in the future. Because of flammability and charge restrictions for R290, carbon dioxide is in some cases preferred even if some of its thermodynamic and transport properties are less favorable than those of R290, especially at high ambient temperature. This study evaluated the performance of a baseline R134a beverage dispenser machine by experimentally measuring initial pull down time and energy consumption during compressor cycling operation at 24°C and 38°C ambient temperatures, respectively. Another important performance criteria for dispensers is the burst capacity, which is the number of 350 ml drinks dispensed at the rate of 3 drinks per minute while maintaining a beverage temperature below 5°C. This test simulates the typical load profile of the machine during peak serving time in hotels and motels. Burst capacity is closely related to thermal storage capacity and therefore the ice amount was also closely monitored. The machine’s refrigeration system was afterwards converted to R744 refrigerant, using a transcritical cycle. Special attention was given to optimization of capillary tube size, refrigerant charge amount and gas cooler design where the strongest impact on the performance at different ambient temperatures was expected. Appropriate instrumentation and theoretical analysis helped to identify optimum selection of capillary tube and R744 refrigerant charge. The optimized R744 system used 385g of charge and pulled down in approximately half the time and dispensed at least 25% more drinks while keeping the energy consumption comparable with its baseline R134a system. Slight increase in gas cooler cost was well overcome by the benefits of larger burst capacity and significantly shorter pull down time allowing: the redesigned beverage dispenser can be kept off longer and needs to be turned on shortly before the serving time

Four Days of Caffeine Withdrawal in Caffeine Consumers Lowers Strength in Knee Flexors and Extensors

Please refer to the pdf version of the abstract located adjacent to the title

Acute Caffeine Supplementation in Regular Caffeine Consumers Minimally Affects Strength in Knee Flexors

Please refer to the pdf version of the abstract located adjacent to the title

Comparison of Constant and Temperature Dependent Blood Perfusion in Temperature Prediction for Superficial Hyperthermia

The purpose of this study was to determine whether prediction of the 3D temperature profile for superficial hyperthermia using constant blood perfusion model could be matched to one with a temperature dependent blood perfusion. We compared three different constant blood perfusion scenarios with one temperature dependent blood perfusion using a layered model of biological tissue consisting of skin (2 mm), fat (10 mm) and muscle (108 mm). For all four scenarios the maximum temperature of 43 °C was found in the muscle tissue in the close proximity (1 – 3 mm) of fat layer. Cumulative histograms of temperature versus volume were identical for the region of 100x100x40 mm3 under the applicator aperture for the three constant blood perfusion models. For temperature dependent blood perfusion model, 85 % of the studied region was covered with the temperature equal or higher than 40 °C in comparison with 43 % for the constant blood perfusion models. Hence this study demonstrates that constant blood perfusion scenarios cannot be matched to one with a temperature dependent blood perfusion