1,163 research outputs found
Imagen pública del Tercer Sector en España
The purpose of this article is to analyse the most significant results of an extensive social research project on the public image of the Third Sector in Spain. The findings of an opinion survey applied to a statistically representative sample of the adult Spanish population is complemented by the additional contribution of fifty interviews with managers and directors of associations, foundations, cooperatives and mutual benefit societies, and the opinion expressed in ten discussion groups held with the representatives of central, regional and local government bodies. The results are grouped into three broad subject areas, preceded by an introduction on the terminological and conceptual definition of the Third Sector. It then covers the social composition of its general profiles in the collective consciousness, an assessment of its functions, the level of social trust, and finally, the Third Sector’s relationships with the public and private sectors, and its prospects of future developmentThird Sector, collective representation, public image.
Choice of Product Variety for the Durable Goods Monopolist
This paper analyzes the strategic choice of variety by a monopolist seller of a durable good as a means to mitigate his commitment problem. The monopolist chooses his product variety with a goal of ensuring that a strong reduction in future prices will not be profitable because it allows the firm to attract few additional consumers. The main result that emerges from considering product variety as an endogenous variable is that, contrary to the case in which it is exogenously determined, social welfare is always higher when the monopolist cannot commit that when he can.durable goods monopolist, commitment, product variety
Presentación
A partir de la década de 1980, los Estados han actuado en conformidad con losmercados, esto es, han ido postulando la libertad y autorregulación absoluta delmercado, apoyando la revolución tecnológica y la globalización e implementandopolíticas de recortes de los derechos sociales y laborales. Con ello han optadopor el modelo capitalista anglosajón, el cual ha ido barriendo al modelo renano,socialdemócrata o escandinavo, más proclives a los elementos de corrección, lospactos interclasistas, las garantías sociales… El modelo anglosajón (financiarizadoy globalizado), que ha tenido desde finales del siglo xx y principios del xxi uncrecimiento desmesurado, ha estado introduciendo, a través de las élites gerenciales,una serie de cambios en los procesos productivos y en la organización deltrabajo. Transformaciones que han implicado la deslocalización de empleos haciaotros países y la automatización de funciones que antes desempeñaban trabajadores,y que han afectado a la composición de la clase trabajadora, y además hanensanchado la brecha de renta entre la élite de una sociedad y su cuerpo generaltanto en el mundo Occidental como más allá
Methodology for development of drought Severity-Duration-Frequency (SDF) Curves
Drought monitoring and early warning are essential elements impacting drought
sensitive sectors such as primary production, industrial and consumptive water users. A
quantitative estimate of the probability of occurrence and the anticipated severity of drought
is crucial for the development of mitigating strategies. The overall aim of this study is to
develop a methodology to assess drought frequency and severity and to advance the
understanding of monitoring and predicting droughts in the future. Seventy (70)
meteorological stations across Victoria, Australia were selected for analysis. To achieve the
above objective, the analysis was initially carried out to select the most applicable
meteorological drought index for Victoria. This is important because to date, no drought
indices are applied across Australia by any Commonwealth agency quantifying drought
impacts. An evaluation of existing meteorological drought indices namely, the Standardised
Precipitation Index (SPI), the Reconnaissance Drought Index (RDI) and Deciles was first
conducted to assess their suitability for the determination of drought conditions. The use of
the Standardised Precipitation Index (SPI) was shown to be satisfactory for assessing and
monitoring meteorological droughts in Australia. When applied to data, SPI was also
successful in detecting the onset and the end of historical droughts.
Temporal changes in historic rainfall variability and the trend of SPI were investigated
using non-parametric trend techniques to detect wet and dry periods across Victoria,
Australia. The first part of the analysis was carried out to determine annual rainfall trends
using Mann Kendall (MK) and Sen’s slope tests at five selected meteorological stations with
long historical records (more than 100 years), as well as a short sub-set period (1949-2011) of
the same data set. It was found that different trend results were obtained for the sub-set. For
SPI trend analysis, it was observed that, although different results were obtained showing
significant trends, SPI gave a trend direction similar to annual precipitation (downward and
upward trends). In addition, temporal trends in the rate of occurrence of drought events (i.e.
inter-arrival times) were examined. The fact that most of the stations showed negative slopes
indicated that the intervals between events were becoming shorter and the frequency of
events was temporally increasing. Based on the results obtained from the preliminary
analysis, the trend analyses were then carried out for the remaining 65 stations. The main
conclusions from these analyses are summarized as follows; 1) the trend analysis was
observed to be highly dependent on the start and end dates of analysis. It is recommended
that in the selection of time period for the drought, trend analysis should consider the length
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of available data sets. Longer data series would give more meaningful results, thus improving
the understanding of droughts impacted by climate change. 2) From the SPI and inter-arrival
drought trends, it was observed that some of the study areas in Victoria will face more
frequent dry period leading to increased drought occurrence. Information similar to this
would be very important to develop suitable strategies to mitigate the impacts of future
droughts.
The main objective of this study was the development of a methodology to assess
drought risk for each region based on a frequency analysis of the drought severity series
using the SPI index calculated over a 12-month duration. A novel concept centric on drought
severity-duration-frequency (SDF) curves was successfully derived for all the 70 stations
using an innovative threshold approach. The methodology derived using extreme value
analysis will assist in the characterization of droughts and provide useful information to
policy makers and agencies developing drought response plans. Using regionalisation
techniques such as Cluster analysis and modified Andrews curve, the study area was
separated into homogenous groups based on rainfall characteristics. In the current Victorian
application the study area was separated into six homogeneous clusters with unique
signatures. A set of mean SDF curves was developed for each cluster to identify the
frequency and severity of the risk of drought events for various return periods in each cluster.
The advantage of developing a mean SDF curve (as a signature) for each cluster is that it
assists the understanding of drought conditions for an ungauged or unknown station, the
characteristics of which fit existing cluster groups. Non-homogeneous Markov Chain
modelling was used to estimate the probability of different drought severity classes and
drought severity class predictions 1, 2 and 3 months ahead. The non-homogeneous
formulation, which considers the seasonality of precipitation, is useful for understanding the
evolution of drought events and for short-term planning. Overall, this model predicted
drought situations 1 month ahead well. However, predictions 2 and 3 months ahead should be
used with caution.
Many parts of Australia including Victoria have experienced their worst droughts on
record over the last decade. With the threat of climate change potentially further exacerbating
droughts in the years ahead, a clear understanding of the impact of droughts is vital. The
information on the probability of occurrence and the anticipated severity of drought will be
helpful for water resources managers, infrastructure planners and government policy-makers
with future infrastructure planning and with the design and building of more resilient
communities
Policy Coordination in an Oligopolistic Housing Market
This paper analyzes the consequences of the interaction between two different levels of government (regulators) in the development of housing policy when their decisions determine the level of competition in the housing market. The analysis discusses the implications derived from a lack of coordination between a local regulator who controls the supply of land for housing development and a central regulator who decides on housing subsidies. The results suggest that lack of coordination has significant effects on prices and supply of houses, housing developers’ profits, and buyers’ surplus.imperfect competition, housing policy coordination
The benefits of active portfolio management. A reform proposal to Michoacan State’s Public Pension Fund Office
El presente artículo estudia el contexto legal y administrativo
de uno de los fondos de pensiones de beneficio definido políticamente más
relevantes en México, la Dirección de Pensiones Civiles del Estado de Michoacán.
Como consecuencia de esto, se hace la propuesta de una política, estructura
y proceso de gestión activa de carteras para su reserva técnica. Para probar la
pertinencia de la propuesta, se realizó una simulación de eventos discretos
con tres tipos de matrices de covarianzas, empleando el modelo Markowitz-
Tobin-Sharpe-Lintner. Los resultados demuestran que se superan los objetivos
actuariales planteados y se logra incrementar, como consecuencia, el periodo
de suficiencia financiera del plan de pensiones
Scientific evidence of the benefits of virgin olive oil for human health
Olive oil is considered to be one of the most healthy dietary fats. There are, however, several types of olive oil present on the market. With the data at present available, the most healthy of them is the virgin olive oil (VOO), rich in phenolic compounds. On November 2011, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) released a claim concerning the benefits of the daily ingestion of olive oil rich in phenolic compounds, such as the VOO. In this review, we will summarize the work which have provided scientific evidence of the benefits of VOO consumption over other type of edible oils even olive oils. Data from randomized, controlled human studies, will be presented. This type of studies are able to provide evidence of Level I which is that required for performing nutritional recommendations at population level.Se considera al aceite de oliva una de las grasas más saludables de la dieta. Hay, sin embargo, varios tipos de aceite de oliva presentes en el mercado. Con los datos actualmente disponibles, el más saludable de ellos es el aceite de oliva virgen (AOV), rico en compuestos fenólicos. En noviembre de 2011, la Autoridad Europea de Seguridad Alimentaria (EFSA) publicó un declaración acerca de los beneficios de la ingesta diaria de aceite de oliva rico en compuestos fenólicos, como el VOO. En esta revisión, vamos a resumir el trabajo que ha proporcionado la evidencia científica de los beneficios del consumo de AOV sobre otro tipo de aceites comestibles e incluso sobre los otros tipos de aciete de oliva. Presentamos, asimismo, los datos de estudios aleatorizados y controlados en humanos. Este tipo de estudios proporcionan evidencia de nivel I, que es el nivel requerido para ofrecer recomendaciones nutricionales a nivel poblacional
Clinkering and hydration study of non-active and active Belite-Alite-Ye'elimite (BAY) cements
The aim of AIM is to promote industry-driven, interdisciplinary research in material science and engineering in order to provide leading-edge, sustainable solutions to the challenges facing engineers in today’s changing society and environment. http://www.ucl.ac.uk/aim/conference-info/37ccsThe manufacturing process of ye'elimite rich cements emit about 15-37% less CO2 to the atmosphere than OPC. Cements that contain belite, ye’elimite and ferrite, known as BYF cements, are promising eco-friendly binders. However, belite, their main phase, shows a slow hydrating behaviour; therefore the corresponding mortars present lower mechanical strengths than OPC at early ages. To solve this problem, BYF clinkers can be activated by: i) forming alite jointly with belite and ye’elimite during clinkering, known as BAY clinkers. The alite and ye’elimite reaction with water should develop high mechanical strengths at early ages, besides, belite contributes to later curing times. ii) A second activation is based on the stabilisation of alpha forms of belite by dopants. The objective of this work is to obtain two types of BAY clinkers (standard and active BAY) using CaF2 as mineraliser and borax as dopant agent to stabilize alpha forms of belite phase. After that, anhydrite was added as sulphate source to obtain the corresponding cements. The hydration behaviour of these cements has been studied through rheological and x-ray diffraction measurements, the latter combined with Rietveld quantitative phase analysis. In addition, mechanical and dimensional properties of BAY mortars are also presented and discussed.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech
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