Essays On Retirement, Labor Supply, And Living Arrangements

Three changes in the U.S. Social Security program affected recent cohorts of older individuals: repeal of the earnings test, increases in the normal retirement age, and increases in the delayed retirement credit. All three policy changes were expected to affect work decisions for those eligible for social security benefits. The first two chapters of my dissertation assess the impact of these policy changes. In the first chapter, using data from the Survey of Income Program and Participation (SIPP) for the years 1996-2013, I study the influence of the three policy changes on the retirement and benefit-claiming decisions of older men and women. There is minimal evidence in the recent literature investigating the sensitivity of estimated responses to the definition of retirement. In particular, I explore how responses to the policy changes differ when assessed using an objective relative to a subjective definition of retirement. The evidence from the empirical analysis indicates that the response to these policy changes is partly sensitive to the retirement definition. I find no effect of recent policy changes on retirement based on a labor force definition, while changes in the delayed retirement credit reduce self-reported retirement among men and women above the normal retirement age. There is stronger evidence of an effect of recent policy changes on the claiming behavior of older individuals. The earnings test repeal raised claiming among men above the normal retirement age, and changes in the delayed retirement credit reduced claiming among men and women who are directly affected. The second chapter examines the influence of the earnings test on the labor supply decisions of older workers. In analyzing the labor supply response to the earnings test, previous researchers have used a static labor supply framework and ignored the possible influence of the delayed retirement credit adjustments in mitigating the earnings test penalty. In contrast to the past research, I assess the labor supply response to the earnings test within a life-cycle model that accounts for the delayed retirement credit adjustments. Using data from the SIPP covering years 1996-2013, I consider the effect on both labor force participation and hours of work. Two potential responses to the policy changes have been relatively less studied: the intertemporal response by individuals and the differential response by sub-groups of individuals who possibly face liquidity constraints or misunderstand the rules of the earnings test. In my work, I provide evidence on both these responses. I find evidence in support of the view that both men and women perceive the earnings test as a tax, as older men and women above the normal retirement age and below age 70 respond to the earnings test by reducing their labor force participation. For working women, I also observe a reduction in the hours of work in response to the earning test, which indicates the somewhat greater flexibility in the choice of hours of work that may be available to women relative to men. The third chapter draws on reports of a rise in the share of young people living with their parents during and following the period after the 2007-2009 recession in the U.S. Previous research has analyzed the relationship between changes in economic conditions and living arrangements of young people by focusing on data based on infrequent (annual/biennial) interviews. In my empirical analysis I use high frequency SIPP data for the years 1996-2013. I examine the change in a young adult’s likelihood of living with a parent in response to changes in local labor-market conditions, and further identify the breakdown of this change into young adults returning home versus their changing their tendency to leave the parental home. Unlike, previous researchers I find no robust evidence that poor labor markets conditions affect the living arrangements of young adults

Adoption of Cloud Computing in India

The researcher looks at adoption and applicability of cloud computing to e-governance in India. Data has been gathered via structured questionnaire from stakeholders of various businesses - public & private sector of India, including Indian IT companies that offer cloud computing solutions to clients. The study takes a balanced and unbiased view of cloud computing with focus on India, to figure out the key factors that lead to its adoption using factor analysis and whether these factors could be the drivers for its adoption in e-governance. Cloud computing has picked up in developed markets and is starting to pick up in India. For enterprises, SMB, Government, NGO & individuals - it reduces initial investments, results in cost savings, gives flexibility, scalability, service on demand, device independency and anytime accessibility and reduces key data loss in the event of hardware crash, loss or theft. However, it has issues like confidentiality, information security, legal & regulatory challenges and malicious attacks as data gets stored in a distributive internet cloud, generally beyond any nation\\\'s geography. The intended target audience for this research are Union & State Governments, Large Municipal Corporations, National Federation of Urban cooperative and credit bank societies Ltd

The design and evaluation of Novel prototypes to visualize web browsing history

Mainstream Web browsers support users in revisiting Web Pages by providing them with a history tool. Research shows that this history tool is severely underutilized. One possible reason is the manner in which the pages are displayed: a linear list of textual links. This thesis investigates the redesign of the history tool by introducing visualization to display the visited Web pages. Three distinct visual prototypes were designed ranging from a traditional scientific visualization method to a concrete visualization that incorporates a metaphor and knowledge transfer from the real-world. The low-fidelity prototypes were evaluated by participants and the best performing design was implemented as a high-fidelity prototype. Further evaluation with participants was conducted and the results were compared against the performance of participants using the traditional history tool of linear textual links.Master's These

Career Engine

Everyone\u27s learning is increasing in this competitive environment, to the point that professional chances are becoming scarce. Companies desire the greatest personnel in their areas. It was difficult to find persons who were bright enough to be recruited at the time. Companies’ attempts to find qualified employees are also increasing. The purpose of this application is to provide a system that allows employers and candidates to communicate with one another. The idea is to speed up the recruiting process by facilitating contact between interested parties. A career engine is a website that offers recruiters and job seekers with online information. Our application helps both job searchers and recruiters choose the finest company for their workers. For job seekers, the employment site presents a list of companies based on their educational credentials, experience, and interests. Furthermore, it offers appropriate candidates from a pool of shortages to recruiters. In this project, we utilized MySQL to store the data, and the frontend is constructed using HTML5, CSS3, Bootstrap, JavaScript, and the backend for PHP is made with the MVC CodeIgniter framework. In our application, we use the technological stacks listed above. Our application presented three responsibilities: job searchers, recruiters, and administrators. The responsibility of the job seeker is to apply for the position and offer feedback to the business. The following recruiter\u27s role is to publicize job vacancies, contact job seekers, and conduct interviews on their behalf. All users, including job seekers, recruiters, and job listings, must be tracked by the administrator

The Culture of Defensive Medicine: Is Tort Reform Necessary?

Articlehttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/96986/1/UMURF-Issue06_2009-AMukkamala.pd

Scanning electron microscopic studies on tongue of open-nesting honey bees Apis dorsata F. and Apis florea F. (Hymenoptera: Apidae)

Taste stimuli play vital role in the life of honey bees. Sensory structures observed on tongue of the honey bees with the help of Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) have become an important tool in analyzing honey bee biodiversity which offers an advanced diagnostic tool to study honey bee biogeography and determine adaptive variations to native flora. Tongue of honey bees present a high geographic variability in regard to the floral resources visited by the bees. The present study has determined to determine differences in the tongue ofopen-nesting bees by scanning electron microscopy of Apis dorsata and Apis florea. The two bees showed distinct morphological variations with respect to the lapping and sucking apparatus. It was observed that the ridges on the proximal region exhibited rough surface on A.dorsata whereas spinous in case of A.florea. Moreover, the arrangement of hair in the middle part of the tongue also differed in the two species. The shape of flabellum differed in the two species reason being the influence of native flora. It was observed that the shape of flabellum was oval in A.dorsata whereas in A.florea it was triangular. These differences indicated for the role of native flora and honey bee biodiversity

Scanning electron microscopic comparison of endophallus of Apis cerana and Apis mellifera

During the present investigations, the detailed morphoarchitecture of the male genitalia viz., the endophallus of the drone of A.cerana F. and A.mellifera L. was scanned under the electron microscope. Endophallus of each species was studied for its unique characteristics. Significant interspecific differences were observed in the 2 different species. These differences highlight the reproductive isolation in the genus. These species specific differences in the endophallus are highlighted in the paper

Singularities and Global Solutions in the Schrodinger-Hartree Equation

In 1922, Louis de Broglie proposed wave-particle duality and introduced the idea of matter waves. In 1925, Erwin Schrodinger, proposed a wave equation for de Broglie’s matter waves. The Schrodinger equation is described using the de Broglie’s matter wave, which takes the wave function, and describes its quantum state over time. Herein, we study the generalized Hartree (gHartree) equation, which is a nonlinear Schrodinger type equation except now the nonlinearities are a nonlocal (convolution) type. In the gHartree equation, the influence on the behavior of the solutions is global as opposed to the case of local (power type) nonlinearities. Our first goal is to understand the behavior of finite energy solutions. We start with proving the local existence and then extend to the global existence for small data. We then, in the energy-subcritical critical regime, classify the behavior of finite energy solutions under the mass-energy assumption identifying the sharp threshold (depending on the size of the initial mass and gradient) for global (scattering) versus finite time (blow-up) solutions. Next, we revisit the problem of scattering and give an alternative proof of scattering, for both NLS and gHartree equations in the radial setting. The alternative approach provides a simpler proof of scattering, which might also be useful for other contexts. Our next aim is to understand the phenomenon of wave collapse (blow-up, the sudden energy transfer from higher levels to lower ones), i.e., solutions with finite time of existence. We first give a sufficient condition for finite time blow-up for the large data and give examples of the various thresholds available in a variety of cases (energy-subcritical, critical and supercritical) for Gaussian data. We then investigate stable singularity formations in the mass-critical gHartree equation, and in particular, rigorously prove a stable blow-up formation in dimension 3. We observe that the nonlocal nonlinearity does not destroy the blow-up dynamics, similar to the local nonlinearities. On the other hand, one of the necessary properties, namely the spectral property required for the blow-up analysis, is modified remarkably. Nevertheless, we are able to prove that stable blow-up occurs with a self-similar profile at the square root rate with a logarithmic correction. Finally, we present the reader with the conclusion and possible future research directions, wrapping up the dissertation

Fatigue Analysis of 3D Printed 15-5 PH Stainless Steel - A Combined Numerical and Experimental Study

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI)Additive manufacturing (AM) or 3D printing has gained significant advancement in recent years. However the potential of 3D printed metals still has not been fully explored. A main reason is the lack of accurate knowledge of the load capacity of 3D printed metals, such as fatigue behavior under cyclic load conditions, which is still poorly understood as compared with the conventional wrought counterpart. The goal of the thesis is to advance the knowledge of fatigue behavior of 15-5 PH stainless steel manufactured through laser powder bed fusion process. To achieve the goal, a combined numerical and experimental study is carried out. First, using a rotary fatigue testing experiment, the fatigue life of the 15-5 PH stainless steel is measured. The strain life curve shows that the numbers of the reversals to failure increase from 13,403 to 46,760 as the applied strain magnitudes decrease from 0.214\% from 0.132\%, respectively. The micro-structure analysis shows that predominantly brittle fracture is presented on the fractured surface. Second, a finite element model based on cyclic plasticity including the damage model is developed to predict the fatigue life. The model is calibrated with two cases: one is the fatigue life of 3D printed 17-4 stainless steel under constant amplitude strain load using the direct cyclic method, and the other one is the cyclic behavior of Alloy 617 under multi-amplitude strain loads using the static analysis method. Both validation models show a good correlation with the literature experimental data. Finally, after the validation, the finite element model is applied to the 15-5 PH stainless steel. Using the direct cyclic method, the model predicts the fatigue life of 15-5 PH stainless steel under constant amplitude strain. The extension of the prediction curve matches well with the previously measured experimental results, following the combined Coffin-Manson Basquin Law. Under multi-amplitude strain, the kinematic hardening evolution parameter is incorporated into the model. The model is capable to capture the stresses at varied strain amplitudes. Higher stresses are predicted when strain amplitudes are increased. The model presented in the work can be used to design reliable 3D printed metals under cyclic loading conditions

Distributed RDF query processing and reasoning for big data / linked data

Title from PDF of title page, viewed on August 27, 2014Thesis advisor: Yugyung LeeVitaIncludes bibliographical references (pages 61-65)Thesis (M. S.)--School of Computing and Engineering. University of Missouri--Kansas City, 2014The Linked Data Movement is aimed at converting unstructured and semi-structured data on the documents to semantically connected documents called the "web of data." This is based on Resource Description Framework (RDF) that represents the semantic data and a collection of such statements shapes an RDF graph. SPARQL is a query language designed specifically to query RDF data. Linked Data faces the same challenge that Big Data does. We now lead the way to a new wave of a new paradigm, Big Data and Linked Data that identify massive amounts of data in a connected form. Indeed, utilizing Linked Data and Big Data continue to be in high demand. Therefore, we need a scalable and accessible query system for the reusability and availability of existing web data. However, existing SPAQL query systems are not sufficiently scalable for Big Data and Linked Data. In this thesis, we address an issue of how to improve the scalability and performance of query processing with Big Data / Linked Data. Our aim is to evaluate and assess presently available SPARQL query engines and develop an effective model to query RDF data that should be scalable with reasoning capabilities. We designed an efficient and distributed SPARQL engine using MapReduce (parallel and distributed processing for large data sets on a cluster) and the Apache Cassandra database (scalable and highly available peer to peer distributed database system). We evaluated an existing in-memory based ARQ engine provided by Jena framework and found that it cannot handle large datasets, as it only works based on the in-memory feature of the system. It was shown that the proposed model had powerful reasoning capabilities and dealt efficiently with big datasetsAbstract -- Illistrations -- Tables -- Introduction -- Background and related work -- Graph-store based SPARQL model -- Graph-store based SPARQL model implementation -- Results and evaluation -- Conclusion and future work -- Reference