Property and Casualty Solvency Funds as a Tax and Social Insurance System

When a Property and Casualty (P&C) insurance company becomes insolvent, solvent insurance companies are forced to pay assessments (a form of taxation) to state guarantee funds ('solvency funds') in order to protect the policyholders of the failed companies. We produce estimates of the costs to the guarantee funds of resolving P&C insurance company insolvencies. We find that the total net costs (payments by the fund less recoveries by the fund) of resolving insolvencies are remarkably high. We estimate that the mean ratio of net costs to assets is approximately one, implying that insolvent companies have liabilities that are roughly twice as large as assets when they fail. Our cost estimate for resolving insurance company insolvencies is roughly three times higher than similar estimates for banks. We also find that the ratio of net costs to assets tends to be higher for small firms, poorly capitalized firms, firms writing significant premiums in long tail lines, and firms that fail because of disasters. Our findings also indicate that the resolution of insolvencies is typically quick. More than 60 percent of all costs to the fund for a given insolvency occur within two years, and more than three-quarters of total costs occur within three years. However, we find that firms with a high proportion of premiums in long tail lines take much longer to resolve.

Melodic Metaphors for Dreams in Three Classic Songs from the Disney Catalog

Three of the most-valued songs from the Disney catalog are “Some Day My Prince Will Come,” “When You Wish Upon a Star,” and “A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes.” All three songs come from animated feature films created during Walt Disney’s lifetime (1901-1966). Furthermore, all three invoke the idea of dreams or wishing. The melodies of these songs feature delayed resolution or a lack of resolution. Such approaches to resolution are symbolic of the intrinsically unresolved nature of dreams

Estimates of scale and cost efficiency for Federal Reserve currency operations

Meeting the currency demands of depository institutions, businesses, and consumers costs the Federal Reserve more than half a billion dollars each year, yet, very little research has been devoted to understanding what factors affect such costs. The authors estimate a cost function in order to obtain estimates of scale and cost efficiency for this service. They find that as in other paper-based technologies, such as checks, scale economies are achieved at a relatively low level of output, implying that currency services are not a natural monopoly. They also provide estimates of facility-specific marginal costs and returns to scale measures that could be used to improve resource allocations. Lastly, they find that the average processing facility operates at more 80 percent of the efficiency of the “best practice” facility, comparable to cost efficiency estimates that have been reported elsewhere for private-sector financial institutions.Federal Reserve banks - Costs ; Payment systems

Unified model of ultracold molecular collisions

A scattering model is developed for ultracold molecular collisions, which allows inelastic processes, chemical reactions, and complex formation to be treated in a unified way. All these scattering processes and various combinations of them are possible in ultracold molecular gases, and as such this model will allow the rigorous parametrization of experimental results. In addition we show how, once extracted, these parameters can be related to the physical properties of the system, shedding light on fundamental aspects of molecular collision dynamics.Comment: 16 Pages, 5 Figure

Beyond power laws: Universality in the average avalanche shape

We report the measurement of multivariable scaling functions for the temporal average shape of Barkhausen noise avalanches, and show that they are consistent with the predictions of simple mean-field theories. We bypass the confounding factors of time-retarded interactions (eddy currents) by measuring thin permal- loy films, and bypass thresholding effects and amplifier distortions by applying Wiener deconvolution. We find experimental shapes that are approximately symmetric, and track the evolution of the scaling function. We solve a mean- field theory for the magnetization dynamics and calculate the form of the scaling function in the presence of a demagnetizing field and a finite field ramp-rate, yielding quantitative agreement with the experiment.Comment: 13 pages, 14 figure

Fundraising in the Arts and Education Using Social Networking

For decades, government spending on the arts in the United States has been controversial, and has resulted in a decrease of public funding of the arts. Grant organizations have gradually become the primary funding choice for artists. However, a trend has arisen where grant organizations are putting increased restrictions/requirements on funding, restricting choices for artists. Fortunately, social networking tools have emerged, allowing the artist to become proactive and seek out funding on their own terms. This session will introduce users to Kickstarter, a fundraising tool utilizing the power of social networking. In addition, Donors Choose, a fundraising tool for education, will also be explored. Finally, best practices for using such fundraising/social networking tools will be examined