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This article provides a large dataset on PSE using a parametric approach, and covering 158 countries of all income levels, over the period 1990–2017. The analysis includes four sectors: education, health, infrastructure, and public administration. We further consider three efficiency indicators regarding the 'Musgravian' tasks for government: allocation, distribution, and stabilization. After computing the efficiency scores for our sample countries, we examine their determinants using a wide range of economic and institutional factors. Our key findings are that trade globalization, factor productivity, and institutional quality seem to be important determinants of total PSE. The results remain robust to alternative specifications and methods. Finally, we provide additional evidence by exploring the sensitivity of the main determinants to different country groups, considering the level of economic development, geographical regions, and fragile states. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses regional competitiveness at the subregional level through a novel methodological approach that adopts a matching design. By comparing the performance of similar firms in different parts of the region, it is possible to detect whether different places provide different competitive territorial assets. Using data for Lombardy, a large and competitive European region, the analysis shows that the different territories of the region are differently competitive in different industries, even when they are similar in terms of total GDP per capita or specialization. The paper also confirms that measuring competitiveness on different indicators (Labour Productivity, TFP, Profitability) can provide different results, and this especially happens when comparing static and dynamic indicators. The methodology presented here is especially relevant to the design of regional policies, that are mostly deployed at the NUTS-2 level but would benefit from accounting for the presence of strongly dis-homogeneous territories inside the same region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This investigation shows that through word embedding and co-occurrence, a researcher can deduce key concepts within a corpus that, with adequate academic contextual knowledge, can guide the investigator to conclude if the corpus belongs to or has been influenced by a particular school of thought. Specifically, we have conducted an extensive analysis of the Journal des Economistes, a prominent platform for the dissemination of ideas within the French Liberal School which run from 1841 to 1936, to demonstrate the effectiveness of these tools in the context of distant reading. We have thus shown how the concepts discussed within the journal, reflect the concerns of the French Liberal School for the concepts of value, commerce, freedom of exchange, freedom, and labor, through statistical methods, as opposed to a close reading of the text. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a bibliometric analysis of the systems dynamics (SD) research landscape, drawing on 2,091 documents from Scopus and Web of Science. This research employs bibliometric techniques to explore the evolution of the scientific community over the past 50 years and assess research productivity and impact. Through network analysis, the study further reveals the field's social and conceptual structures. This approach revealed four pivotal thematic clusters, which were discussed based on content analysis: (1) operations research and strategy formulation, (2) behavioral studies and collaborative approaches, (3) dynamic performance management, and (4) systems thinking for sustainable development. The findings reveal a diverse and interdisciplinary trajectory of SD research, reflecting its integration into a broad array of fields and its potential to inform both theoretical and practical applications. The paper concludes by providing targeted recommendations for future SD research, with a particular emphasis on enhancing management and organizational studies through the incorporation of SD methodologies. This includes the potential for SD to influence the design of adaptive strategies, the use of SD in participatory policymaking, and the application of SD tools in promoting organizational learning and sustainability.

AbstractThis paper assesses the impact of pegging the CFA franc to the euro – at a fixed parity – on real GDP per capita in the West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU) and the Central African Economic and Monetary Community (CAEMC) countries. Using a set of 35 annual country-level panel data from 1980 to 2019, we apply the 'bias-corrected’ synthetic control estimators to create a 'synthetic country’ (a counterfactual) for each treated CFA country. The counterfactual is a weighted average of comparable countries that best reproduces the initial trends or characteristics of the treated country before the treatment occurs. Except for Equatorial Guinea, which shows a significant positive difference between its real GDP per capita and counterfactual, our results suggest that, overall, there is no statistical evidence that real GDP per capita has increased relative to what it would have been in the absence of the pegging of the CFA to a hard currency following France’s accession to the eurozone.

Increased hygiene behavior may be a factor in the development of contaminationrelated obsessive-compulsive symptoms (C-OCS). We aimed at investigating (1) the course of C-OCS over 1 year after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic and (2) the effects of changes in hand hygiene (i.e., duration and frequency of handwashing) and related distress regulation on the long-term course of C-OCS. In a longitudinal study, we assessed 1,220 individuals from the German general population at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic (t1), 3 months later (t2), and 12 months later (t3). Pre-pandemic data were available in a subsample from 2014 (n = 430). A decrease in C-OCS over the first year of the pandemic emerged with a small effect size. Thirty-six percent of the participants scored above the clinical cut-off score at t1, 31% at t2, and 27% at t3. In 2014, only 11% scored above the clinical cut-off score. Hierarchical regression showed that C-OCS at t1 was the strongest predictor of a long-term increase in C-OCS. With small effect sizes, change in the duration (not frequency) of handwashing from t1 to t2, as well as the distress-reducing effect of handwashing served as additional predictors. Implications for information on hand hygiene guidelines are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research examines the effect of economic uncertainties on bank stability in ASEAN-8 countries. We use estimations with fixed effects for a panel dataset of bank stability, bank characteristics, banking system characteristics, and macroeconomic uncertainties from 2010 to 2020. Geopolitical risk (GPR), economic policy uncertainty (EPU), climate policy uncertainty (CPU), world pandemic uncertainty (WPU), global supply chain pressure (GSCP), and monetary policy uncertainty (MPU) are used as proxies for economic uncertainty (MU) in this research. We find that although an increase in macroeconomic uncertainties weakens bank stability, GPR is positively related to bank stability. An alternative measurement of bank stability, endogenous tests, and quantile regression corroborate our primary findings. Further analyses focus on the heterogeneous influence of macroeconomic uncertainties on bank stability with diversified bank specifics and the country's financial openness. Our paper supplies deep insights for bank managers and macro policymakers in the ASEAN region relevant to the effect of macroeconomic uncertainties on bank stability. Most crucially, experimental results from this research enrich a wealth of knowledge about the regional banking industry's stability; they are the basis for the establishment of bank strategies and macroprudential policies geared to managing the increased macro-unpredictability.

Increased hygiene behavior may be a factor in the development of contamination-related obsessive-compulsive symptoms (C-OCS). We aimed at investigating (1) the course of C-OCS over 1 year after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic and (2) the effects of changes in hand hygiene (i.e., duration and frequency of handwashing) and related distress regulation on the long-term course of C-OCS. In a longitudinal study, we assessed 1,220 individuals from the German general population at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic (t1), 3 months later (t2), and 12 months later (t3). Pre-pandemic data were available in a subsample from 2014 (n = 430). A decrease in C-OCS over the first year of the pandemic emerged with a small effect size. Thirty-six percent of the participants scored above the clinical cut-off score at t1, 31% at t2, and 27% at t3. In 2014, only 11% scored above the clinical cut-off score. Hierarchical regression showed that C-OCS at t1 was the strongest predictor of a long-term increase in C-OCS. With small effect sizes, change in the duration (not frequency) of handwashing from t1 to t2, as well as the distress-reducing effect of handwashing served as additional predictors. Implications for information on hand hygiene guidelines are discussed.

This paper aims to research the organizational factors influencing the implementation of energy efficiency measures in companies. The analysis was performed on a sample of companies from Serbia included in the World Bank Enterprise Survey. The raw data collected by the World Bank were utilized to analyze the correlation between various organizational factors and the adoption of energy efficiency measures. The analysis revealed a statistically significant correlation between management maturity and the implementation of energy efficiency measures in companies. These findings suggest that improving energy efficiency is not an isolated process but rather closely related to the maturity of management practices, highlighting the importance of comprehensive organizational development for achieving optimal energy management.

The primary use of futures is hedging risk. Traders in the spot market can hedge certain risks through the futures market. With the development of the futures market, the arbitrage transactions around futures have attracted increasingly attention. The aim of this paper is to establish an innovative and unique pairs trading framework, and use it to test the effectiveness of China's futures market. The framework for pairs trading is based on cointegration test, Kalman filter and Hurst index filtering. We use the data of 47 commodities with relatively good liquidity in the Chinese commodity futures market. We apply the representative index of China's commodity futures market, ''Wenhua Commodity Index'' as the benchmark, to evaluate the performance of the strategy and compare it with the benchmark model. This study found that, according to the pairs trading framework, after considering transaction costs, the cumulative return in the sample reached 81%, the cumulative return out of the sample was 21%. It is worth noting that the out-of-sample maximum drawdown achieved excellent results of no more than 1%. In the same period, trading the Wenhua Commodity Index with a ''buy and hold'' strategy achieved a gain of 31%, but with maximum drawdown reached 15%. The values of our paper are, first it proves that Chinese commodity futures market is not a weak-form efficient market, because technical analysis based on machine learning could obtain excess returns. Second, this research combines the theory and practice of statistical arbitrage, which also provides guiding significance for investment practice.

Real estate market analysis can involve many aspects. One of them is the study of the influence of various factors on prices and property values. For this type of issues, different kinds of measures and statistical models are often used. Many of them do not give unambiguous results. One of the reasons for this is the fact that the real estate market is characterized by the concept of local markets, which may be affected in different ways by economic, social, technical, environmental and other factors. Incorporating the influence of local markets, otherwise known as submarkets, into models often helps improve the precision of mass real estate valuation results. The delineation of submarket boundaries can be done in several different ways. One tool that is helpful in these types of situations are geographically weighted regression (GWR) models. The problem that may arise when using such models is related to the nature of some market factors, which may be of a qualitative nature. Because neighborhoods of individual properties may lack variability in terms of some variables, estimating GWR models is significantly difficult or impossible.

Aim/purpose – Multiple factors affect a passenger’s origin and destination airport choice. This study explores some of the leading indicators associated with performance in cities with more than one airport. Two important Multi-Airport Systems (MAS) in Brazil were the object of this study: São Paulo (Congonhas and Guarulhos) and Rio de Janeiro (Santos Dumont and Galeão), the most significant demand-generating centers in the country and the most critical distribution centers of flights from South America.

The effect of proximity to a transit system on property values has become a key issue of debate regarding public infrastructure and economic development. This article aims to examine the impact of selected stations along the Blue line of Delhi Mass Rapid Transit System (MRTS) on commercial property prices. The research analyzed 1,413 commercial property parcels sold before and after the commissioning of Blue line in 2005. Hedonic Price Analysis (HPA) was used to estimate the effects of proximity to the metro rail on commercial property values. The method was applied to two time periods, i.e., from 2000-2004 and 2005-2008, coinciding with planning and construction (pre-commissioning phase and the operation phase (post-commissioning phase) of metro rail using actual sale prices of commercial units. The results indicate that a station node shows a negative trend during the planning and construction period. However, the operation period has produced a significant price premium associated with commercial properties, connected with improved accessibility. The coefficients indicate that MRTS has induced an increase in prices from INR 732.80 to INR 246.19, and its radius of impact covers an area of approximately 1/2 km from the stations. The methodology and results provide insight with a specific focus on commercial real estate values in other metropolitan cities developing and expanding MRTSs.

Diaspora investment flows measured as foreign direct investments represent one of the major outcomes of the activities of diaspora investors, entrepreneurs, and venture capitalists in the economy. This paper contributes to the literature with distinct analysis of diaspora investment flows in low interest rate environments (Canada, Denmark, Euro area, Japan, Korea Republic, Sweden and the US) and high interest rate environments (Brazil, China, Colombia, India, Indonesia, Mexico and Turkey). First, we employ the Bounds cointegration analysis to investigate whether diaspora investment integrates either of the two groups of economies. Second, we apply the Toda-Yamamoto causality approach to examine whether the interest rate environment causes diaspora investment inflows. Third, we employ the Autoregressive Distributed Lag-Mixed Data Sampling (ADL-MIDAS) technique to evaluate the role of macroeconomic performance for attracting diaspora investments. We find proof of financial integration of diaspora investments in all the low interest rate economies, whereas the evidence is limited to three countries in the high interest rate environment. We also find that the low interest rate environment (more than the high interest rate environment) engenders diaspora investment inflows and also enhances the positive impact of macroeconomic performance in attracting diaspora investments. We highlight some insightful investment and policy implications from the findings.

This paper analyses correlations between several organizational characteristics and product/process innovations in enterprises in Serbia. We used the World Bank Enterprise Survey data on 339 small, medium, and large companies from various industries. Many of the factors analysed in this study are consistent with theoretical conclusions in the literature on this topic and relate to organizational maturity. Also, factors such as the size of the company and the industry to which it belongs were analysed. For correlations testing, the Chi-square correlation coefficient and the Cramer’s V test were used. The analysis revealed correlations between innovativeness and many organizational characteristics. However, in some cases, contrary to theoretical claims, correlations were not confirmed. We found that the introduction of new products and/or processes in the company is influenced by business strategy, production targets, number of performance indicators monitored, establishment of quality management system, formal training programs for company’s full-time employees, ease of achieving the company’s production targets, level of awareness of management and employees about the company’s production targets, spending on research and development activities within the company, and acquisition of external knowledge, way of promoting non-managers in a company, time frame of the company’s production targets, company’s size and main market.

The tradition of communicating with ghosts is deeply rooted in various belief systems around the world. The motif of supernatural encounters recurs in numerous myths, legends, and ballads, functioning as one of the human universals, embraced among all kinds of communities. Ghosts were believed to have a profound impact on the realm of the living not only in terms of action but also feelings; their appearance evoked a wide array of sensations: fear, moroseness, or apprehension, but also comfort and an uncanny sense of protection. Yet, numerous nineteenth-century sceptics pointed out the potential dangers of spiritualism, concentrating on the emerging spiritualist subculture. The article aims to explore the way spiritualism in Victorian Britain was described by the contemporary media. By looking at the textual and pictorial excerpts from the press, I argue that nineteenth-century spiritualism, commonly associated with the haunting imagery of spectral encounters, cautionary tales, or even romantic stories of reunions, was formed mostly by the proponents of the movement. By examining Victorian mainstream visual culture and articles from magazines, I trace the media’s critical responses to the issue of alleged spiritual meetings. Such an analysis of sources may provide a fuller and deeper understanding of the portrayal of spiritualism, especially among Victorian opponents of the movement

• OCD logically would be expected to be impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic situation, including due to commonality of contamination/washing symptoms. • Longitudinal data in clinical settings suggested marked symptom worsening in 20–65 % of OCD patients; but that not all patients experience a worsening, and some experience improvement. • Cross-sectional data from general population studies implicated trait compulsivity and pandemic-related stress in OCD symptoms during the pandemic. • Studies should examine neuropsychiatric sequelae of Covid-19; and they should incorporate validated measures to quantify emergence/worsening of OCD symptoms. There has been much speculation about untoward effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on psychological symptoms. OCD may be expected to be especially impacted. Our aim was to distil the current evidence base on relationships between the pandemic and obsessive-compulsive symptoms, in patients, and general population samples. We conducted a rapid scoping review, in the form of a systematic literature search, coupled with narrative review. 32 relevant papers were identified. (1) A sizable proportion of people with OCD (but not all) experienced/reported symptom worsening during the pandemic, especially during initial restrictions (approximately 20–65 % of cases in longitudinal studies); (2) contamination/washing symptoms appeared particularly susceptible; and (3) OCD symptoms in general population samples were associated with trait compulsivity and pandemic-related-stress. The literature was heterogeneous with various methodological issues being commonplace. The review identified important unaddressed issues: how should exposure based therapy be adapted during pandemics? How can we minimise harm from exacerbation of OCD in vulnerable individuals arising from public health messaging? Why do some but not all OCD patients experience worsening? And does Covid-19 infection affect (or lead to) OCD symptoms? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The fascinating thing about the 'finding that the measures taken to contain this pandemic in the transport system have, on the one hand, achieved in a very short time precisely those effects that qualified transport scientists have been demanding from politicians for decades and, on the other hand, the fact that it has not been possible to realize the same successes in the transport system without C19, although human lives, hygiene and health are at stake in both areas. Unfortunately, little is known about the origin of C19. In the Corona crisis, one also recognizes the importance of certain self-sufficiency, not only for medical care and equipment. The relationship between C19 and the transport system is closer than one would think. C19 is the result of the thoughtless intrusion of humans into nature, which was no longer respected in its intrinsic value, but devalued to the object of marketing. The most effective measure against car addiction is to prevent the "docking" of the car to the home and all other places of human activity. This measure has been shown to be most effective in combating viral infections. The measures to be taken are; 1. car-free settlements and sanctions, 2. speed limits and effective control, 3. technical measures to minimise the risks of the remaining car traffic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research background: Lesser Poland is one of the most visited regions in Poland. Among the reasons why it is so, there are a variety of attractions located in this voivodeship and also the activities taken by local government, for which the development of the tourism industry is one of the key goals.

This paper discusses the causal relationships among posted content types, the number of reached individuals and follower counts of a Facebook brand page by investigating the communication forms of a Hungarian Twitch.tv live streamer. The Kolmogorov-Smirnov test for the analyses’ distributional properties is followed by the Kruskal-Wallis H test, which determines significant differences in content types in terms of their total reach, reaction, comment and share counts. The Kendall’s tau-b tests are performed for the examination of interrelationships among the retrieved Facebook metrics. Furthermore, mediation analysis is conducted, wherein the antecedent role is taken by post type, the follower count appears as a consequent variable and the total reach count takes the mediator role in the proposed model. The results of the analysis conclude that the analysed Facebook metrics display statistically significant, strong and positive correlations with one another; additionally, post type has a strong, significant and direct influence on reached individuals and although they do not show a significant, direct influence on follower count, they display a significant, total effect on it. The paper thereby contributes to the existing online brand personality and gaming research, offering value to the research domain of online marketing and communication as well.

Risk and return are key concepts in financial science and are actually considered to be the two sides of the investment coin. Since Islamic finance instruments are emerging tools in Islamic countries, especially in Iranian capital market, identifying the risks of these instruments and, consequently, the expected return from investment by investors due to the risks associated with these tools is significant. Thus this study, through examining the risks associated with manfa’at sukuk, tries to examine the relationship between risk and return from manfa’at sukuk using factor models. In this paper, the model of the expected rate of return for manfa’at sukuk has been investigated while considering the risks of these securities. The statistical population of this research is the issued sukuk, which is based on assets, i.e ejareh and manfa’at sukuk in Iran’s modern financial tools market, from 1393 to 1397, whose data are available and accessible.

We propose a novel approach to deal with the problem of indeterminacy in linear rational expectations models. The method consists of augmenting the original state space with a set of auxiliary exogenous equations to provide the adequate number of explosive roots in presence of indeterminacy. The solution in this expanded state space, if it exists, is always determinate, and is identical to the indeterminate solution of the original model. The proposed approach accommodates determinacy and any degree of indeterminacy, and it can be implemented even when the boundaries of the determinacy region are unknown. Thus, the researcher can estimate the model using standard software packages without restricting the estimates to the determinacy region. We combine our solution method with a novel hybrid Metropolis–Hastings algorithm to estimate the New–Keynesian model with rational bubbles by Galí (2021) over the period 1982:Q4–2007:Q3. We find that the data support the presence of two degrees of indeterminacy, implying that the central bank was not reacting strongly enough to the bubble component. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The complexity of multi-component real properties results from the possibility of identifying various components in legal, physical or functional terms. The possibility of distinguishing various functional elements of real properties, combined with the specificity resulting from their market properties, is problematic when applying the comparative approach to real estate valuation. In this case, the valuation procedure can be implemented using statistical models: the parametric model or the conditional one.

The relative importance of key state-level outcomes upon U.S. national corn and soybean production was examined using correlated component regression, a recently developed regression technique for application to multicollinear and sparse data sets. Standardized coefficients were used to rank the states' relative importance. A Herfindahl-Hirschman Index was used to measure the degree of concentration among the top ranked states. The empirical analysis looked at two time periods: a pre-Genetic Modification (1975–1995) and a post-Genetic Modification (1996–2017) period. The results indicate that U.S. corn production is becoming less geographically concentrated in terms of state-level importance while the opposite holds true for soybean production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Real estate valuation is carried out correctly if it takes into account all the conditions occurring on a given market at the time of its performance. One of the important determinants of correct valuation is the proper determination of the land use class of the property being valued. It is equally important to find similar properties with the same land use classes as the property subjected to valuation. This does not pose a problem when a property is located within an area with one specific land use zone. If, however, its land use zoning is not homogeneous, finding similar properties may be difficult.

This paper analyses how mortgage borrower liquidity constraints and home equity drive the realized loss rates given default using loan-level data. We define defaulted loans with zero loss as cures and those with non-zero loss as non-cures. We find economically that borrower liquidity constraints and positive equity explain cure, while negative equity explains non-zero loss. The findings provide an important economic-rationale for a separation of the cure and loss processes in mortgage loss models and their applications such as loan pricing and bank capital regulation. The results have great relevance for the multi-trillion dollar mortgage industry for a more efficient capital allocation, better mortgage pricing and more forward-looking loan loss provisioning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the analysis of dependence in financial markets started a century ago, there is still room for new work, both because statistical methods continue to de developed, allowing stronger and more robust analysis, and because more and more data is available. In this context, we propose to make a deep analysis of the Swiss stock market, one of the most important financial centres in the world, studying the main index and also 19 of its 20 components. We use detrended fluctuation analysis, which allows us to analyse the existence of long-term dependence in a given variable. As our objective is to analyse the evolution of that dependence over time, we use a sliding windows approach. The results show that several of the analysed stocks have a behaviour which is not consistent with the absence of dependence, which could be informative for actual and potential investors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]