infonet-economy

Bern will angeblich Daten von reichen Amerikanern an die US-Steuerbehörde weitergeben, die Konten bei der UBS haben. Bankenexperte Hans Geiger bezweifelt, dass dies dem Bankgeheimnis schadet.

Central examinations—that is, centrally set and marked exams—have often been discussed as an instrument for improving educational outcomes. The aim of our study was to determine whether central exams have an impact not only on educational but also on labour market outcomes. We explain school quality choice through the incentives created by central exams vs. non-central exams and...

We present a model of structural change due to non-linear Engel-curves for consumer goods. Goods are sequentially introduced starting out as a luxury with high income elasticity and ending up as a necessity with low income elasticity. Although this leads to rising and falling sectoral employment shares, the model exhibits a steady growth path along which the Kaldor facts are...

Recent neuroimaging findings suggest a role of the extrastriate body area (EBA) in self/other distinction and in the perception of pain and emotions in others. The present functional magnetic resonance imaging study investigated whether EBA is modulated by the perception of pain in others. Participants were scanned during 2 consecutive sessions: 1) a localizer task precisely...

This paper analyses the equilibrium effects of individual information filters. Information is modelled as advertisements which are distributed across a population of consumers with heterogeneous preferences. An advertisement that provides knowledge about a product with little or no utility for a consumer is considered junk. Filters are characterised by their level of tolerance. The...

This study uses Markowitz mean-variance portfolio theory with forecasted data for the years 2005 to 2035 to determine efficient electricity generating technology mixes for Switzerland. The SURE procedure has been applied to filter out the systematic components of the covariance matrix. Results indicate that risk-averse electricity users in 2035 gain in terms of higher expected return...

In this study, Markowitz mean-variance portfolio theory is applied to electricity-generating technologies of the United States and Switzerland. Both an investor (focused on changes in return) and a current user (focused on return in levels) view are adopted to determine efficient frontiers of electricity generation technologies in terms of expected return and risk as of 2003. Since...

I discuss how poverty decomposition methods relate to integral approximation, which is the foundation of decomposition of the temporal change of a quantity into key drivers. This offers a common framework for the different decomposition methods used in the literature, claries their often somewhat unclear theoretical underpinning and
identifes the methods'shortcomings. In...