Are VAT reforms an effective tool for promoting culture? A quasi-experiment in Spain

Sponsoring culture is a long-term profit-generating investment that public policy makers can achieve by means of Pigouvian subsidy or tax schemes. This paper evaluates the effectiveness of the three VAT reforms implemented between 2012 and 2018 (one tax raise reform and two tax cut reforms) in the cultural sector in Spain. We first provide visual evidence and empirical estimates of the tax shifting and the distribution of the VAT burden between consumers and producers. We then use a regression discontinuity design to assess the causal effects of these VAT reforms on performing acts and cinema consumption (both in the extensive and the intensive margin). Several interesting findings arise from our results. First, we find that producers only passed through 45% of the VAT cut to consumer prices. Second, the effect of the 2017 VAT reduction on performing arts slightly increased the number of households consuming these cultural services, whereas the 2018 tax cut on cinema had no significant effect in the number of moviegoers (extensive margin). Third, the cultural spending per household conditional on participation (intensive margin) increased after the two VAT rate reductions. Finally, we test for asymmetries in pass-through with respect to the 2012 tax raise and we find (i) no evidence of prices responding more strongly to increases than to decreases in VAT, (ii) a symmetric response of the number of households consuming these cultural services, and (iii) an asymmetric response of the average cultural spending conditional on participation.     

Lagging behind in suburbia: Suburban versus urban newcomers’ employment settlement service outcomes in Metro Vancouver,Canada

Suburbanization is reshaping the context of immigrant settlement in Canada. Newcomer immigrants are increasingly settling initially in suburban communities as opposed to traditional receiving neighborhoods in urban centers. However, the quality of settlement services for newcomers to suburban neighborhoods has lagged behind, creating a mismatch between newcomer settlement patterns and service provision. As settlement patterns are recognized as significant determinants of employment success for newcomers and employment achievement is a key theme of integration, this study compares suburban and urban newcomers’ satisfaction with employment settlement services, associated financial experiences and coping mechanisms. Drawing upon qualitative interviews with 43 newcomer immigrants in Vancouver and three surrounding suburbs, we argue that suburban newcomers experience more difficulties with employment services from settlement service agencies than do urban newcomers. Subsequent unemployment may contribute to suburban settlers experiencing greater difficulty paying their monthly bills than do urban immigrants.     

A population sample registry for public health survey investigations: methods,lessons, and successes

Public health relies on sample surveys to monitor the health of populations and investigate factors that contribute to population health and illness. Such investigations require surveying individuals who are selected in ways that support statistical inference to the population. Faced with rising costs and declining participation, survey researchers are exploring economical ways to recruit samples that validly represent larger populations. The current report describes an innovative resource, the Colorado Adult Population Sample–Survey Research Registry, which maintains survey access to respondents from a probability-based state health survey. We describe recruitment and retention strategies, explore representativeness, report several studies that used the registry, and discuss future directions.     

Task-based learning approaches for supporting the development of social science researchers’ critical data skills

Conducting social science research is a complex process, and social science students face a number of learning challenges in order to develop their skills. Moreover, new sources and types of data including so-called big data are providing new opportunities for research, but also pose methodological challenges. In this article, we explore a task-based learning approach for teaching social science research methods. We draw on evidence from two case study learning tasks: (i) the collection and analysis of Twitter data; and (ii) designing and conducting a face-to-face and online survey. The students were guided to co-lead the tasks, apply their knowledge and then to critically reflect. The pedagogical framework of task-based learning provides opportunities to embed learning in new ways by integrating knowledge, practice and critical reflection. Task-based learning can create a dynamic learning environment and can empower students to develop their identities as researchers.     

Young people's orientations to the future: navigating the present and imagining the future

This article discusses the findings of the Imagine Sheppey project (2013–2014) which studied how young people are ‘oriented’ towards the future. The aim and approach of the project were to explore future imaginaries in a participatory, experimental, and performative way. Working with young people in a series of arts-based workshops, we intervened in different environments to alter the space as an experience of change – temporal, material, and symbolic. We documented this process visually and made use of the images produced as the basis for elicitation in focus groups with a wider group of young people. In this article we discuss young people's future orientations through the themes of reach, resources, shape, and value. In so doing, we reflect on the paths that our young respondents traced to connect their presents to what is next, what we call their modes of present–future navigation. We explore the qualities and characteristics of their stances within a wider reflection about how young people approach, imagine, and account for the future.     

Experiences with systematic triangulation at the Global Environment Facility

Systematic triangulation may address common challenges in evaluation, such as the scarcity or unreliability of data, or the complexities of comparing and cross-checking evidence from diverse disciplines. Used to identify key evaluation findings, its application has proven to be effective in addressing the limitations encountered in country-level evaluation analysis conducted by the Independent Evaluation Office of the Global Environment Facility (GEF). These include the scarcity or unreliability of national statistics on environmental indicators and data series, especially in Least Developed Countries; challenges in evaluating the impacts of GEF projects; and inherent difficulties in defining the GEF portfolio of projects prior to the undertaking of the evaluation. In addition to responding to the need for further developing triangulation protocols, procedures and/or methodologies advocated by some authors, the approach offers a contribution to evaluation practice. This applies particularly to those evaluation units tasked with country-level evaluations in international organizations, facing similar constraints.     

Difference-based Methods for Truncating the Singular Value Decomposition

Given a noisy time series (or signal), one may wish to remove the noise from the observed series. Assuming that the noise-free series lies in some low-dimensional subspace of rank r, a common approach is to embed the noisy time series into a Hankel trajectory matrix. The singular value decomposition is then used to deconstruct the Hankel matrix into a sum of rank-one components. We wish to demonstrate that there may be some potential in using difference-based methods of the observed series in order to provide guidance regarding the separation of the noise from the signal, and to estimate the rank of the low-dimensional subspace in which the true signal is assumed to lie.     

真实性学习理念下的教学方法及实践应用

本文分享了作者在美国研修期间亲身经历的体现真实性学习理念的三种教学方法与活动:同伴教学、跨时空对话、视频制作。通过真实再现纽约州立大学奥斯威戈分校研修课堂精彩片段,分析教学方法与原理,并探讨在国内高校尤其是教师教育课堂的应用途径。