Institutional factors,government policies and appropriate technologies

Traditionally the use of inappropriate technologies in the developing countries has been explained by the existence of factor price distortions, e.g. the price of labor being artificially raised by labor legislation, and the price of capital being reduced by subsidies and unrealistic exchange rates. In reality the technological choice is often determined by economic conditions and the local sociocultural/political conditions. The institutional framework of the country may discourage the appropriate technology. The obstacles can be overcome when the following conditions are met: 1) a national consensus about the need for development efforts and importance of policy goals; 2) promising market prospects and/or an effective marketing system; and, 3) sufficient industrial competition in both home and international markets. Institutional problems come from the generation and diffusion of technologies from the supply side which are introduced to people who do not see the need for them. More emphasis on the marketing side ususally results in application of correct technology, especially where governments fund research and development projects and formulate their plans on the basis of a concrete investment or production plan and a clear idea about the target market. Land reforms and agricultural price policies are needed as well as the establishment of an efficient national administrative network.     

WHAT DO BRITISH HISTORICAL DATA TELL US ABOUT GOVERNMENT SPENDING MULTIPLIERS?

British data from the early 1700s through World War I reflect the results of numerous high‐quality natural experiments of government spending. Britain frequently participated in wars, increasing military spending massively. Wartime distortions were relatively limited because the government generally adopted tax smoothing policy and rarely implemented interventions. Government spending multiplier estimates are low or negative and significantly below unity. This paper finds no evidence that the multiplier was higher in the slack state than in the normal state. (JEL E32, E62)     

The COVID‐19 Pandemic and Families in Japan

This paper, which is authored by members of the Japanese Association of Family Therapy (JAFT), describes the COVID‐19 pandemic in Japan from a family systems perspective. The authors are active members of JAFT and include current and past presidents and officers. We describe the course of the pandemic and the ways in which government policies to mitigate the pandemic have affected Japanese families. Challenges that affect Japanese families include the inability to participate in family and social rituals, prescribed gender roles that specifically affect women, high suicide rates, and prejudice against those who are at risk of spreading the infection. The need to shelter in place has also forced family homes to function as a workplace for parents, classrooms for children, and day care services for frail elders, which has resulted in psychological distress among individuals and conflicts among families. We discuss ways that therapists have worked with Japanese families using online therapy.     

Robust Bayesian model selection for variable clustering with the Gaussian graphical model

Statistics and Computing - Variable clustering is important for explanatory analysis. However, only few dedicated methods for variable clustering with the Gaussian graphical model have been...     

Development and evaluation of the physical activity questionnaire for elderly Japanese: the Nakanojo study

The Physical Activity Questionnaire for Elderly Japanese (PAQ-EJ) is a self-administered physical activity questionnaire for elderly Japanese; the authors report here on its repeatability and direct and indirect validity. Reliability was assessed by repeat administration after 1 month. Direct validation was based on accelerometer data collected every 4 s for 1 month in 147 individuals age 65-85 years. Indirect validation against a 10-item Barthel index (activities of daily living [ADL]) was completed in 3,084 individuals age 65-99 years. The test-retest coefficient was high (r = .64-.71). Total and subtotal scores for lower (transportation, housework, and labor) and higher intensity activities (exercise/sports) were significantly correlated with step counts and durations of physical activity <3 and >or=3 METs (r = .41, .28, .53), respectively. Controlling for age and ADL, scores for transportation, exercise/sports, and labor were greater in men, but women performed more housework. Sex- and ADL- or age-adjusted PAQ-EJ scores were significantly lower in older and dependent people. PAQ-EJ repeatability and validity seem comparable to those of instruments used in Western epidemiological studies.     

Functional benefit of power training for older adults

Aging leads to significant losses in muscle mass, strength, and the ability to independently perform activities of daily living (ADL). Typically, standard resistance training (RT) has been used to reduce these losses in function by maintaining or even increasing muscle strength in older adults. Increasing strength does not necessarily, however, result in an increase in the ability to perform ADL. There is now research suggesting that muscle power is more closely associated with the performance of ADL than muscle strength is, so training for muscle power might lead to more beneficial results in functional performance. This review of studies investigating the effect of training on ADL performance in older adults indicated that standard RT is effective in increasing strength in older adults, but power training that contains high-velocity contractions might be a more optimal means of training older adults when the emphasis is on increasing the performance of ADL.     

Meaningful learning in weighted voting games: an experiment

In April 2013, all of the major academic publishing houses moved thousands of journal titles to an original hybrid model, under which authors of accepted papers can choose between an expensive open access (OA) track and the traditional track available only to subscribers. This paper argues that authors might now use a publication strategy as a quality signaling device. The imperfect information game between authors and readers presents several types of Perfect Bayesian Equilibria, including a separating equilibrium in which only authors of high-quality papers are driven toward the open access track. The publishing house should choose an open-access publication fee that supports the emergence of the highest return equilibrium. Journal structures will evolve over time according to the journals’ accessibility and quality profiles.     

Social security reform ideas in Japan

Japan has a complex social security system. This article discusses the demographic and economic situation in Japan as background for understanding the setting in which the social security system functions. Japan has a three-pillar system for retirement income. The first pillar is the social security pension plan; the second pillar is the voluntary occupational pension plan; and the third pillar is personal savings, including the personal pension plan. The most important part of the retirement income system is the social security pension plan, which paid benefits accounting for 64% of the total income of elderly households in 1998. The five Employees' Pension Plans are established on a compulsory social insurance basis. Most large Japanese employers have a mandatory retirement age. Over 90% of all employees, including public sector ones, must retire from their career jobs at age 60.     

Time-based goal chasing method for mixed-model assembly line problem with multiple work stations

In sequencing problems for mixed-model assembly line in JIT production system, the Goal Chasing method (GC) is widely used for parts used leveling goal. The difference in assembly time of each product is not taken into consideration in the Goal Chasing method. Assembly time usually varies with product types. In recent years, the Time-Based Goal Chasing method (TBGC) has been proposed. The advantage of TBGC is to consider the influence of different assembly time of each product and idle time in production period. TBGC, however, has been only applied to single work station problems. In this paper, TBGC is applied to an assembly line problem with multiple work stations. Furthermore, the sequencing method and use of Simulated Annealing (SA) or Local Search (LS) for this problem are proposed.