Mass-mediated surveillance: borders,mobility, and reality television

This article analyzes the social construction of border surveillance and policing in reality-based television. Utilizing content analytic methods to document and decode popular images of borders, mobility, and insecurity, it assesses three programs from Australia, the UK, and the United States. Despite claims of offering accurate and unfiltered depictions, the programs are ideological and provide visions of enforcement that reinforce stereotypes regarding the risks of permeable borders and exonerate intensive regimes of surveillance and securitization. Our findings suggest this occurs in three ways. First, the programs inflate the extent and seriousness of lawlessness associated with cross-border movement. Second, they offer individualistic explanations of crime that cite personal choices and pathologies as determinants. Finally, alongside neglecting their perspectives and interpretations of events, when compared to the reality of official statistics, the programs disproportionately feature suspected offenders as members of marginalized groups. The social and political implications of these findings are discussed.     

Approximate Bayesianity of Frequentist Confidence Intervals for a Binomial Proportion

The well-known Wilson and Agresti–Coull confidence intervals for a binomial proportion p are centered around a Bayesian estimator. Using this as a starting point, similarities between frequentist confidence intervals for proportions and Bayesian credible intervals based on low-informative priors are studied using asymptotic expansions. A Bayesian motivation for a large class of frequentist confidence intervals is provided. It is shown that the likelihood ratio interval for p approximates a Bayesian credible interval based on Kerman’s neutral noninformative conjugate prior up to O(n^{? 1}) in the confidence bounds. For the significance level α ? 0.317, the Bayesian interval based on the Jeffreys’ prior is then shown to be a compromise between the likelihood ratio and Wilson intervals. Supplementary materials for this article are available online.     

The influence function of the optimal bandwidth for kernel density estimation

Theories about the bandwidth of kernel density estimation have been well established by many statisticians. However, the influence function of the bandwidth has not been well investigated. The influence function of the optimal bandwidth that minimizes the mean integrated square error is derived and the asymptotic property of the bandwidth selectors based on the influence function is provided.     

t-Type corrected-loss estimation for error-in-variable model

In this article, we consider a linear model in which the covariates are measured with errors. We propose a t-type corrected-loss estimation of the covariate effect, when the measurement error follows the Laplace distribution. The proposed estimator is asymptotically normal. In practical studies, some outliers that diminish the robustness of the estimation occur. Simulation studies show that the estimators are resistant to vertical outliers and an application of 6-minute walk test is presented to show that the proposed method performs well.     

Extended scaled prediction variance optimality for modified central composite design

Robust parameter designs (RPDs) enable the experimenter to discover how to modify the design of the product to minimize the effect due to variation from noise sources. The aim of this article is to show how this amount of work can be reduced under modified central composite design (MCCD). We propose a measure of extended scaled prediction variance (ESPV) for evaluation of RPDs on MCCD. Using these measures, we show that we can check the error or bias associated with estimating the model parameters and suggest the values of α recommended for MCCS under minimum ESPV.     

人口受教育程度对居民消费的影响研究--基于动态面板分位数回归法

本文采用1996～2015年的31个省市自治区宏观数据,使用动态面板分位数回归方法研究人口受教育程度和居民消费的数量关系。研究结果表明,人口受教育程度对消费有着较为显著的影响,且人口受教育程度对中等消费支出水平的影响略大于高、低消费支出水平的影响,这说明中等消费水平的居民消费受到人口受教育程度的影响更加敏感和有弹性。另外,模型中其他各解释变量系数在各分位数上的差异不大,说明这些影响因素对于不同消费支出水平的消费影响没有太明显差异。     

公共服务供给机制创新:北欧的改革实践与启示

提供公共服务是政府的主要任务。供应与生产的区分,说明政府不可能也没必要包揽所有的公共服务。北欧各国按照事权财权匹配和公共服务效率原则,通过建立和完善府际责任分担、公共财政保障、公私伙伴合作、公众参与提供、服务质量监督等机制,从而有效地满足了公共服务需求。他们的成功实践启示我们:公共服务制度的建立和完善,必须合理划分各级政府公共服务责任,建立以公共服务为导向的公共财政支出体系,充分发挥社会和民间力量在提供公共服务方面的作用。     

从“凯恩斯效应”到“阿米曲线”——政府规模与经济增长关系的非线性转向

政府规模与经济增长之间的关系问题是宏观经济研究中的核心问题之一.关于两者关系的传统研究往往以线性假定为基础,所以实证结果出现了巨大的差异.这种现象促使研究者从非线性角度重新审视政府规模与经济增长之间的关系.“巴罗法则”在内生增长框架内为政府规模与经济增长关系研究提供了一个标准的分析框架,揭示了两者之间的倒“U”关系.而“Armey曲线”不仅非常直观地表达了政府规模与经济增长之间的非线性关系,同时还指出这种非对称关系的非对称性质,具有很强的总结性和政策指导意义.     

内生与杂糅视野下的古埃及文明起源

关于古代埃及文明的起源,埃及学家和相关学科的学者们一直试图给出一个明确的答案;但是由于保存下来的文物极度匮乏,加之它涉及古代埃及与西亚、黑非洲之间的关系,这一问题始终没有明确的结论。许多欧美学者试图证明埃及文明的"北来说";与此同时,非洲和美国黑人学者则极力强调古代埃及文明的黑非洲性质。探讨古代埃及文明的起源不仅涉及对考古发掘物和古代文献的阐释,而且还受到欧洲中心论、白人优越论、黑人身份认同等因素的影响。近年来在埃及、利凡特、努比亚等地的考古发掘表明,古代埃及文明是一种原生文明,同时它又受到来自埃及以北和以南两个方向的影响,正是这种内生与杂糅的双重性造就了古代埃及文明大一统和分而治之两种趋势之间彼此较量与相互调和的事实。     

中国养老保险缴费对消费和储蓄的影响

考虑到家庭可能面临信贷约束,同时可能有目标储蓄的动机,当期养老金缴费可能会减少当期可支配收入,进而抑制消费,并可能提高储蓄率。使用城镇住户调查2002—2009年9省市的数据,利用养老保险缴费率和养老保险参与率的城市差别随时间的变化,构建家庭养老金缴费的工具变量,实证研究发现:在2006年之前,尽管增加养老保险覆盖率本身有助于刺激消费,在给定缴费前的收入水平以及养老保险覆盖状态时,提高养老金缴费率会显著抑制缴费家庭的消费。另外,养老保险缴费负担对总消费的影响主要也是负面的。