Latin American convergence and divergence towards the mortality profiles of developed countries

It is uncertain whether Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) countries are approaching a single mortality regime. Over the last three decades, LAC has experienced major public health interventions and the highest number of homicides in the world. However, these interventions and homicide rates are not evenly shared across countries. This study documents trends in life expectancy and lifespan variability for 20 LAC countries, 2000–14. By extending a previous method, we decompose differences in lifespan variability between LAC and a developed world benchmark into cause-specific effects. For both sexes, dispersion of amenable diseases through the age span makes the largest contribution to the gap between LAC and the benchmark. Additionally, for males, the concentration of homicides, accidents, and suicides in mid-life further impedes mortality convergence. Great disparity exists in the region: while some countries are rapidly approaching the developed regime, others remain far behind and suffer a clear disadvantage in population health.     

随机需求环境下联产品系统价格与产量决策研究

基于固定比例生产技术和多产品随机需求的情形,研究了联产品制造商的两阶段产量和价格联合优化模型。通过反向倒推的优化求解,得到了联产品制造商的最优产量和价格决策以及变化规律。同时研究了需求服从均匀分布时,需求波动对均衡的影响。研究结果表明,在订货成本较低和一种产品的需求波动性较大时,当另外一种产品的波动增大,则该产品的最优订货量增大,同时价格下降。借助数值仿真,分析了价格敏感度和产出比例对最优决策和利润的影响。结果表明,在给定一种产品的价格敏感度时,另外一种的价格敏感度越大,那么该产品的价格就越低,制造商的订货量就下降。当一种产品的产出比例固定时,另一种产品的产出比例上升时,则该产品的价格下降,制造商的订货量下降,总利润上升。     

审计定价管制与交易剩余——2010年审计定价管制失效的自然实验

在经济下行压力加大、资本市场进一步开放的新形势下,厘清审计市场交易——监管机制,完善审计服务市场尤为必要。借由2010 年审计定价管制政策失效的自然实验,本文通过嵌入双边随机边界模型,得到审计双方的定价交易剩余指标,运用双重差分模型解析价格管制与交易定价的作用机制。研究发现,定价管制失效的原因不在于规制俘获,而在于价格管制与当前的市场效率不匹配。下限管制尽管能够提高审计师剩余,但同时会放大交易定价风险,增加剩余的错配,扰乱交易秩序。上限管制则进一步固化市场的低价竞争。进一步研究发现审计师剩余与盈余质量显著相关,2014年的放开定价管制政策提高了审计师剩余。研究厘清了审计市场交易机制,有利于未来研究审计交易机制的微观影响及与盈余质量的关联,为在新时代把握审计市场交易——监管规律、培育自发良性交易的审计市场提供有益借鉴。     

LOG-PERIODOGRAM ESTIMATION OF LONG MEMORY VOLATILITY DEPENDENCIES WITH CONDITIONALLY HEAVY TAILED RETURNS

Many recent papers have used semiparametric methods, especially the log-periodogram regression, to detect and estimate long memory in the volatility of asset returns. In these papers, the volatility is proxied by measures such as squared, log-squared, and absolute returns. While the evidence for the existence of long memory is strong using any of these measures, the actual long memory parameter estimates can be sensitive to which measure is used. In Monte-Carlo simulations, I find that if the data is conditionally leptokurtic, the log-periodogram regression estimator using squared returns has a large downward bias, which is avoided by using other volatility measures. In United States stock return data, I find that squared returns give much lower estimates of the long memory parameter than the alternative volatility measures, which is consistent with the simulation results. I conclude that researchers should avoid using the squared returns in the semiparametric estimation of long memory volatility dependencies.     

Inference for the measurement of poverty in the presence of a stochastic weighting variable

Empirical applications of poverty measurement often have to deal with a stochastic weighting variable such as household size. Within the framework of a bivariate distribution function defined over income and weight, I derive the limiting distributions of the decomposable poverty measures and of the ordinates of stochastic dominance curves. The poverty line is allowed to depend on the income distribution. It is shown how the results can be used to test hypotheses concerning changes in poverty. The inference procedures are briefly illustrated using Belgian data. An erratum to this article can be found at     

半脆弱印刷数字有意义水印算法研究

数字水印技术是在数字作品中嵌入不明显的记号。该文分析了印刷品制作中包含数模-模数转换过程的特性,与数字水印技术相结合,将纯数字域的防伪手段应用到模拟领域中的印刷品上。将印刷品扫描打印过程作为失真信道进行建模分析,并在算法中加入预失真;比较了数字水印各算法,结合印刷品的特性采用并改进特征值分解的方法,嵌入和检测有意义水印,通过该水印对二次扫描打印印刷品脆弱不可检测,来达到防伪的要求。该算法相对于空域算法和其他变换域算法有复杂度低、检测准确度高的优势。     

高速SDRAM控制器设计的FPGA实现

同步动态存储器(SDRAM)控制器通常用有限状态机实现,对于一般的设计方法,由于状态数量多,状态转换通常伴随大的组合逻辑而影响运行速度,因此,SDRAM控制器的速度限制了SDRAM存储器的访问速度。该文从结构优化入手来优化方法,利用状态机分解的思想将大型SDRAM控制状态机用若干小的子状态机实现,达到简化逻辑的目的,不仅提高了速度还节省了资源,对该类大型SDRAM控制器的实现有一定参考意义。     

中国货币政策和财政政策相对有效性的实证研究

在我国由计划经济向市场经济的体制转轨过程中,货币政策和财政政策已成为我国宏观经济调节的主要手段,在我国的经济发展中发挥了重要作用。但货币政策和财政政策是各自独立的政策体系,由于作用的方式和条件有较大区别,其效果也有较大不同,文章试图应用脉冲响应函数和方差分解方法,对改革开放以来我国货币政策和财政政策的效果进行实证比较研究,并得出有关结论,为我国的宏观调控政策提供理论分析和实证检验的依据。     

Discrete time modelling of disease incidence time series by using Markov chain Monte Carlo methods

Summary.  A stochastic discrete time version of the susceptible–infected–recovered model for infectious diseases is developed. Disease is transmitted within and between communities when infected and susceptible individuals interact. Markov chain Monte Carlo methods are used to make inference about these unobserved populations and the unknown parameters of interest. The algorithm is designed specifically for modelling time series of reported measles cases although it can be adapted for other infectious diseases with permanent immunity. The application to observed measles incidence series motivates extensions to incorporate age structure as well as spatial epidemic coupling between communities.     

Finite Sample Performance in Cointegration Analysis of Nonlinear Time Series with Long Memory

Nonlinear functions of multivariate financial time series can exhibit long memory and fractional cointegration. However, tools for analysing these phenomena have principally been justified under assumptions that are invalid in this setting. Determination of asymptotic theory under more plausible assumptions can be complicated and lengthy. We discuss these issues and present a Monte Carlo study, showing that asymptotic theory should not necessarily be expected to provide a good approximation to finite-sample behavior.