7,437 research outputs found
Owner-occupied housing taxation: an equity evaluation of the UK and US tax systems.
No full textThis research identifies and quantifies horizontal and vertical inequities resulting from selected owner-occupied housing tax policies though micro-simulation. The simulations are spread sheet constructions underpinned by the respective UK and US tax systems. Within each country-specific simulation case families are established varying with regard to income levels and investment choices. The specific tax policies analysed are the acquisition taxes, property taxes, elements specific to housing affecting income taxes (i.e. mortgage interest relief) and capital gains taxes. In addition to the specific tax policies, the overall tax obligations (the sum of the four specific taxes) are considered. The time frame of the study is a twenty-year period from 1990 through 2009. A recurring theme in the literature is that homeowners ought to be taxed as investors in rental properties to ensure tenure neutrality or, alternatively, taxed as any other investor to ensure tax neutrality. This research considers the corresponding effects on horizontal and vertical equity by modifying the UK and US tax systems for increased levels of neutrality through further micro-simulation analysis. Finally, the respective owner-occupied housing tax policy changes and reforms that occurred within the twenty-year period studied are evaluated in terms of enhancements to or hindrances of horizontal and vertical equity. This is accomplished by simulating sixteen five-year periods within the twenty-year time frame and evaluating horizontal and vertical equity on a within-country and a cross- country basis. What appears to be lacking in the literature is an extensive comparative analysis of the specific owner-occupied housing tax policies and their interrelationship with respect to the complex overall tax system in which they are present. The aim of this research is to contribute to the middle/high range of comparative analytical work. The research is set within a comprehensive theoretical framework and systematically ii compares the two countries’ specific tax policies and their overall impact on the respective tax systems. The methodology used is consistent between the two countries, ensuring a robust dual-nation comparison. The US specific tax policies relevant to homeownership and the overall tax system were found to have greater inherent horizontal inequities when compared with the UK tax policies and tax system. Both countries’ specific tax systems were found to have varying inherent vertical inequities. The UK homeowner occupiers experience more vertical equity (progressivity) in the acquisition tax system when compared with the US investors. Conversely, the US homeowner occupiers experience more vertical equity (progressivity) in the property tax, income tax and capital gains tax systems. Overall, the US investors experience a more progressive tax system when compared directly with the UK investors. The abolition of the UK Mortgage Interest Relief at Source (MIRAS) resulted in a less progressive income tax system for homeowner occupiers but one that is more horizontally equitable with other investors. The erosion of the benefits realised from the US mortgage interest and real estate tax deductions has resulted in a more vertically and horizontally equitable income tax system for all but the most wealthy. Vertical equity was improved by the adoption of the UK council tax in that it is a less regressive form of property taxation when compared with its predecessor. The recent reforms to the UK stamp duty (land tax) have made the system of acquisition taxation more vertically equitable but have exacerbated the horizontal inequity of the system with respect to other capital investors. The US capital gains tax system as it relates to the homeowner occupier changed significantly with the Tax Reform Act of 1997, resulting in a simpler but less equitable system depending on circumstances. With regard to the equity of the overall tax systems of the two countries, the UK’s progressivity has decreased while the horizontal equity has improved during the twenty-year period, whereas the progressivity of the US system has remained relatively flat with an improvement in horizontal equity. iii The author concludes with a call for the gradual repeal of the mortgage interest relief in the US, a subsidy shown to be extremely vertically inequitable in this study and one that was estimated to cost the exchequer $79 million in lost tax revenue in 2010 by the US Office for Management and Budget. While a taxable imputed rental income may be theoretically optimal, the well-recognised administrative and compliance issues associated with such tax reform make it untenable. Therefore, the second best option and the one adopted by the UK and most other developed nations, is not to allow a deduction for a cost in generating untaxed income. This research contributes a unique synthesis of methodological techniques to the housing equity literature. The combined analyses of horizontal equity under the classical definition with the chosen structural and distributional techniques in evaluating vertical equity have never been done before. The analysis of the overall tax system comprising four specific tax systems is also original in this area of research and employs the Suits (1977) method for determining overall progressivity. There is an attempt within this research to replicate the results derived from the Suits indices by similarly extending the structural indices, thus testing the transferability of the methodology established by Suits. This is the first attempt to extend the structural indices established decades earlier to researcher’s knowledge. The results from two of the three structural measures are inconsistent with each other and the results from the Suits indices and therefore not believed to be informative. However, the results from the extended Liability Progression of both countries are indeed consistent with the results of Suits indices. This is an interesting research observation and may be indicative of the transferability of the Suits methodology. This area of research continues to be discussed by academics and policymakers given the conflicting underpinning theories and continued fiscal favouritism in many developed countries. This research area has become even more topical in the last few years given the recent financial crisis. The multi-layered, comparative micro-simulation technique employed within this research provides a solid platform from which to appraise conventional wisdoms and proposals for future policy with regard to owner-occupied housing taxation and beyond
Product branching and low temperature reaction kinetics by chirped-pulse Fourier transform mm-wave spectroscopy in a pulsed uniform supersonic flow
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Previous issue date: 2019-06-18The CRESU technique (French acronym for “reaction kinetics in uniform supersonic flows”) has been applied with great success in the past two decades to study the kinetics of reactions at low temperatures. In this approach, a uniform low temperature flow is produced via a Laval nozzle expansion giving a wall-less reactor at constant pressure and low temperature. Product detection in that work has been either with laser-induced fluorescence directly in the flow or vacuum ultraviolet photoionization after sampling. We have recently combined low temperature Laval flows with broadband mm-wave detection (chirped-pulse/uniform flow or “CPUF”) to study product branching in photodissociation and reaction.\footnote{Oldham, J. M.; Abeysekera, C.; Joalland, B.; Zack, L. N.; Prozument, K.; Sims, I. R.; Park, G. B.; Field, R. W.; Suits, A. G. 2014, 141, 154202} Because chirped-pulse microwave detection requires monitoring the free induction decay on the timescale of microseconds, it cannot be employed at the high densities we achieve in the flows. We have used two approaches to overcome this limitation. In one, we used a “quasi-uniform” flow in which an unoptimized Laval flow was followed by a second expansion to lower temperature and density.\footnote{Dias, N.; Joalland, B.; Ariyasingha, N. M.; Suits, A. G.; Broderick, B. M. The Journal of Physical Chemistry A 2018, 122, 7523-7531.}\footnote{Broderick, B. M.; Suas-David, N.; Dias, N.; Suits, A. G. Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics 2018, 20, 5517-5529.} Detailed fluid dynamics simulations allow us to understand the temperature and density throughout that flow. Product branching can be measured under these conditions but not kinetics, as the conditions vary throughout the flow. Recently we have implemented airfoil sampling\footnote{Soorkia, S.; Liu, C.-L.; Savee, J. D.; Ferrell, S. J.; Leone, S. R.; Wilson, K. R. Review of Scientific Instruments 2011, 82, 124102.} of an optimized flow. This allows us to study low temperature kinetics as in CRESU, but with the power of broadband mm-wave spectroscopy. Recent results for several systems relevant to chemistry in cold molecular clouds and planetary atmospheres will be presented using both the quasi-uniform flow and airfoil sampling
Continuous-wave cavity ring-down spectroscopy in a pulsed uniform supersonic flow
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Previous issue date: 6"\begin{wrapfigure}{r}{0pt}_x000d_
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We introduce a new approach that couples a pulsed uniform supersonic flow with high sensitivity continuous wave cavity ringdown spectroscopy (UF-CRDS) operated in the near infrared (NIR). _x000d_
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This combination is related to the CRESU\footnote{I. Sims, J. L. Queffelec, A. Defrance, C. Rebrion-Rowe, D. Travers, P. Bocherel, B. Rowe, I. W. Smith, J. Chem. Phys. 100, 4229-4241, (1994).} technique developed in France and used for many years to study reaction kinetics at low temperature, and to the microwave based chirped-pulse uniform supersonic flow spectrometer (CPUF) developed in our group which has successfully demonstrated the use of pulsed uniform supersonic flow to probe reaction dynamics at temperatures as low as 22 K\footnote{C. Abeysekera, B. Joalland, N. Ariyasingha, L. N. Zack, I. R. Sims, R. W. Field, A. G. Suits, J. Phys. Chem. Lett. 6, 1599-1604, (2015).}. CRDS\footnote{N. Suas-David, T. Vanfleteren, T. F\""{o}ldes, S. Kassi, R. Georges, M. Herman, J. Phys. Chem.A, 119, 10022-10034, (2015).} operated with NIR permits access to the first overtones of C-H and O-H stretching/bending which, in combination with its extraordinary sensitivity opens new experiments complementary to the CPUF technique._x000d_
The UF-CRDS apparatus (Figure) utilizes the pulsed uniform flow produced by means of a piezo-electric stack valve\footnote{C. Abeysekera, B. Joalland, Y. Shi, A. Kamasah, J. M. Oldham, A. G. Suits, Rev. Sci. Instrum. 85, 116107, (2014).} in combination with a Laval nozzle. At present, two machined aluminum Laval nozzles designed for carrier gases Ar and He generate flows with a temperature of approximately 25 K and pressure around 0.15 mbar. This flow is probed by an external cavity diode laser in the NIR (1280-1380 nm). Laval nozzles designed using a newly developed MATLAB-based program will be used in the future. A detailed illustration of the novel UF-CRDS instrumentation and its performance will be presented along with future directions and applications. _x000d_
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Effects of pressure suits and backpack loads on man's self-locomotion in earth and simulated lunar gravity
No full textPressure suits and backloads effects on locomotion in simulated lunar gravit
Rubber Suits.
No full textEditors: Aug. 1859-July 1865, J. D. White, J. H. McQuillen, G. J. Ziegler.--Aug. 1865-Dec. 1871, J. H. McQuillen, G. J. Ziegler.--Jan. 1872-May 1891, J. W. White.--July 1891-Apr. 1930, E. C. Kirk (with L. P. Anthony, Dec. 1917-Apr. 1930).--May 1930-Dec. 1936, L. P. Anthony.Vols. 1-13 are called "new series."Merged in Jan. 1937 with: Journal of the American Dental Association, ISSN 1048-6364, to form: Journal of the American Dental Association and dental cosmos, ISSN 0375-8451
Experimental and numerical characterization of a pulsed supersonic uniform flow for kinetics and spectroscopy
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Previous issue date: 6%begin{wrapfigure}{r}{0pt}_x000d_
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The current CPUFfootnote{J. M. Oldham, C. Abeysekera, J. Joalland, L. N. Zack, K. Prozument, I. R. Sims, G. Barrat Park, R. W. Filed and A. G. Suits, J. Chem. Phys. 141, 154202, (2014).} (Chirped Pulse Uniform Flow) and the new UF-CRDS (Uniform Flow Cavity Ring-Down Spectroscopy) setups relie mostly on the production of a good quality supersonic uniform flow._x000d_
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A supersonic uniform flow is produced by expanding a gas through a Laval nozzle - similar to the nozzles used in aeronautics - linked to a vacuum chamber._x000d_
The expansion is characterized by an isentropic core where constant very low kinetic temperature (down to 20K) and constant density are observed. The relatively large diameter of the isentropic core associated with homogeneous thermodynamic conditions makes it a relevant tool for low temperature spectroscopy. On the other hand, the length along the axis of the flow of this core (could be longer than 50cm) allows kinetic studies which is one of the main interest of this setup (CRESU techniquefootnote{I. Sims, J. L. Queffelec, A. Defrance, C. Rebrion-Rowe, D. Travers, P. Bocherel, B. Rowe, I. W. Smith, J. Chem. Phys. 100, 4229-4241, (1994).})._x000d_
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The formation of a uniform flow requires an extreme accuracy in the design of the shape of the nozzle for a set of defined temperature/density. The design is based on a Matlab program which retrieves the shape of the isentropic core according to the method of characteristics prior to calculate the thickness of the boundary layerfootnote{D. B. Atkinson and M. A. Smith, Rev. Sci. Instrum. 66, 4434, (1995).}._x000d_
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Two different approaches are used to test the viability of a new nozzle derived from the program. First, a computational fluid dynamic software (OpenFOAM) models the distribution of the thermodynamic properties of the expansion. Then, fabricated nozzles using 3-D printing are tested based on Pitot measurements and spectroscopic analysesfootnote{N. Suas-David, V. Kulkarni, A. Benidar, S. Kassi and R. Georges, Chem. Phys. Lett. 659, 209-215, (2016)}. _x000d_
I will present comparisons of simulation and measured performance for a range of nozzles. We will see how the high level of accuracy of numerical simulations provides a deeper knowledge of the experimental conditions
Rent sharing in the multi-fibre arrangement : theory and evidence from US apparel imports from Hong Kong
No full textAvailable estimates of tariff equivalents of quotas and welfare calculations on the costs of multi-fibre arrangements (MFA) for developing countries are based on the premise of perfect competition in both product and license markets. It is also assumed that the exporting countries that administer the MFA quotas receive all the scarcity rents. The authors argue that, in the presence of market power on the buyers'side in the product markets combined with concentration in the license markets, the importing countries might retain part of this rent. Although the impact of imperfect competition on rent appropriation has been analyzed in literature, rent sharing has so far been ignored in both analytical and empirical work. This paper makes a theoretical case for rent sharing, and then analyzes U.S. imports of apparel products from Hong Kong. The authors find that rent sharing substantially affects the estimated magnitude of welfare losses that exporting developing countries suffer because of MFA quotas.Access to Markets,Markets and Market Access,Economic Theory&Research,Environmental Economics&Policies,Health Economics&Finance
Emulation is the most sincere form of flattery : retro videogames, rom distribution and copyright
No full textThe Internet has made it possible for amateur game creators to collaborate on projects irrespective of geographical location. The success of projects such as Minecraft, and even CounterStrike, demonstrates that ‘indie’ developers can create entertainment products just as popular and successful as mainstream developers with huge budgets. However, many individuals instead are more interested in the old than the new – reliving past experiences through the playing of old videogames that are no longer commercially sold. Through the creation of emulators, and the ripping of ROM images (data that allows for the playing of an emulated videogame, such as Super Mario Bros. on the Super Nintendo), games with nostalgic value can be easily distributed, played and replayed. In addition, this allows for the preservation of legacy content that may otherwise be consigned to the ‘dustbin of history’. However, irrespective of the effort and ingenuity that goes into the creation of emulation software, and the effort involved in ripping ROM data to make old games playable, are these pursuits entirely legal? The purpose of this paper is to consider the compatibility of such projects with pre-existing norms of intellectual property law, comparing and contrasting the approaches of US and EU IP regimes in their handling of emulators and ROMS. The paper will analyse the issue under pre-existing legislation and with regard to relevant case law, seeking to draw conclusions on whether the existing regimes in copyright law are compatible and satisfactorily balance the right of videogame publishers to seek fair remuneration for their work with the desire by enthusiasts to preserve and relive a form of creative culture
Economic Analysis of Litigation and the Legal Process
No full textThis paper contains the chapters on litigation and the legal process from a general, forthcoming book, Foundations of Economic Analysis of Law (Harvard University Press, 2003). In chapter 17, I consider the basic theory of litigation. Here I describe the three phases of litigation: its initiation through suit, the determination of whether the parties will settle their case or proceed to trial, and, if trial results, the trial expenditures. I also analyze the social desirability of their decisions, a major theme being that the private incentives to litigate may diverge from what is socially desirable. In chapter 18, I extend the basic theory of litigation, examining among other issues the bringing of negative value suits, shifting of legal fees to losers at trial, lawyer-client fee arrangements, and the influence of insurers on litigation. Then, in chapter 19, I discuss several general aspects of the legal process not considered in the basic theory and its extensions, including private systems of adjudication, the value of accuracy in adjudication, the appeals process, and the function of legal advice.
Activists and Corporate Behavior in Food Processing and Retailing: A Sequential Bargaining Game
No full textThis study examines the strategic interaction between food companies and activists using a game theoretic model of sequential bargaining in the absence of complete information. In a rather confined set of circumstances, findings indicate it is always in the best interest of the food company to comply with activists' demands. More frequently, however, there will be cases where compliance is not optimal, depending on the size of the expected effect of protest, cost of defending against protest, and the cost of protest to the activist.activists, corporate behavior, food industries, sequential bargaining game, Agribusiness,
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