1,721,076 research outputs found
Central bank independence : a critical view
Get PDFWhile expansive literature on central bank independence contains some criticisms to the independent central bank quasi-paradigm, few critical analyses have been undertaken in the years between Friedman (1962) and Posen (1994). The author extends Posen's analysis to developing countries, discussing more broadly and systematically the reasons why merely instituting an independent central bank may not bring about its professed benefits, especially in developing countries. The author argues that widely reported empirical tests that are purported to support the central bank independence proposition are plagued by potential problems of simultaneity, reverse causality, missing variables, and measurement errors. Yet one can not make positive recommendations about institutional arrangements for central banks if causality relations are not well established. Institutions are shaped by a country's record of and preferences for inflation and may have little influence on them. The author also argues that the purported benefits of an independent central bank may be eroded by conflicts between fiscal and monetary policy and by inherent problems of central bank institutional design (especially mechanisms for board appointments, public accountability, and budgetary control). If these institutional problems are not solved, problems of dynamic inconsistency traditionally associated with monetary policy are not eliminated,but merely transformed. The author suggests that the benefits of central bank independence are less likely obtained in less developed countries with shallow financial markets. Accordingly, central bank independence should be granted at a later stage in a country's financial sector development. If a less developed country seeks to establish a low-inflation path, it should concentrate on instituting financial policy reforms (such as liberalization and privatization) that bolster opposition to inflation rather than easily reversible and practically meaningless changes in legal and institutional structures. This will better ensure the sustainability -- and hence the credibility -- of the government's anti-inflation stance. Fiscal policy is often at the root of macroeconomic disturbances in developing countries. Fiscal policy is more deserving of special protection from politics because of fiscal dominance over monetary policy and its greater vulnerability to private interests. The author suggests that the solution might be to make fiscal policy less susceptible to political pressures by creating an independent fiscal board. Tying the fiscal hands of government may seem a far-fetched idea. But would it not make more sense to force discipline on fiscal policy directly rather than indirectly through monetary policy?Economic Theory&Research,National Governance,Banks&Banking Reform,Economic Stabilization,Macroeconomic Management
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Mobile Banking: The Impact of M-Pesa in Kenya
Get PDFM-Pesa is a mobile phone based money transfer system in Kenya which grew at a blistering pace following its inception in 2007. We examine how M-Pesa is used as well as its economic impacts. Analyzing data from two waves of individual data on financial access in Kenya, we find that increased use of M-Pesa lowers the propensity of people to use informal savings mechanisms such as ROSCAS, but raises the probability of their being banked. Using aggregate data, we calculate the velocity of M-Pesa at roughly four person-to-person transfers per month. In addition, we find that M-Pesa causes decreases in the prices of competing money transfer services such as Western Union. While we find little evidence that people use their M-Pesa accounts as a place to store wealth, our results suggest that M-Pesa improves individual outcomes by promoting banking and increasing transfers.
Variations on the Author
Get PDF“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Get PDFWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Autonomous Flight of a Commercial Quadrotor
Get PDFIn this paper we describe a controller and sensor fusion algorithm for a low-cost commercial quadrotor helicopter and its implementation in ROS. The dynamics of the system is assumed decoupled and identified as four SISO systems using subspace state-space system identification methods. A simple PD controller is designed using these open loop transfer functions and evaluated in simulation.Fil: Curi, S.. Instituto Tecnológico de Buenos Aires; ArgentinaFil: Mas, Ignacio Agustin. Instituto Tecnológico de Buenos Aires; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Sanchez Peña, Ricardo Salvador. Instituto Tecnológico de Buenos Aires; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentin
Dynamic Control of Mobile Multirobot Systems: The Cluster Space Formulation
Get PDFThe formation control technique called cluster space control promotes simplified specification and monitoring of the motion of mobile multirobot systems of limited size. Previous paper has established the conceptual foundation of this approach and has experimentally verified and validated its use for various systems implementing kinematic controllers. In this paper, we briefly review the definition of the cluster space framework and introduce a new cluster space dynamic model. This model represents the dynamics of the formation as a whole as a function of the dynamics of the member robots. Given this model, generalized cluster space forces can be applied to the formation, and a Jacobian transpose controller can be implemented to transform cluster space compensation forces into robot-level forces to be applied to the robots in the formation. Then, a nonlinear model-based partition controller is proposed. This controller cancels out the formation dynamics and effectively decouples the cluster space variables. Computer simulations and experimental results using three autonomous surface vessels and four land rovers show the effectiveness of the approach. Finally, sensitivity to errors in the estimation of cluster model parameters is analyzed.Fil: Mas, Ignacio Agustin. Instituto Tecnológico de Buenos Aires; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Kitts, Christopher. Santa Clara University; Estados Unido
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Get PDFWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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