Suchergebnisse

We are entering a new monetary era. Central banks around the world- spurred by the development of privately controlled digital currencies as well as competition from other central banks-have been studying, building, and, in some cases, issuing central bank digital currency ("CBDC"). Although digital fiat currency is one of the hottest topics in macroeconomics and central banking today, the discussion has largely over- looked the most straightforward and appealing strategy for implementing a U.S. dollar-based CBDC: expanding access to bank accounts that the Federal Reserve already offers to a small, favored set of clients. These accounts consist of entries in a digital ledger-like other digital currencies--and are extremely desirable, offering high interest, instant payments, and full government backing with no limit. But U.S. law restricts these accounts to an exclusive clientele consisting primarily of banks. Privileged access to these accounts creates a striking asymmetry at the core of our monetary framework: government-issued physical currency is available to all, but government-issued digital currency (in the form of central bank accounts) is not. This dichotomy is unwarranted. Congress should authorize the Federal Reserve to give everyone--individuals, businesses, and institutions--the option to maintain accounts at the central bank. We call these accounts Fed Accounts. Unlike the CBDC approaches currently under discussion, which would use complicated and inefficient distributed ledger technology and be walled off from the existing system of money and payments, Fed Accounts would be seamlessly interoperable with the mainstream payment system, relying on technologies that the Federal Reserve has used for decades.

This paper is based on original data from a qualitative study on the impact of the Right to Rent part of the Immigration Act 2016 in Scotland. Our findings show that in addition to being an integral part of the government's project of creating a "hostile environment for immigrants" the process of extending the state's 'law and order' functions to organisations responsible for providing welfare services and distributing public goods is of wider political importance. Here we argue that this process, what Bourdieu calls the rightward tilting of the bureaucratic field, results in widespread discrimination as it entails a shift in focus of its criminalising gaze from 'conduct' to 'status'. The effects of this rightward shift altered the categories through which welfare services were both conceived and delivered more widely. We found that the almost universal opposition of the housing sector to the unwanted imposition of duties previously confined to border control agencies shows the extent to which the state is not a unitary monolith but is, rather, a site of perpetual struggle and contestation. By locating the perspective of housing professionals in relation to the government's attempts to redraw the boundaries of the state's own responsibility, we can gain a valuable insight into the processes of state crafting, which have wider implications beyond merely the creation of a hostile environment for immigrants.

Other pamphlets on socialism bound with this. ; Includes bibliographical references. ; Mode of access: Internet.

Canadian municipalities and regional governments experience a significant number of water main breaks. In general, metallic water mains break when corrosion has progressed to a degree such that the pipes can no longer withstand a combination of various forces such as traffic loads, earth pressures, pressure due to frost heave, water pressure, and thermal stresses due to temperature change. A survey conducted by the National Research Council of Canada (NRCC) and other literature indicates that water main breaks tend to increase during winter. This trend suggests that one possible cause of water main breaks during winter may be the increase in the earth pressure (frost load) associated with freezing of soils. Field tests have been undertaken by NRCC in collaboration with municipalities to study different forces acting on buried pipes.The shortcoming of the field test, however, is that soil properties and environmental conditions such as water table and temperatures can not be controlled, and therefore it is difficult to differentiate the relationships between these influential factors and responses of the pipe. One way to produce experimental data under controlled conditions is to perform laboratory tests. ; Les municipalités canadiennes et les collectivités régionales sont éprouvées par un grand nombre de ruptures de conduites maîtresses. En général, il y a rupture des conduites maîtresses métalliques lorsque la corrosion a progressé à un degré tel que les conduites ne peuvent plus résister à une combinaison de diverses forces comme les surcharges imposées par le roulage, la poussée des terres, la pression attribuable au soulèvement par le gel, la pression de l'eau et les contraintes thermiques attribuables aux changements de température. Une enquête menée par le Conseil national de recherches du Canada (CNRC) de même que des documents d'autres sources indiquent que les ruptures de conduites maîtresses tendent à augmenter durant l'hiver. Cette tendance suggère comme cause possible des ruptures l'augmentation de la poussée des terres (charges dues au gel), qui est tributaire des conditions de gel dans les sols. Des essais in situ ont été entrepris par le CNRC en collaboration avec des municipalités, dans le but d'étudier les différentes forces qui agissent sur les canalisations enfouies. Ces essais comportent toutefois une lacune: les propriétés et les conditions environnementales du sol, telles que la nappe phréatique et les températures, sont incontrôlables; par conséquent, il est difficile de différencier les relations entre ces facteurs influents et les réponses des canalisations. L'essai en laboratoire représente un moyen de produire des données expérimentales sous conditions contrôlées. ; Peer reviewed: No ; NRC publication: Yes

In C. porosus < 80 cm SVL (snout-vent length), growth rate decreases as body size increases; males grow faster than females, and both sexes grow faster in the wet season than in the dry season.

If the exponential growth curve for specimens < 80cm SVL is extrapolated, it underestimates the maximum size of C. porosus. A second growth curve for specimens > 80cm SVL has been derived separately, and the two curves intersect in the vicinity of 70 cm SVL. The size at which C. porosus cease growing seems quite variable and some data indicate a range of 3.9-6.0 m total length for males. The twocurve growth model is thought to reflect an energetic advantage in feeding on large rather than small prey.

Abstract
Previous studies in the macaque monkey have provided clear causal evidence for an involvement of the medial-superior-temporal area (MST) in the perception of self-motion. These studies also revealed an overrepresentation of contraversive heading. Human imaging studies have identified a functional equivalent (hMST) of macaque area MST. Yet, causal evidence of hMST in heading perception is lacking. We employed neuronavigated transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to test for such a causal relationship. We expected TMS over hMST to induce increased perceptual variance (i.e., impaired precision), while leaving mean heading perception (accuracy) unaffected. We presented 8 human participants with an optic flow stimulus simulating forward self-motion across a ground plane in one of 3 directions. Participants indicated perceived heading. In 57% of the trials, TMS pulses were applied, temporally centered on self-motion onset. TMS stimulation site was either right-hemisphere hMST, identified by a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) localizer, or a control-area, just outside the fMRI localizer activation. As predicted, TMS over area hMST, but not over the control-area, increased response variance of perceived heading as compared with noTMS stimulation trials. As hypothesized, this effect was strongest for contraversive self-motion. These data provide a first causal evidence for a critical role of hMST in visually guided navigation.

This article reviews the literature on changing housing aspirations and expectations in contemporary housing systems. It argues that there is a conceptual and definitional gap in relation to the term 'housing aspirations', as distinct from expectations, preferences, choices and needs. The article sets out working definitions of these terms, before discussing the evidence on changing housing (and related) systems. Emerging research has begun to consider whether trends such as declining homeownership, affordability concerns and precarious labour systems across a range of countries are fundamentally changing individuals' aspirations for the forms of housing they aim to access at different stages of their lives. Whilst much of the research into housing aspirations has been considered in terms of tenure, and homeownership in particular, this article suggests that research needs to move beyond tenure and choice frameworks, to consider the range of dimensions that shape aspirations, from the political economy and the State to socialization and individuals' dispositions for housing.

Project Burn Prevention was designed and implemented to determine the ability of a public education program to increase awareness about burn hazards and reduce the incidence and severity of burn injuries. Media messages were transmitted to residents of a large metropolitan area; separate school and community interventions were implemented in two demographically similar communities within the Standard Metropolitan Statistical Area (SMSA). A second metropolitan area and two of its communities served as control sites. Messages for specific, high-risk age groups emphasized flame burns because of their severity and scalds because of their frequency. Knowledge gains were demonstrable only as a result of the school program. Neither the school program nor the media campaign reduced burn incidence or severity; the community intervention may have brought about a moderate, temporary reduction in injuries. Multiplicity of messages, brevity of the campaign, and separation of the interventions are among possible reasons for the program's failure to significantly reduce burn injuries. Education for personal responsibility is not sufficient. Product modification and environmental redesign must be instituted through education and legislation for successful control of burn injuries.