Posted by constantdream on June 29, 2008
Authors
Greg L. Zacharias, Jean MacMillan, and Susan B. Van Hemel, Editors, Committee on Organizational Modeling: From Individuals to Societies, National Research Council
Description
Today’s military missions have shifted away from fighting nation states using conventional weapons toward combating insurgents and terrorist networks in a battlespace in which the attitudes and behaviors of civilian noncombatants may be the primary effects of military actions. To support these new missions, the military services are increasingly interested in using models of the behavior of humans, as individuals and in groups of various kinds and sizes. Behavioral Modeling and Simulation reviews relevant individual, organizational, and societal (IOS) modeling research programs, evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of the programs and their methodologies, determines which have the greatest potential for military use, and provides guidance for the design of a research program to effectively foster the development of IOS models useful to the military. This book will be of interest to model developers, operational military users of the models and their managers, and government personnel making funding decisions regarding model development.
Tables of Contents
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Posted by constantdream on June 11, 2008
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Posted by constantdream on June 8, 2008
Teaching and learning guides
The ten METAL teaching and learning guides are written primarily for lecturers and tutors, and present innovative and interactive approaches to teaching mathematical concepts to economics students. The guides include:
- Presentation of mathematics concepts.
- Top tips.
- Teaching and learning suggestions.
- Seminar activities, also available as separate files in .pdf or Microsoft Word format.
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1. Mathematical Review .pdf (984 KB) |
| This guide is designed to set out some of the basic mathematical concepts needed to effectively teach economics at undergraduate level. The basic concepts covered by this guide are; arithmetic operations; fractions; percentages; powers; indices and logarithms, and the basic rules of algebra. |
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Download Guide 1 Activity Sheets separately .pdf (216 KB) or Word (479 KB).
Guide 1 Operator Templates also available .pdf (21.9 KB) or Word (67 KB). |
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2. Linear Equations .pdf (890 KB) |
| This Guide focuses on ways to help students grasp the meaning, significance and practical application of the equation of a straight line. Students will have opportunities to achieve a number of learning outcomes. |
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Download Guide 2 Activity Sheets separately .pdf (95 KB) or Word (148 KB). |
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3. Linear Equations - further topics .pdf (791 KB) |
| This Guide extends the analysis of linear equations to settings in which there is more than one equation, and where a solution to the system of equations is required. |
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Download Guide 3 Activity Sheets separately .pdf (114 KB) or Word (400 KB). |
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4. Linear Programming .pdf (995 KB) |
| This guide intends to serve as a useful resource for colleagues delivering linear programming to undergraduate students. Students are assumed to have a basic grasp of mathematics but there is no presumption that they have knowledge or any practical understanding of linear programming. |
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Download Guide 4 Activity Sheets separately .pdf (206 KB) or Word (1,710 KB). |
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5. Finance and Growth .pdf (861 KB) |
| This Guide is designed to set out some of the basic mathematical concepts needed to teach financial economics at undergraduate level. The concepts covered by this guide are; arithmetic and geometric series; Simple and compound interest; the time value of money; investment appraisal; and the NPV rule and the IRR rate of return rule. |
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Download Guide 5 Activity Sheets separately .pdf (212 KB) or Word (281 KB). |
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6. Non-linear Equations .pdf (693 KB) |
| This guide attempts to promote the use of non-linear equations and functions with clear statements of why they matter within the study of economics. Key to this is the use of data and application to economic problems and use of economic principles to guide the mathematics. |
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Download Guide 6 Activity Sheet separately .pdf (75 KB) or Word (108 KB). |
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7. Differentiation .pdf (835 KB) & Annex Microsoft PowerPoint (339 KB) |
| Differentiation lies at the heart of an introductory module or course in mathematical economics, but can present a number of significant challenges to students. These need to be dealt with before students become confident dealing with the rest of their degree course material. This guide includes an annex in PowerPoint format, which can be downloaded and adapted for use in class. |
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Download Guide 7 Activity Sheets separately .pdf (47 KB) or Word (83 KB). |
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8. Partial Differentiation .pdf (663 KB) |
| This guide is designed to help lecturers set out the basic mathematical concepts and techniques needed for their students to effectively learn how to do economic analysis where a dependent variable is driven by two or more independent variables. The basic concepts covered are; partial derivatives, unconstrained optimisation, Lagrange multipliers and constrained optimisation. |
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Download Guide 8 Activity Sheets separately .pdf (94 KB) or Word (95 KB). |
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9. Integration .pdf (677 KB) |
| This guide does not intend to provide learning materials per se. Rather, it intends to help colleagues secure very good student learning by offering a resource which helps to deliver high quality teaching. Implicitly, the guide attempts to ‘bring alive’ the topic of integration and to engender in students an appreciation of what integration is, how it is applied, and how it can be used. |
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Download Guide 9 Activity Sheets separately .pdf (90 KB) or Word (203 KB). |
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10. Matrices .pdf (1.08 MB) |
| This guide is designed to set out some of the basic mathematical concepts needed to teach economics and financial economics at undergraduate level. The concepts covered by this guide are; the dimensions of a matrix and surrounding vocabulary; addition, subtraction, multiplication and division of matrices; matrix transposition; matrix inversion; finding the determinant of a matrix; Cramer’s rule; Input-Output analysis. |
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Download Guide 10 Activity Sheets separately .pdf (178 KB) or Word (244 KB). |
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Posted by constantdream on May 20, 2008
Authors:
Jeffrey T. Macher and David C. Mowery, Editors, Committee on the Competitiveness and Workforce Needs of U.S. Industry, National Research Council
This book is published by The National Academies Press
Description
The debate over offshoring of production, transfer of technological capabilities, and potential loss of U.S. competitiveness is a long-running one. Prevailing thinking is that the world is flat that is, innovative capacity is spreading uniformly; as new centers of manufacturing emerge, research and development and new product development follow.
Innovation in Global Industries challenges this thinking. The book, a collection of individually authored studies, examines in detail structural changes in the innovation process in 10 service as well as manufacturing industries: personal computers; semiconductors; flat-panel displays; software; lighting; biotechnology; pharmaceuticals; financial services; logistics; and venture capital. There is no doubt that overall there has been an acceleration in global sourcing of innovation and an emergence of new locations of research capacity and advanced technical skills, but the patterns are highly variable. Many industries and some firms in nearly all industries retain leading-edge capacity in the United States. However, the book concludes that is no reason for complacency about the future outlook. Innovation deserves more emphasis in firm performance measures and more sustained support in public policy.
Innovation in Global Industries will be of special interest to business people and government policy makers as well as professors, students, and other researchers of economics, management, international affairs, and political science.
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online Reading
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Posted by constantdream on May 9, 2008
The World Economic Outlook (WEO) database contains selected macroeconomic data series from the statistical appendix of the World Economic Outlook report, which presents the IMF staff’s analysis and projections of economic developments at the global level, in major country groups and in many individual countries. The WEO is released in April and September each year.
Use this database to find data on national accounts, inflation, unemployment rates, balance of payments, fiscal indicators, trade for countries and country groups (aggregates), and commodity prices whose data are reported by the IMF.
Data are available from 1980 to the present, and projections are given for the next two years. Additionally, medium-term projections are available for selected indicators. For some countries, data are incomplete or unavailable for certain years.
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Posted by constantdream on May 4, 2008
EstaPlus is a free statistical software -freeware- focused on descriptive statistics developed by Alejandro Vergara Massa that can analyze and plot using data distributed in one-dimensional or two-dimensional variables, in discreet or continuous mode.
The following are its main features:
- Lots of data formats
- One-dimensional or two-dimensional variables
- Discreet (grouped in intervals) or continuous variables
- Quantitative and qualitative data
- Introduction of tabular or not tabular data
- Storage features
- Save and print data tables
- Save and print analysis reports
- Import tables from spreadsheets (using Tabulator Delimited Spreadsheet format)
- Edition features
- Automatic error checking during data introduction
- Automatic filling of data tables
- Full control of the edition of data tables
- Detailed analysis of data table
- Measures of central tendency
- Characteristic of dispersion
- Characteristic of form
- Identification of outliers
- Functional dependence
- Analysis of regression
- Measures of statistical dependence
- Analysis of percentiles
- Analysis of moments
- Other features
- On line help that includes definitions of statistical formulas
- Probability wizard
- Windows and Linux PC editions
It requires Windows 98, ME, NT 4, 2000, XP and upper. It can work with Windows 95 with the appropriate libraries. Minimum resolution of 800×600.
To install this version, simply run the downloaded file.
EstaPlus V2.2.1 for Linux (620 KB)
It requires a distribution based on RedHat 6.2 for x86 and upper, like RedHat 7.1 or Mandrake 8.0. It can work with other distributions.
To install this version, expand the downloaded file in a temporary directory. Once expanded, run from this directory ./install
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Posted by constantdream on May 4, 2008
Freedom in the World, Freedom House’s flagship publication, is the standard-setting comparative assessment of global political rights and civil liberties. Published annually since 1972, the survey ratings and narrative reports on 193 countries and 15 related and disputed territories are used by policymakers, the media, international corporations, civic activists, and human rights defenders to monitor trends in democracy and track improvements and setbacks in freedom worldwide. The Freedom in the World DATA and REPORTS are available in their entirety on the Freedom House website.
Comparative scores for all countries from 1973 to 2006
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Posted by constantdream on April 20, 2008
The World Investment Report focuses on trends in foreign direct investment (FDI) worldwide, at the regional and country levels and emerging measures to improve its contribution to development.
Every issue of the Report has:
- Analysis of the trends in FDI during the previous year, with especial emphasis on the development implications.
- Ranking of the largest transnational corporations in the world.
- In-depth analysis of a selected topic related to FDI.
- Policy analysis and recommendations.
- Statistical annex with data on FDI flows and stocks for 196 economies.
The World Investment Report has been published annually since 1991.
Each year´s Report covers the latest trends in foreign direct investment around the World and analyses in depth one selected topic related to foreign direct investment and development.
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Posted by constantdream on March 30, 2008
A compact, portable program that provides most basic statistical capabilities: data manipulation (recoding, transforming, selecting), descriptive stats (including histograms, box&whisker plots), correlation & regression, and the common significance tests (chi-square, t-test, etc.). Written in C (source available); runs on Unix/Linux, Windows, Mac, among others.
DOWNLOAD
Manual
Software
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Posted by constantdream on March 16, 2008
Information and communication technologies and geographic concentration of manufacturing industries: Evidence from China
by Hong, Junjie
Fu, Shine
Using the 2004 China economic census database, this paper examines the impact of information and communication technologies (ICT) on the geographic concentration of manufacturing industries, controlling for other determinants of industrial agglomeration. Higher geographic concentration is found consistently in industries where ICT are more widely adopted, and the association is stronger at higher geographic levels. Furthermore, young firms that have adopted ICT, although they are more footloose, contribute to industrial agglomeration. High-tech industries with advanced ICT also tend to agglomerate. Contrary to the prevalent argument that ICT lead to more dispersion, our study suggests that ICT promote industrial agglomeration.
Some Policy Issues on Open Source and Proprietary Software
Graziella Marzi
Software industry is a fast growing sector of the economy which is undergoing significant changes both for the presence of the open source mode of production and for the challenges of globalization and convergence with other industries. This paper analyses the role of open source software (OSS) on competition and innovation in the software industry and debates the economic rationales for promoting the adoption of OSS by national and local governments.
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