Home About us Contact
|
Home About us Contact | ||
|
|
||
Cost Component (cost + component)
Selected AbstractsUrban Polycentricity and the Costs of Commuting: Evidence from Italian Metropolitan AreasGROWTH AND CHANGE, Issue 3 2010PAOLO VENERI ABSTRACT Polycentricity at the metropolitan scale is perhaps the model of spatial organisation that needs to be investigated more thoroughly as regards its effects on travel. The aim of this paper is to test the role of polycentricity,as well as other spatial characteristics, such as compactness, functional diversification and size,in the costs of commuting, taking into account an external cost component (per-capita CO2 emissions) and a private cost component (time spent on travelling). The degree of urban polycentricity has been measured by adopting a dynamic approach based on commuting flows and on social network analysis tools. The analysis is carried out using a database of 82 Italian metropolitan areas (MAs). Results show that MAs with a higher degree of polycentricity are more virtuous both in terms of private and external costs of mobility, while the degree of compactness is associated with lower environmental costs but with higher private costs. Size is associated with both higher external and private costs, while the role of functional diversification turns out to be statistically insignificant. Socio-demographics also play a role. [source] Annual planning of harvesting resources in the forest industryINTERNATIONAL TRANSACTIONS IN OPERATIONAL RESEARCH, Issue 2 2010David Bredström Abstract A cost-efficient use of harvesting resources is important in the forest industry. The main planning is carried out in an annual resource plan that is continuously revised. The harvesting operations are divided into harvesting and forwarding. The harvesting operation fells trees and puts them in piles in the harvest areas. The forwarding operation collects piles and moves them to storage locations adjacent to forest roads. These operations are conducted by machines (harvesters, forwarders and harwarders), and these are operated by crews living in cities/villages that are within some maximum distance from the harvest areas. Machines, harvest teams and harvest areas have different characteristics and properties and it is difficult to find the best possible match throughout the year. The aim of the planning is to find an annual plan with the lowest possible cost. The total cost is based on three parts: production cost, traveling cost and moving cost. The production cost is the cost for the harvesting and forwarding. The traveling cost is the cost for driving back and forwards (daily) from the home base to the harvest area and the moving cost is associated with moving the machines and equipment between harvest areas. The Forest Research Institute of Sweden (Skogforsk), together with a number of Swedish forest companies, has developed a decision support platform for the planning. One important element of this platform is that it should find high-quality plans within short computational times. One central element is an optimization model that integrates the assignment of machines to harvest areas and schedules the harvest areas during the year for each machine. The problem is complex and we propose a two-phase solution method where, first, we solve the assignment problem and, second, the scheduling. In order to be able to control the scheduling in phase 1 as well, we have introduced an extra cost component that controls the geographical distribution of harvest areas for each machine in phase 1. We have tested the solution approach on a case study from one of the larger Swedish forest companies. This case study involves 46 machines and 968 harvest areas representing a log volume of 1.33 million cubic meters. We describe some numerical results and experience from the development and tests. [source] Use of pharmacoeconomics in prescribing research.JOURNAL OF CLINICAL PHARMACY & THERAPEUTICS, Issue 1 2003Part 1: costs, moving beyond the acquisition price for drugs Summary This paper addresses pharmacoeconomics in prescribing research and reflects the increasing use of techniques of economic evaluation to aid drug purchasing decisions in a variety of settings , for national drug subsidization programmes, provincial purchasing plans, insurance programmes, and for hospital and area health authority formulary decisions. First, we focus on the cost component of an economic evaluation and discuss methodological issues that are relevant to all pharmacoeconomic analyses. [source] Optimal switchover times between two activities utilizing the same resourceNAVAL RESEARCH LOGISTICS: AN INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL, Issue 2 2002M. Karakul Abstract The "gold-mining" decision problem is concerned with the efficient utilization of a delicate mining equipment working in a number of different mines. Richard Bellman was the first to consider this type of a problem. The solution found by Bellman for the finite-horizon, continuous-time version of the problem with two mines is not overly realistic since he assumed that fractional parts of the same mining equipment could be used in different mines and this fraction could change instantaneously. In this paper, we provide some extensions to this model in order to produce more operational and realistic solutions. Our first model is concerned with developing an operational policy where the equipment may be switched from one mine to the other at most once during a finite horizon. In the next extension we incorporate a cost component in the objective function and assume that the horizon length is not fixed but it is the second decision variable. Structural properties of the optimal solutions are obtained using nonlinear programming. Each model and its solution is illustrated with a numerical example. The models developed here may have potential applications in other areas including production of items requiring the same machine or choosing a sequence of activities requiring the same resource. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 49: 186,203, 2002; DOI 10.1002/nav.10008 [source] Informed trading in the index option market: The case of KOSPI 200 optionsTHE JOURNAL OF FUTURES MARKETS, Issue 12 2008Hee-Joon Ahn This study examines if informed trading is present in the index option market by analyzing the KOSPI 200 options, the most actively traded derivative product in the world. The spread decomposition model developed by Madhavan, Richardson, and Roomans (1997) is utilized and the adverse-selection cost component of the spread estimated by the model is then used as a proxy for the degree of informed trading. We find that adverse-selection costs constitute a nontrivial portion of the transaction costs in index options trading. Approximately one-third of the spread can be accounted for by information asymmetry costs. A further analysis indicates that adverse-selection costs are positively related with option delta. Our regression analysis shows that option-related variables are significantly associated with estimated information asymmetry costs, even when controlling for proxies for informed trading in the index futures market. Finally, we find the evidence that foreign investors are better informed compared to domestic investors and that domestic institutions have an edge in terms of information over domestic individuals. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 28:1118,1146, 2008 [source] Optimum futures hedge in the presence of clustered supply and demand shocks, stochastic basis, and firm's costs of hedgingTHE JOURNAL OF FUTURES MARKETS, Issue 12 2003Carolyn W. Chang In a doubly stochastic jump-diffusion economy with stochastic jump arrival intensity and proportional transaction costs, we develop a five-factor risk-return asset pricing inequality to model optimum futures hedge in the presence of clustered supply and demand shocks, stochastic basis, and firm's costs of hedging. Concave risk-return tradeoff dictates a hedge ratio to be substantially less than the traditional risk-minimization one. The ratio now comprises a positive diffusion, a positive jump, and a negative hedging cost component. The faster jumps arrive, and the more hedging costs, the more pronounced are the respective jump and hedging cost effects. Empirical validation confirms that actual industry hedge ratios vary significantly across firm's costs of and efficiency in hedging and are significantly lower than what risk-minimization dictates. The model also can be used to compute a threshold production level for determining if a firm should hedge. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 23:1209,1237, 2003 [source] Affordable diagnostics,Changing the paradigm in India,,CYTOMETRY, Issue S1 2008Bala S. Manian Abstract A successful strategy for developing affordable diagnostics begins with a shift in viewpoint. Diagnostics is a tool for generating clinical information. Amassed experience in different parts of the globe has shown that this process of generating and utilizing clinical information is not only different among various countries but also different in microenvironments within the same country. The development of affordable diagnostics requires consideration not only of the component costs such as hardware and consumables but also other related costs that contribute to the generation and delivery of that information. It is important to recognize that these costs associated with public health in resource-poor settings cannot remain at the mercy of charitable contributions from western nations. Therefore, the challenge of technological innovation is to create solutions that are locally affordable and sustainable in the long run within the local macroeconomic constraints. The solutions should permit generation of local economic activity that will reinforce long-term economic sustainability. For this reason it is essential not only to analyze the diagnostic process but also to define a pathway by which local healthcare systems in recipient nations can be endowed with elements that empower them to acquire and practice up-to-date modern diagnostic skills. The objective of this paper is to provide a wider view of diagnostic cost components and to show how solutions developed and delivered locally have resulted in economically affordable as well as sustainable products. © 2008 Clinical Cytometry Society [source] Estimating the Costs of Epilepsy: An International Comparison of Epilepsy Cost StudiesEPILEPSIA, Issue 5 2001Irene A. W. Kotsopoulos Summary: ,Purpose: To compare systematically the national and per capita estimates of the cost of epilepsy in different countries. Methods: Studies for this literature review were selected by conducting a Medline literature search from January 1966 to March 2000. Key methodologic, country-related, and monetary issues of the selected epilepsy cost studies were evaluated to compare their direct cost estimates and to explore their distribution. The results of the selected studies were made comparable by converting them with different types of conversion factors and expressing them as a proportion of the national expenditure on health care. Results: Ten epilepsy cost studies were reviewed. The proportion of national health care expenditure on epilepsy shows a range of 0.12,1.12% or 0.12,1.05% depending on the type of conversion factor. The list of cost components included in the estimation of the direct costs of epilepsy differs from study to study. A comprehensive list is associated with a decrease in the contribution of drug and hospital costs to the total direct costs of epilepsy. Conclusions: This study highlights the importance of studying the economic consequences of epilepsy and of interpreting the results on the international level. The results of epilepsy cost studies can provide insight into the distribution of the costs of epilepsy and the impact of epilepsy on the national expenditure on health care. [source] Impact of the Change in Tick Size on Transaction Costs and Liquidity: An Empirical Investigation of the Taiwan Stock Exchange,ASIA-PACIFIC JOURNAL OF FINANCIAL STUDIES, Issue 4 2010Su-Wen Kuo C12; G15 Abstract The minimum price variation on the Taiwan Stock Exchange reduced for most price categories on March 1, 2005. The present paper simultaneously examines the institutional and endogenous impacts of tick size changes on transaction costs, market liquidity, and trading activity. The empirical evidence suggests that following a reduction in tick size, uniform declines are discernible in transaction costs and market liquidity. In particular, those stocks with a larger relative tick size reduction, higher trading volume, and higher order handling cost components have greater reductions in spread and market depth. Moreover, endogenous tick size reductions have an adverse effect on the trading activity for low-price stocks, due to the relative disadvantage in explicit transaction costs. Finally, the present study observes a general diminution in trade size resulting from a reduction in tick size in the Taiwan Stock Exchange. This study attributes plausible rationales to the fact that after tick size reductions, informed traders employ a smaller trade size to hide private information, or front-runners place a smaller trade size to avoid market turbulence. [source] | |||||||||||||