The Theory of Monetary Aggregation (Contributions to Economic Analysis)

Book Description

In recent years, there has been renewed interest in index number and aggregation theory, since the two previously divergent fields have been successfully unified. The underlying aggregator functions which are weakly separable subfunctions of utility and production functions, are the building blocks of economic theory, and the derivation of index numbers based upon their ability to track those building blocks is now called the "economic theory of index numbers."

William Barnett, the coeditor of this volume, introduced modern economic index number theory into monetary economics. His merger of economic index number theory, with monetary theory was based upon the use of Diewert's approach to producing "superlative" nonparametric approximations to the theoretically exact aggregator functions. This book comprises a focussed and unified collection of Barnett's most important publications in this area.

The papers in the book have been organized into logical sections, with unifying introductions and overviews. The result is a systematic development of the state of the art in monetary and financial aggregation theory. The sections cover the origin of the user cost price of monetary services. Exact aggregation of monetary assets on the demand side for consumers and firms, and on the supply side for financial intermediaries, general equilibrium of all economic agents' demands and supplies, dynamic solution of the exact system, and extension to monetary aggregation under risk. The extension of index number theory to the case of risk is completely general, and can be applied to tracking any exact economic aggregator under risk. In all cases, the criterion used for evaluation is the tracking ability of the approximation to the exact aggregator function of economic theory.

Many of the empirical and policy puzzles in monetary economics disappear when simple sum monetary aggregates are replaced by index numbers that are coherent with theory. Simple sum monetary aggregates became incoherent with theory, when monetary assets began paying interest and therefore could no longer be viewed as perfect substitutes.

Book Description

The introduction of a single European currency constitutes a remarkable instance of internationalization of monetary policy. Whether a concomitant internationalization can be detected also in the econometric foundations of monetary policy is the problem dealt with in this book. Its basic theoretical ingredients comprise a data-driven approach to econometric modelling and a generalized approach to cross-sectional aggregation. The resulting econometric model systematically combines statistical and economic theory by extending a cointegrated VAR into a structural ECM. The empirical outcome is a data-consistent causal money demand function, isolated within a properly identified dynamic macroeconomic system for Europe.

Monetary aggregation: A reconciliation of theory and central bank practice (IMF working paper)

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Monetary aggregation: A reconciliation of theory and central bank practice (IMF working paper)
Huw Pill
Manufacturer: International Monetary Fund
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

Money & Monetary Policy | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B0006QGC2I

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Research Division working papers
Richard G Anderson
Manufacturer: Research Department, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B0006QJDYM

Book Description

With escalating demands upon research and assessment growing more varied, surveys are now used to assess and drive organizational change by examining company performance, customer and employee satisfaction, empowerment, and key aspects of corporate culture.

With Organizational Surveys, you'll learn how to:

Drive change with surveys

Use 360* feedback

Set expectations of results

Deal with ethical concerns

Facilitate feedback, action-planning, and follow-through . . . and much more!

No other book approaches this collection's range and specificity, or its emphasis on actual practice in organizations. It's your indispensible toolbox for assessment and change!

Customer Reviews:

Comprehensive - but needs an update to accommodate internet surveys and other methodological developments........2006-01-19

I purchased this 418pp volume in 1998 and recently re-read this book to reacquaint myself with the rich material. What Kraut has done as an editor is to select 35 pertinent papers that discuss Organizational Surveys under three main heading:
1) Purposes and uses.
2) The Survey process.
3) Special applications - such as linking survey results to "hard" figures such as productivity and performance.

The book is packed with sage advice, both academic and practical. For example it counsels researchers to work closely with insiders in order to get the most useful surveys, and it spends many pages discussing the questions of implementing the recommendations and the whole issue of raising employee expectations by even conducting surveys.

But what a lot has occurred in the 10 years since this book was edited. I find on re-reading that several cutting-edge ideas (linking internal results to customer satisfaction measures) are fairly standard now; and of-course the advent of web-based online surveys has had a major effect upon the practicability and style of conducting employee research. Online surveys, with their wonderful capacity to capture open-enders, really enable researchers to glue their quant findings much closer to qualitative styles of research including focus groups (given scant coverage here) and ethnography: the act of observing how the organisation does things. In essence, I don't feel the collection of papers deals quite adequately with the central question: what is it that makes organizational research and surveys different from other kinds of research.

One key difference is the question of culture, and the way sub-units within an organisation may act as distinct and cohesive "tribes" capable of affirming, or subverting the overall objectives of the organisation by applying their sense of values, sense of fairness and sense of direction to their day-to-day involvement. Fascinating stuff - but this volume only discusses such issues in a generic manner.

In short, the publishers might be prompted to consider a new updated edition. This book was state of the art 10 years ago, but its relevance is diminishing. I still give it four stars (just) because of the quality of the writing and the value of its insights - but the book is no longer solid gold. There's rust appearing on the bodywork, and readers will need to find other volumes to accompany this one. That's not a bad approach because the subject-matter has evolved quickly.

Was good to the last chapter...then was a downer........1998-12-10

Book covers a wide variety of survey topics very well. I underlined a great many thoughts. One thought that occured to me was that I was on my way to doing Organizational Surveys. But at the end was warned "I would be a 'bounder' if I read a few books and started practicing." It seems this book's final conclusion is that you need to join the Union to do surverys, ie. be a phd or working under one. The book was still a great value.

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Casebriefs: Torts

Manufacturer: Harcourt Brace Legal and Professional Publica
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Law | Subjects | Books
General | Law | Professional & Technical | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0159002036

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Legal Path Series: Torts Keyed to Epstein 8th. Edition (Legal Path Series)

Manufacturer: Mclaren Legal Publishers LLC
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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Cases and Materials on Torts

Getting to Maybe: How to Excel on Law School Exams

ASIN: 0976871637

Product Description

This law school study aid is a "keyed" book. It summarizes all the major cases in the text book to which it is linked and in the order those cases are printed. Our cases are presented in the IRAC format (Issue, Rule, Analysis and Conclusion). Each case uses a text symbol preceding the Issue, Rule Analysis and Conclusion of the case referenced.

Legal Path Series: Torts Keyed to Prosser, Wade & Schwartz 11th. Edition (Legal Path Series)

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Legal Path Series: Torts Keyed to Prosser, Wade & Schwartz 11th. Edition (Legal Path Series)

Manufacturer: Mclaren Legal Publishers LLC
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 0976871645

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Casebriefs: Torts
Editor-Gilbert Law Summaries
Manufacturer: Harcourt Brace Legal and Professional Publica
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OJKMOG

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The man's personal life is none of our business.....

Good biography of one of the 20th century's most fascinating scientists

Potentially Good Subject Matter-Poor Writing

Big on science, but not much of a biography

Good, fair read

Carl Sagan: A Life in the Cosmos
William Poundstone
Manufacturer: Owl Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books
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Look Inside Biographies | Trip | Specialty Stores | Books
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Carl Sagan: A Life

Conversations with Carl Sagan (Literary Conversations)

The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark

Billions & Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millennium

Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors

ASIN: 0805057676

Amazon.com

Science writer William Poundstone (and biographer of game-theory guru John von Neumann) begins this book of deftly strung anecdotes from the life of pop-science demigod Carl Sagan with the following anecdote: four-year-old Carl, a Jewish kid growing up near the Jersey shore, rides piggyback on his dad's shoulders into the 1939 World's Fair and the "World of Tomorrow." Surrounded by mocked-up "rocketports," GM's "Futurama," and the promise of outlandish technology to come, it's easy to imagine the impact on this little guy who was to become one of our century's most visionary and visible scientists. A childhood friend tells Poundstone that "from an early age Carl was seized with the fabulous mission of searching for life on other worlds," a quest that would dominate his entire professional career.

Poundstone recounts how this quest drove the immensely intelligent, ambitious, and charismatic Sagan, from his discovery of Arthur C. Clarke to his predictable adolescent chemistry-set accidents to his colorful academic career and professional work on the Viking and Voyager missions, nuclear disarmament, the award-winning Cosmos, and Robert Zemeckis' Contact. What recommends this biography most, though, isn't its completeness but its style: Poundstone has divided the 500-plus-page book into over 200 easily digestible, addictive little sections, each an entertaining or illuminating (or, often, laugh-out-loud) anecdote from Sagan's life, with titles like "Pornography in Space," "Muskrats, Drunkards, Extraterrestrials," and "Sagan Versus Apple Computer." (The in-house name for the mid-range PowerMac 7100 was "Carl Sagan," the joke being that it would make Apple "billions and billions." But forced to change it by Sagan, Apple switched to "BHA," later revealed to stand for "Butt-Head Astronomer"--Sagan sued for libel.) --Paul Hughes

Book Description

In this compelling life of Carl Sagan, award-winning science writer William Poundstone details the transformation of a bookish young astronomer obsessed with life on other worlds into science's first authentic media superstar. The instantly recognizable Sagan, a fixture on television and a bestselling author, offered the layperson entry into the mysteries of the cosmos and of science in general. To much of the scientific community, however, he was a pariah, a brazen publicity seeker who cared more about his image and his fortune than the advancement of science. Poundstone reveals the seldom-discussed aspects of Sagan's life, the legitimate and important work of his early scientific career, the almost obsessive capacity to take on endless projects, and the multiple marriages and fractured personal life, in what The New Yorker called an "evenhanded guide" to a great man's career.

Customer Reviews:

The man's personal life is none of our business............2007-09-09

I think it is nothing more then a tabloid tell all book that has no merits to it.

Good biography of one of the 20th century's most fascinating scientists.......2006-02-13

I knew Carl Sagan from Pale Blue Dot, Billions and Billions, and especially his wonderful Cosmos (truly, if there is one book everybody should read, Cosmos is it). The man that transpires from these books appeared to me as an wonderful example of what human beings should strive for, and I naturally picked up Poundstone's biography out of curiosity.

Poundstone covers Sagan's life adequately. He does not limit himself to that however, dedicating ample space to explaining the scientific context behind much of Sagan's work. He defends Sagan's positions well, but also presents the positions of some of Sagan's adversaries with apparent honesty.

The low point of this reading is the revelation that Sagan's personal life was not always exemplary. Living with a man as busy and allegedly full of ego as Sagan was a challenge. He married three times, finally finding the ideal partner in his relationship with Ann Druyan, who in particular appears to have made him a better family man.

Sagan's life is fascinating and shows admirable continuity. From his involvement with the question of whether there is life on Mars to the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI), he has remained largely devoted to the question of extraterrestrial life, a new field initially called exobiology.

Sagan's influence in the scientific world has been huge, if not as a traditional scientist, then as a man who seeded ideas. But his role as a popularizer of science has probably been even more important. In particular, his hit TV show from the 80s, Cosmos, has made his name famous to the point probably of being at some point the second-best known scientist in the 20th century (after Einstein, of course), at least in the US. Many have become scientists later in life after watching the show as kids.

Sagan knew how to teach, as his Cornell students can testify. He was able to inspire awe from the contemplation of the physical world. His always perfect (if a little snobbish-sounding) elocution, and his sometimes poetic stances, touch the mind and the heart.

Poundstone's biography confirms that Sagan was an extremely smart man, and a constant defender of reason. He never tired and always loved what he was doing. Through his books and teaching, he has sent the message that humans should not let their brains at the door. What Voltaire and Swift did with satire, Sagan did with science.

Sagan's untimely end in 1996 at age 62 is tragic, first on a personal level because he was in the end fully aware that his illness could take him, and second for the world at large, as he could have easily provided his insight and wisdom for another twenty years.

Potentially Good Subject Matter-Poor Writing.......2006-01-08

Mark Twain once said, "Anybody can have ideas--the difficulty is to express them without squandering a quire of paper on an idea that ought to be reduced to one glittering paragraph." The quote couldn't be more apt than when examining this work. I initially started to read this book being interested in Carl Sagan the person and what he had to say. I came away feeling it was a tedious chore.

First off, the book is divided into short subsections that make for easy stopping points. The initial happenings start like most biographies do by tracing Sagan's roots starting from his Grandparents on down. It details his early childhood and precocious nature which was evident from the start. The story quickly moves on to his early commitment to be an astronomer even though this wasn't regarded highly at the time. Throughout the book Carl's marriages are also discussed in some detail. My major complaint with the book starts with all of the dreadful descriptions of every single scientific project Sagan worked on. Even after the reader gets the gist the writer continues to drone on and on about what I felt were insignificant details to the extent they were described. For example, Sagan was a big proponent of a nuclear winter theory. The idea being that nuclear war would adversely affect the climate by cooling it and possibly leading to the complete demise of life as we know it. Well, Poundstone elaborates on this for close to 100 pages. At one point I had to flip to the cover of the book to make sure I hadn't picked up a book about nuclear holocaust or annihilation. Poundstone also goes into monotonous detail over every one of the Viking, Voyager, Pioneer, and Seti projects that Sagan worked on. My question would be-is this all there was to Carl Sagan? Was his work more important than who he was as a person?

The writer's language also does not flow very well. He is far from eloquent. He seems bright enough but everything seems forced and tentative like he is trying to think of what to say and how to say it. Sometimes this leads to non sequitur types of passages. As I was reading I kept feeling like I was missing some punch line. Eventually, I realized I wasn't missing anything but it was simply the writer's inability to communicate.

One good thing I felt the writer did do was display Sagan's faults and shortcomings. We are led to see that he was often egotistical, dismissing of former close friends, and not always a very good father. His friend's opinions of him are also revealed in somewhat explicit detail. For these reasons I feel the book isn't a complete waste but overall I was left with a feeling of distaste for it.

Big on science, but not much of a biography.......2004-08-25

I've been a fan of Carl Sagan's popularization of science since the "Cosmos" days. I agree he wasn't the most brilliant scientist around, but he did more to make people interested in astronomy than any scientist of his generation and beyond.

This biography goes way too far into the scientific realm, but doesn't tell me much about Sagan as a man. As a student of astrophysics (a hobby, not a career for me), I found the science interesting, but it wasn't why I bought this book.

Good, fair read.......2002-12-31

You can add me to the list of people who was about 7 or so when I first saw Cosmos, and it was a major influence (along with 2 scientist parents of my own) to go into science (not astronomy). Carl Sagan, and the way he made science poetic, influenced me greatly.

I feel that an absolute must in a biography, is fairness. I neither want to read idolatry, nor a muckracking book. This book was fair in its depiction of Sagan: a brilliant scientist, who cared about the world, science, writing, and his own ego. I especially liked the sections on his work with NASA on the various Mars missions; where do we land, what experiments do we perform, and just what do the results mean, anyway?

There was enough information about his background and personal life to keep it interesting, but not so much that it bored me. I was unaware of his first marriage to Lynn Margulis; a famous scientist in her own right.

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Skeptical Inquirer, published by Thomson Gale on January 1, 2007. The length of the article is 6582 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Man for the Cosmos: Carl Sagan's life and legacy as scientist, teacher, and skeptic: in this new remembrance of Carl Sagan, who died ten years ago, a noted planetary scientist and colleague (and former student of Sagan) recalls Sagan's immense contributions to planetary research, the public understanding of science, and the skeptical movement.(Biography)
Author: David Morrison
Publication: Skeptical Inquirer (Magazine/Journal)
Date: January 1, 2007
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 31 Issue: 1 Page: 29(8)

Article Type: Biography

Distributed by Thomson Gale

Men of the Cosmos.(Carl Sagan and David Morrison)(Editorial): An article from: Skeptical Inquirer

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Men of the Cosmos.(Carl Sagan and David Morrison)(Editorial): An article from: Skeptical Inquirer
Kendrick Frazier
Manufacturer: Thomson Gale
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

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Book Description

This digital document is an article from Skeptical Inquirer, published by Thomson Gale on January 1, 2007. The length of the article is 530 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Men of the Cosmos.(Carl Sagan and David Morrison)(Editorial)
Author: Kendrick Frazier
Publication: Skeptical Inquirer (Magazine/Journal)
Date: January 1, 2007
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 31 Issue: 1 Page: 4(1)

Article Type: Editorial

Distributed by Thomson Gale

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