Why do industries donate money to legislative campaigns when roll-call votes suggest that donors gain nothing in return? I argue that corporate donors may shape policy outcomes by influencing powerful agenda setters in the early stages of lawmaking. On the basis of a new dataset of more than 45,000 individual state-legislator sessions (19882012), I document how agenda control is deemed valuable...

Mediastinoscopy is a safe and simple endoscopic procedure for the exploration of the superior mediastinum. It provides useful information as to the possible resectability of bronchogenic carcinoma, or for establishing the diagnosis of primary tumors of the mediastinum, metastatic disease and a variety of chronic granulomata.

A group of people wishes to use money to exchange goods efficiently over several time periods. However, there are disadvantages to using any of the goods as money, and in addition fiat money issued in the form of notes or coins will be valueless in the final time period, and hence in all earlier periods. Also, Walrasian market prices are determined only up to an arbitrary rescaling. Nevertheles...

STUDY DESIGN Patients with low back pain, sciatica, and neurogenic claudication were observed during computed tomographic myelography or magnetic resonance imaging in psoas-relaxed position and axially compressed supine position of the lumbar spine. OBJECTIVE To estimate the clinical value of axially loaded imaging in patients with degenerative disorders of the lumbar spine. SUMMARY OF BACK...

A theoretical model of the ethical preferences of individuals is tested by conducting a choice experiment on safety-enhancing road investments. The relative value of a saved life is found to decrease with age, such that the present value of a saved year of life is almost independent of age at a pure rate of time preference of a few percent, and a saved car driver is valued 17-31% lower than a p...

1 Center for Systems Biology and Faculty of Industrial Engineering, Mechanical Engineering and Computer Science, School of Engineering and Natural Sciences, University of Iceland, Reykjavík, Iceland, 2 Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Iceland, Reykjavik, Iceland, 3 Division of Science and Math, Center for Genomics and Systems Biology, New York University Abu Dhabi Institute, Ne...