This paper is motivated by our attempt to answer an empirical question: how is private health insurance take-up in Australia affected by the income threshold at which the Medicare Levy Surcharge (MLS) kicks in? We propose a new difference de-convolution kernel estimator for the location and size of regression discontinuities. We also propose a bootstrapping procedure for estimating confidence b...

This paper studies quantity surcharge and heterogeneity in consumer attention, using scanner data in the peanut butter category. Quantity surcharge exists for packaged goods when a smaller package size is cheaper than its larger size counterpart per unit. Quantity surcharges are frequent in the data, and households have heterogeneous purchasing behavior during quantity surcharge weeks: attentiv...

An effort is made to evaluate the formulation of seismic active earth pressure behind a nonvertical retaining wall supporting c-Ф backfill. The formulation is prepared to get a single critical wedge surface for simultaneous action of weight, surcharge, cohesion and adhesion. The success of any retaining structure involves the awareness of seismic active earth pressure. The effect of various par...

This paper presents a review of combined vacuum consolidation and surcharge preloading which is arguably more sustainable approach to soft-soil ground improvement than other strategies in reducing post-construction settlements. Vacuum consolidation has become more prevalent with technological developments in vertical drains, pumps and geosynthetics. Satisfactory vacuum pressures can be sustaine...

This paper investigates the impact of surcharge/unloading at both sides ground surface on an existing underground shield tunnel varying burial depths. A large-scale indoor model experiment was conducted to study vertical convergence deformation, settlement, and additional surrounding pressure different depths when occurred surface. The effect depth, surcharge mass, uneven further investigated b...

BACKGROUND The abuse of alcoholic beverages leads to numerous negative consequences in Taiwan, as around the world. Alcohol abuse not only contributes to cardiovascular disease, hypertension, diabetes and cancer, but it is also an underlying cause of many other serious problems, such as traffic accidents, lost productivity, and domestic violence. International leaders in health policy are incre...

—This paper investigates the problem of proportionally fair double-sided energy auction involving buying and selling agents. The grid is assumed to be operating under islanded mode. A distributed auction algorithm that can be implemented by an aggregator, as well as a possible approach by which the agents may approximate price anticipation is considered. Equilibrium conditions arising due to pr...

Vacuum–surcharge preloading is widely used in soft soil foundation reinforcement projects. To study the characteristics of changes pore water pressure and settlement as a result effect vacuum–surcharge preloading, this paper, consolidation model was established for large–sized sand–drain fluid–solid coupling along depth direction while taking sequence actual surcharge vacuum into consideration ...

This paper presents a model of a card payment system to address the pricing and rules that govern such systems. It evaluates the social optimality of privately set interchange fees and the adoption of a rule by payment systems to prevent merchants surcharging for card transactions using two extremes of merchant pricing—monopolistic pricing and perfect competition. Both types of merchant pricing...