Electricity distribution network is a prime example of a natural local monopoly. In many countries, electricity distribution firms are regulated by the government. In Finland, the regulator estimates the efficient cost frontier using the data envelopment analysis (DEA) and stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) methods. This paper reports the main results of the research project commissioned by the...

Environmental performance of the U.S. States is investigated for the period of 1990 – 2007 using Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA). The SFA accounts for both efficiency measure and stochastic noise affecting a frontier. The frontier is formed using indicators of GDP, energy consumption, population, and CO2 emissions. For comparability, all indicators are expressed as ratios to total. Statistic...

In the literature two approaches of productivity analyses can be found, namely the neoclassical approach and the frontier approach. Neoclassical analysis weights inputs by value shares, a procedure that requires data on factor input shares or prices. This approach imputes productivity growth to factors, but cannot distinguish a movement towards the efficiency frontier and a movement of the latt...

For investigating the formation of frontier zones, study of changes in small communities that constituted the majority of earlier populations provides a different perspective from a focus on major centers. A network model applied to settlement and cemetery sites on Rome’s Danube River frontier in Bavaria, Germany, shows that many communities, through participation in regional and long-distance ...

Voluntary frontier settlement leads to independent agency. Since this type of research has not yet been implemented in ongoing voluntary settlement frontiers, we conducted several cultural tasks to investigate Shenzhen, known as China's ongoing "South Frontier," which is composed mostly of people that have emigrated from other Chinese provinces within the past 30 years. We hypothesized that res...

In this paper, we test for productivity gains resulting from the introduction of a productivity-based incentive program in a large manufacturing plant of a Fortune 500 corporation. We develop a methodology based on a stochastic nonparametric frontier estimation technique to evaluate productivity in the postincentive plan period relative to the pre-incentive plan period. We also test for product...

We examine the cost structure of public schools in this paper, using frontier cost models that enable us to estimate sources of inefficiency. A two equation stochastic frontier model is presented that can be used to explain both cost and the sources of inefficiency. Using that model and data for public schools in Nebraska over the period 1989-92, we estimate cost frontiers for the districts. Es...

We examine the ability of the Expansionary Fiscal Contraction (EFC) hypothesis to explain the performance of of OECD economies during times of crisis. We ̄nd some limited evidence in its favour: if public consumption is reduced in response to a ̄scal crisis (as de ̄ned by a high level of debt), private consumption does seem to increase. However the size of the e®ect is smaller than that typicall...

Previous bufferless router designs require to drop and retransmit packets or deflect them each time a network channel get conflicted. These approaches, unfortunately, make data packets and even their flits arrive at destinations out-of-order. In this work, we present a new bufferless router architecture that provides in-order packet delivery. The key idea is to utilize pipeline registers at cha...

In this paper is presented a parallel algorithm for computing a Lagrange interpolation on a Extended Fibonacci Cube EFC 1(n).The algorithm consists of three phases: initialisation phase, main phase in wich the Lagrange polynomials are computed and final phase in wich the terms of the interpolation formula are added together.