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The use of time-of-day (TOD) pricing as a load management tool for electric utilities has recently gained wide interest. Although utilities have successfully used TOD pricing for some industrial customers, its applicability in the residential sector is untested. The Federal Energy Administration (and now the Department of Energy) has funded several experiments to test the implications of TOD pricing for residential customers. The major objective of this study is to analyze the Arizona TOD pricing experiment. Data from the first six months of the experiment had been analyzed previously in several different studies. Summaries of their methodologies and results are presented in Chapter 1. Many of these earlier analyses were unable to identify significant TOD price responses. A major deficiency in all was their failure to account properly for participation incentive payments. Consequently, meaningful inferences regarding residential responses to TOD prices cannot be drawn from these misspecified models. Chapter 2 contains a description of the experiment and the data is generated. The basic observation is monthly kilowatt hours consumed by each household in three time periods. Special attention is given to the derivation of the incentive payment inherent in the experimental design. This payment depends on experimental rates and patterns of pre-experimental usage. Specific adjustments to the data are required due to variations in billing cycle lengths and days. Details of these procedures and information on how the samples were edited are discussed in Chapter 3. The conclusion of this chapter presents data which reveal that households did significantly shift consumption from high to low cost periods. Chapter 4 contains a description of the hypothesized models and statistical methodology. Since this study focuses on household responses to TOD prices while controlling for impacts of experimental design, theoretically derived models are not tested. Income, TOD prices, heating or cooling degree-days, the electricity-using capacity of the households' appliance stocks, and incentive payments are the major determinants of consumption investigated. Ordinary least squares techniques are used to estimate TOD demand models for each month, for the summers of 1976 and 1977, and for the winter of 1976/77. Since the experimental design was modified in May, 1977, an analysis of covariance was done to test for structural changes. The results presented in Chapter 5 emphasize the importance of including the incentive payment in the TOD models. Without this term, no TOD price is significant. With it, TOD prices and the other independent variables are shown to be significant determinants of consumption. Statistical results are very impressive for the models estimated from the 18 months of cross-sectional data. Since the incentive payments depended partially on the rates to which customers were assigned, calculation of price elasticities had to be modified accordingly. Simple elasticities measured price responses which ignored the impact of the incentive payment. Since the incentive did not depend on experimental usage, it is the appropriate measure of household responses to TOD prices. Total price elasticities are used to measure TOD price responses under the specific Arizona experimental environment. A number of important conclusions are discussed in Chapter 6. The most important deal with the treatment of the incentive payment. When it is properly modeled, meaningful price coefficients can be estimated. Also, the results strongly suggest that households earmarked this payment for electricity purchases. Partial derivatives of the incentive were much larger than those for income. Misleading billing information may have produced this unexpected result. In May, 1978, billing procedures were improved. An analysis of these data should shed more light on this important matter.

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Suizidale Handlungen, also Suizide und Suizidversuche, sind mit großem Schmerz, großer Trauer und auch großem Schamgefühl verbunden. Dies betrifft nicht nur die Suizidenten selbst, sondern auch Angehörige und Freunde. Weltweit sterben etwa eine Million Menschen jährlich durch Suizid und in Deutschland steht der Suizid auf Platz sieben der häufigsten Todesursachen. Schätzungen zu Folge ist die Anzahl der Suizidversuche pro Jahr, im Vergleich zu den Suiziden, bis zu 30-fach höher. Dies zeigt, dass suizidale Handlungen zusätzlich eine hohe Relevanz für das Gesundheitssystem darstellen. Diese Arbeit entstand im Zuge des OSPI-Projektes in Leipzig. Einem europäischen Projekt zur Einführung eines Präventionsprogramms gegen suizidale Handlungen. Es wurden alle Suizidenten, die innerhalb eines Zeitraums von drei Jahren im Universitätsklinikum Leipzig behandelt wurden, erfasst. Die elektronischen Patientenakten wurden dafür, unter Verwendung der entsprechenden ICD-Kodierungen für Selbstverletzungen bzw. Selbstvergiftungen, durchsucht. Ziel war es, neben der lückenlosen Erfassung und epidemiologischen Auswertung aller Fälle, Aussagen über die Art der Behandlung von Suizidenten und den damit verbundenen direkten und indirekten Kosten zu machen. Es zeigten sich, im Vergleich zu bereits bestehenden Studien aus anderen Ländern, keine signifikante epidemiologischen Unterschiede, während deutlich mehr Patienten intensivmedizinisch versorgt und psychiatrisch untersucht wurden, als dies in anderen Ländern der Fall war. Im Hinblick auf die Gesamtkosten, in Höhe von rund 3,9 Millionen Euro, konnte diese Arbeit, abgesehen vom menschlichen Aspekt, die ebenfalls wichtige gesundheits-ökonomische Bedeutung solcher Fälle aufzeigen.

Įmonių vadovams ypatingai aktuali galimybė rasti pelno ir pelningumo rodiklių gerinimo sprendimą grupuojant paslaugas bei taikant jų klientams atitinkamas sąlygas. Įvertinant pelningumą būtina analizę atlikti per jos teikiamų paslaugų ir klientų prizmę ypač tuomet, kai jų veikla priklauso nuo keletos paslaugų grupių. Lizingo bendrovės pelningumo ir jį indikuojančių rodiklių pagal jų paslaugas struktūros analizė padeda įmonei rasti pajamingiausias bei pelningiausias paslaugas, nustatyti vis didėjančių ar galimų sąnaudų priežastis, remiantis atliktos analizės rezultatais galima numatyti ateities planus dėl paslaugų asortimento ar jų sąlygų tobulinimo. Remiantis Lietuvos ir užsienio autorių siūlomais metodais (modelių taikymas siekiant įvertinti paslaugų pajamingumą ir pelningumą, ekonominių statistinių rodiklių analizė, paslaugų rodiklius įtakojančių veiksnių koreliacinė regresinė analizė), magistro darbe atlikta teikiamų paslaugų pelningumo dinamikos analizė, pajamų, išlaidų, pelno ir pelningumo rodiklių tarpusavio priklausomybės įvertinimo analizė. Vertinant paslaugų pelningumą pritaikytas situacinis pasirinkų sąlygų modelis, atlikta paslaugų pajamų priklausomybės nuo pasirinktų išorinių ir vidinių veiksnių regresinė koreliacinė analizė bei atliktas pelno, pajamų ir pelningumo rodiklių prognozavimas. Atskleidus lizingo bendrovės išperkamosios nuomos paslaugos gaunamų pajamų priklausomybę nuo didėjančio sutarčių skaičiaus, bei gaunamų komisinių pajamų dalies reikšmingumo... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / For the company manager it‘s very important to find an opportunity of enlarging companies profit and profitability by grouping services and especially in case when its financial state depends on revenue and profit of several services or products. By adjusting the structural analyze of leasing‘s companies services profitability and the rates influencing it‘s value, helps to find the most largest revenues and profit giving services, helps to find the problems and shows the probability to prevent the situation of bigger or possible, but unexpected costs, it‘s more easily by it‘s result to make prognostication and the solution of companies services assortment in future. Keeping processing by the recommendations of Lithuanian and author‘s of foreign countries, by evaluating the profitability of leasing company’s services it was taken the dynamic analyze of services profitability, evaluated the correlation of rates dynamics such as revenue, costs, profit and profitability. The model of chosen possible situation was adjusted to find the most profitable service, evaluated the correlation and regression analyze of factors influencing revenues from services, also prognostication of revenue, profit and profitability rates. It was researched, that the relationship between service revenue and the growth of new clients is direct, also the importance of commission revenues through all analyzed period decreased comparing with all service revenues, so trying to enlarge the profitability of... [to full text]

Magistro baigiamojo darbo tikslas – išanalizuoti investicijas į žmogiškąjį kapitalą ir įvertinti jų grąžą Lietuvoje, remiantis atlikta mokslinės literatūros analize. Konceptualiojoje darbo dalyje žmogiškojo kapitalo bei investicijų į jį diskusiniai klausimai aptariami teoriniu aspektu remiantis lietuvių bei užsienio autorių darbais. Analitinėje – tiriamojoje darbo dalyje pateikta investicijų į žmogiškąjį kapitalą kaštų ir naudos, grynosios dabartinės vertės, atsipirkimo periodo ir pajamų normos analizė. Skaičiavimais gauti rezultatai lyginami su kitų šalių rodikliais, siekiant objektyviai įvertinti investicijas į aukštąjį išsilavinimą ir jų grąžą Lietuvoje. Trečioji darbo dalis apima investicijų į žmogiškąjį kapitalą tobulinimo krypčių numatymą. / The aim of this final Master paper is to analyze the investment to human capital and evaluate its return and effectiveness in Lithuania according to the scientific literature. Conceptual part of this paper discloses the debatable questions of human capital and investment to it based on literature of Lithuanian and foreign authors. Analytical part of the paper investigates costs and benefit, net present value, payback period and rate of return of investment to human capital. Results according to main calculations are compared with foreign countries in order to be objective when evaluating the return rate of investment in human capital in Lithuania. Main trends for improvement are included in the third part of the paper.

This paper examines the reasons behind firms considering backsourcing. While firms experience problems with their outsourcing activities, backsourcing emerges as an alternative solution. Firms primarily take cost considerations into account when reconsidering their outsourcing practices, but this only scratches the surface. A deeper analysis is needed, since cost increases arise from issues such as quality defects and cooperation problems. Even though production costs are low, outsourcing always implies transaction costs. Therefore, firms must implement a landed cost analysis before making their outsourcing decision. However, transaction costs occur from lack of competence, difficulties in communicationand problems in working relationships. This paper intends to focus on these underlying elements, since backsourcing is not only a matter of increased costs. Based on five interviews this study identifies these underlying elements. Findings suggest that backsourcing has emerged due to lack of monitoring and control systems as well as communication difficulties. Excessive focus on the core competence of the firm will also increase the risks of backsourcing. This paper also suggests that backsourcing may arise from business opportunities, since internal and external conditions change.