The economic viability of farming in Saskatchewan is eroding and the future of the industry is becoming uncertain given the current economic state. The combination of low commodity prices, increasing input and transportation costs, ongoing drought conditions, inadequate safety net programs, and environmental concerns resulting from agricultural greenhouse gas emissions has led to this uncertainty. One possible solution for producers to help overcome or at least minimize the negative trends occurring in agriculture, which is proposed, is afforestation of agricultural land. Afforestation not only provides net private benefits of timber income but external benefits, including carbon sequestration, and preservation of native forests, which provides areas for hunting, wildlife viewing, and conservation of land. The economic efficiency of afforestation was examined using a transitional benefit cost framework for both crop and pasture systems. This allowed for both private and social perspectives, along with the opportunity costs, to be included and the economic efficiency of afforestation from each perspective was determined. The potential conversion of agricultural land to afforestation was based solely on economic efficiency and assumed producers demonstrated an economically rational decision making process. The results from the benefit cost analysis indicated that the net private benefits from afforestation were never significant enough to warrant the conversion of either crop or pasture systems to afforestation. The results did however show that the net social benefits from afforestation would warrant the conversion of crop systems to afforestation for a limited number of situations. Crop systems on physically marginal land with a carbon payment of either $22.58 or $33.55 tonne of C would warrant conversion to afforestation, using either a single or infinite rotation. The infinite rotation resulted in a larger allocation of land to afforestation. The role afforestation can play in helping producers diversify and increase income levels is limited. The low price paid for timber and the high costs of establishment for afforestation are the main constraints. In order for afforestation to become economically efficient on a large scale the constraints facing producers needs to be addressed.

The economic viability of farming in Saskatchewan is eroding and the future of the industry is becoming uncertain given the current economic state. The combination of low commodity prices, increasing input and transportation costs, ongoing drought conditions, inadequate safety net programs, and environmental concerns resulting from agricultural greenhouse gas emissions has led to this uncertainty. One possible solution for producers to help overcome or at least minimize the negative trends occurring in agriculture, which is proposed, is afforestation of agricultural land. Afforestation not only provides net private benefits of timber income but external benefits, including carbon sequestration, and preservation of native forests, which provides areas for hunting, wildlife viewing, and conservation of land. The economic efficiency of afforestation was examined using a transitional benefit cost framework for both crop and pasture systems. This allowed for both private and social perspectives, along with the opportunity costs, to be included and the economic efficiency of afforestation from each perspective was determined. The potential conversion of agricultural land to afforestation was based solely on economic efficiency and assumed producers demonstrated an economically rational decision making process. The results from the benefit cost analysis indicated that the net private benefits from afforestation were never significant enough to warrant the conversion of either crop or pasture systems to afforestation. The results did however show that the net social benefits from afforestation would warrant the conversion of crop systems to afforestation for a limited number of situations. Crop systems on physically marginal land with a carbon payment of either $22.58 or $33.55 tonne of C would warrant conversion to afforestation, using either a single or infinite rotation. The infinite rotation resulted in a larger allocation of land to afforestation. The role afforestation can play in helping producers diversify and increase income levels is limited. The low price paid for timber and the high costs of establishment for afforestation are the main constraints. In order for afforestation to become economically efficient on a large scale the constraints facing producers needs to be addressed.

Personalization that uses information technology to tailor content and products/services to the preferences and tastes of individual customers has become a useful function in online relationship marketing. Many techniques have been developed, and research on personalized services has increased substantially in recent years. The objective of this research is to propose a relationship-building perspective that treats the relational benefits resulting from personalized services as the important mediated factors that affect customer loyalty. In this research, a theoretical model is proposed to include both cognitive and affective benefits in order to investigate their relative influences on customer loyalty. A controlled laboratory experiment was conducted to investigate the effect of three different personalization tactics: socialness, self-reference, and content relevance. The results showed that personalized services can contribute to customer loyalty by bringing relational benefits to customers, and the impact of affective benefits on customer loyalty is greater than that of cognitive benefits. The findings extend our existing understanding of personalization, and offer valuable information to practitioners on enhancing their website design.

Class of 2012 Abstract / Specific Aims: The specific aim of this study was to assess the impact of public mental health benefit changes on patients with a serious mental illness. Methods: A comprehensive literature search was conducted using several databases. Articles that were included in the analysis met the following inclusion criteria: 1) Study conducted in the United States 2) Study population composed of adults (≥18) with a diagnosis indicative of a serious mental illness (psychotic disorders, bipolar disorders, major depressive disorder, anxiety disorders, dysthymic disorder, or a personality disorder) 3) Study evaluated a change or discontinuation of mental health services, 4) Study reported outcomes. Main Results: Of the 117 studies originally identified, 27 met all the inclusion criteria. Data was then extracted from each study regarding the design of the study, patient demographics, and impact of the various outcomes. Five studies looked at the implementation of prior authorizations required for psychiatric medications, which all showed increased rates of treatment discontinuation. Two of these five studies also looked at the impact on emergency department (ED) visits and hospitalizations with both studies showing increased ED visits, but no effect on hospitalizations. Three studies looked at the implementation of Medicare Part D, which all showed increased rates of medication access problems and increased rates of ED visits. Other studies that examined medication access issues found increased rates of suicide ideation or behavior, increased rates of treatment discontinuation, and increased rates of ED visits. Conclusions: Given the amount of variability among the studies, it is difficult to determine the impact specific benefit changes have on patients diagnosed with a serious mental illness. In order to draw conclusions regarding specific benefit changes, more studies looking at similar outcomes need to be conducted. This is critical as the studies examined, in general, showed negative outcomes for patients with a serious mental illness when mental health benefit changes were implemented.

Abstract Considerable amounts of research have been done on various aspects of orthognathic surgery during its short history. Nevertheless, there are no comprehensive publications on the cost-risk-benefit analysis of the entire process of orthognathic surgery. The purpose of the present study was to evaluate the psychosocial and biophysiological outcomes of orthognathic surgery with special reference to complications and financial costs. The study series consisted of patients referred for consultations and treatment of dentofacial deformities and involved a total of 953 patients and 20 controls. Both prospective clinical follow-up examinations with measurements of various clinical parameters and retrospective assessments of radiographs and patient records were included. Functional and pain-related reasons were found to motivate patients to seek orthognathic surgery, and this impression was confirmed by the clinical findings. The great majority of the subjects examined had signs and symptoms of temporomandibular disorders (TMD). The significance of facial appearance for the motivation to seek treatments seemed to play a lesser role compared to most earlier studies. Most of the patients felt that their expectations had been fulfilled by the treatment, and despite the potential risks involved, the overall complication rate in orthognathic surgery was very low. The most usual problem was neurosensory deficit of the inferior alveolar nerve. TMD patients with skeletal Class II non-open bite dentofacial deformity seem to have the greatest probability to benefit from orthognathic surgery, especially if their TMD is mostly of muscular origin. Pain in the face and headache improved significantly. The outcomes were more variable when the TMD mainly originated from internal derangements. In these cases, the individual outcome of treatment is more difficult to predict, and conservative treatment methods should probably be tried first. The orthognathic surgery of patients with non-open bite skeletal Class II dentofacial deformity is also cost-effective due to the low complication rate and the low cost, since sagittal ramus osteotomy is often sufficient treatment. However, there must be weighty grounds for orthognathic surgery of skeletal open-bite deformities due to their greater risk for relapse and condylar resorption. The high expenses of their treatment also result in a poor cost-effectiveness ratio.

The present research is aimed at understanding the current situation of the fringe benefits demand and satisfaction of the R&D engineers. It investigates the effects of the fringe benefits satisfaction in regard to two aspects: the commitments of the organizations and the intention to quit of the employees. The population of our survey is confined to the R&D engineers of High-tech Industry. Of totally 255 distributed questionnaires, there are 176 effective. The results of our study are concluded as follows: 1.Among 38 kinds of fringe benefits surveyed, 7 of them, namely, group-term insurance, festivities gifts or coupons, birthday gifts or coupons, wedding and funeral money, regular medical check, domestic and foreign trips and interest clubs, have the highest occurrence; over 90% of the companies offer them. Besides, more than 50% of the companies offer 21 kinds of fringe benefits. Hence it shows that the companies from the high-tech industry stress on employees¡¦ benefit. 2.As regard to the fringe benefits which R&D engineers value, they are for the most part also the one which R&D engineers satisfy, e.g. regular medical check, group-term insurance, emergency financial assistance, free parking lots, additional vacations beside those specified by the Labor Standards Law, flexible working hours, etc. So it is obvious that high-tech industry companies do take the expectations of the R&D engineers into consideration when they plan their fringe benefits offer. 3.Individual attributes and company variables have the different influences on employee benefit demand and benefit satisfaction. 4.Employee benefit satisfaction is positively related to organizational commitment; Employee benefit satisfaction is negatively related to intention to quit.

Diss. (sammanfattning) Örebro : Örebro universitet, 2006. / Härtill 6 uppsatser.

The employee benefits are currently considered by more and more employers as a komponent part of a personal policy of the company and are used as an instrument of tax planning and tax optimization. Also employees are used to be remunerated also with the help of noncash benefits. On the other hand the state makes efforts to minimize the tax and contributions benefits of the tax payer. The target of this graduate thesis is to describe and compare the tax implications of the employee benefits in the chosen OECD countries. The content analysis of czech and foreign literary sources was necessary to collect the secondary data. The recommendations for the Czech Republic result from the analytic part of the graduate thesis. The tax implications of the employee benefits in the chosen OECD countries (Canada, Australia, New Zealand) are much different in comparison with the tax implications of the employee benefits in the Czech Republic. Nevertheless some tax implications are identical for all countries in conception of solution of mobile and option plans. The greatest differences are in the tax implications of superannuation scheme and life insurance. Tax implications of other types of benefits (meals, education, company car for personal use, recreation and sport and accommodation) are different always only in one or two countries. Countries with the greatest differences in tax implications of the employee benefits are Australia and New Zealand.

AN ECONOMIC EVALUATION OF COASTAL \VETLANDS IN KOREA BY IIEE-DONG PYO The thesis undertakes a detailed economic analysis of the coastal wetlands of Korea and applies the double-bounded dichotomous choice model and spike model of the contingent valuation method to systematically evaluate their conservation value. Further analysis including an extension of the original spike model using only singlcbounded data (Kristrom, I ()(n) to modelling double-bounded data for more statistical efficiency to deal with /.ero observations was made. As a result, the estimated willingness-to-pay for conserving the coastal wetlands under the study is S3.9 per month per household, and the annual aggregated conservation value for the entire nation is about 175 million dollars in a conservative scenario. The study then applies a benefit-cost analysis (8C';\) to coastal wetlands around the Youngsan River, an area of dispute between development and preservation in Korea, with a synthesised estimation of the ecosystcm functional values for coastal wetlands and rice paddies developed by reclamation. The results show wetland development would be preferred to its preservation in an optimistic seenano and conventional BC A, yielding NPV of $49million at the discount rate of 8(Yo, IRR of 8.28%, and B/C ratio of 1.03. By contrast, a normal scenario rejects economic feasibility for the development project at the discount rate of 8°/c), yielding a NPV of -$271 million, IRR of 6.5% and B/C ratio of 0.84. With an extended Be A including conservation values for I-year, 5-year and 1 O-year payment, the estimates of IRR are 7.42%, 5.42%, and 4.06%, respectively under the optimistic scenario. Meanwhile, under the nOnllal Scenario the estimates of IRR arc 5.85%, 4.25%, and 3.09%, respectively. In addition, this study includes a discussion of a comprehensiYe review of conjoint analysis and the integrated environmental management of coastal wetlands developing sustainability indicators for coastal lisheries using bio-economic models in Appendix.

Economic benefit assessment has become an integral requirement of transmission system planning in the context of electricity market deregulation around the world. In a deregulated electricity market, not only does transmission planning have to address technical requirements but also has to consider commercial issues linked to an electricity market. One of the prime goals of transmission planning is to ensure a fair distribution of economic benefits among the market participants (all those who produce, transmit and consume). These economic benefits attributable to a transmission interconnection generally appear as benefits to an electricity market and are referred to as market benefits. Even from a regulatory perspective, assessment of market benefits of a transmission interconnection is an essential requirement to ascertain its economic value. The market benefit assessment of a transmission interconnector presented in this thesis is specific to the Australian National Electricity Market (NEM) consistent with the regulatory framework in the NEM. This thesis develops a market benefit assessment framework in accordance with Regulatory Investment Test for Transmission (RIT-T) to assess the economic significance of Basslink, one of six inter-regional transmission interconnectors in the Australian NEM. A long-term market benefit modelling framework comprising least cost modelling (LCM) and time sequential modelling (TSM) is developed and applied to undertake modelling of long term market benefits. PLEXOS, a leading power market modelling software is used for this purpose. Economic analysis concludes that the presence of Basslink is of significant economic value in terms of market benefits for the ranges of market development scenarios (MDS) studied.