Abstract Not Available.

Abstract Not Available.

No description available.

This thesis is concerned with the regional economic impacts of the Hibernia oil and gas development. With the intention of showing the linkage-leakage process of major resource development, I develop a conceptual framework which combines notions of interregional input-output, location quotient and capital availability ratio. The framework suggests how standard approaches to input-output analysis could be modified by concepts of capital constraints; and used as a basis to formulate policies on how to extract significant economic benefits from resource development. The study shows that the impact of resource development, particularly on Newfoundland, would be restricted to a few industrial sectors. Thus, extensive regional economic development could not be carried out based mainly on natural resource projects dictated by the operations of market forces. The main reason is that there are limited manufacturing establishments in Atlantic Canada. Also, a significant portion of the equipment would be sourced from outside Canada. The results of the empirical analysis also indicate that given the manufacturing linkages between the provinces regional economic development should not be viewed in isolation, but rather should be considered within a broader context of how the regions relate to the national economy. Therefore, there is a need to develop a sourcing policy based on the principle of government-industry cooperation if the high expectations regarding the industrial and employments benefits to be generated by the Hibernia oil and gas development are to be realized. The challenge facing policy makers in the coming years would be to nurture through their initiatives government-industry cooperation, as well as, develop operational policies that would balance regional interests with national objectives; while maintaining the "Single Window" concept through the Joint Offshore Management Boards (JOMB). Finally, I discuss the recently concluded Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement (FTA) which is expected to come into force on January 1, 1989. There are seven specific provisions of the Agreement which would have an impact on major oil and gas development projects and the federal regional economic development policies and programs. The implications of the FTA would present a challenge to decision makers and analysts in designing programs and policies to optimize oil and gas development related benefits.

Bottle-feeding has been associated with excess childhood disease. The costs of managing this burden have not yet been quantified in Canada. This thesis estimated the direct costs of three childhood diseases (diarrhea, otitis media and lower respiratory infection) attributable to bottle-feeding among Ontario infants under the age of one year in 1994. A systematic review identified relative risks among bottle-fed children. The prevalence of bottle-feeding was determined from the National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth, 1994/1995. Impact fractions were calculated for each of the three diseases and applied to the costs of physician visits and hospitalizations which were provided by the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences. The net direct costs of bottle-feeding were estimated as the sum of attributable costs minus cost savings. The cost of health care attributable to bottle-feeding was estimated to be $2.2 million. A sensitivity analysis revealed that bottle-feeding could have yielded cost savings of $88,900 or cost just under $4.0 million. This estimate was conservative as the costs of drugs were not included.

Cette thèse a pour but de définir le concept de micro-entreprise informelle en se basant sur les critères établis par l'Organisation de coopération et de développement économique, d'analyser un type et une activité spécifiques de ME informelles dirigées par des femmes et d'étudier leur fonction de subsistance dans un pays en voie de développement. Un travail d'enquête basé sur des entrevues a été entrepris dans la commune d'Attécoubé, un quartier pauvre d'Abidjan, en Côte d'ivoire. Les femmes interviewées dirigent toutes une micro-entreprise informelle de vente de produits vivriers sur le marché de la commune. La thèse tente de déterminer si la ME informelle est une stratégie de subsistance pour ces femmes démunies. A partir des réponses obtenues, il a été trouvé que les revenus de la microentreprise informelle sont immédiatement utilisés pour subvenir aux besoins essentiels de leur famille, immédiate et étendue, et non réinvestis dans l'activité de vente. La conclusion générale de l'étude est que la ME informelle, telle que définie par l'OCDE, constitue effectivement une stratégie de subsistance pour les femmes les plus démunies.

This study focuses on the measurement and factors underlying the unequal dispersion of income among individuals. The first part of this study is devoted to a theoretical discussion of inequality and a survey of income distribution theories. In the methodological part it is indicated that, for a veriety of reasons, it is desirable to use a well fitted model to describe the observed income distribution in order to analyse the extent and sources of inequality. Such a model is proposed as a tool to describe the observed income distribution of Canada. The robustness of the specified model is supported by several goodness of fit indicators including the comparative analysis of different measures of income inequality in parametric and non-parametric forms. By using data from three Canadian censuses (1971, 1981 and 1986), the distributions of total annual money income and of wages and salaries among Canadian males and females are examined. The study is carried out for different levels of education and goods and service producing occupations and industries too. The processes of income polarization and the decline of the middle class are also studied in the Canadian context. Statistical synthesis of the findings indicates that inequality in total income and earnings has increased. Concerning sex, it is shown that inequality among the female population was larger than inequality within the male population; however the income differentials between males and females declined over time showing a narrowing trend of the income gap by sex. In terms of eduction, generally, income inquality among individuals with elementary schooling is greater than for individuals with secondary schooling, and university graduates have a lower level of inequality than the two other educational groups. Income inequality in service producing sectors is greater than in goods producing sectors. The study indicates that the change in inequality is the outcome of several socioeconomic, technological, institutional and demographical processes. By discussing some of the possible explanations for the Canadian income inequality during the 1971-1986 period, it is found that among the main determinants we identify (i) the industrial occupational employment shift from goods to services, (ii) the increase in part-time work, and (iii) increased female labour force participation.

Abstract Not Available.

Regional disparities are a fact of Canadian life. Large income disparities among regions have persisted for a long time. Disparities in employment opportunities are also substantial. The location of key economic sectors is highly concentrated and this has resulted in a highly regionalized industrial structure. The existence of such disparities has preoccupied both academics and politicians, but few of their efforts aimed at reducing these disparities have been successful. A review of previous research shows that although traditional economic theory has long considered capital accumulation at the heart of the growth process, regional analysis in Canada has largely ignored the importance of capital formation in determining relative economic fates of the various regions of the country. The central issue of this study has been to examine the role which capital accumulation has played in regional disparities in Canada since the 1960s. Two main questions were addressed. The first question considers the extent to which the regional distribution of capital stocks has affected growth in regional output, productivity, and employment. The thesis has established some strong correlations between patterns of growth of capital stocks on the one hand, and regional economic disparities in output, productivity, and employment on the other hand. A detailed examination of the regional dynamics of capital accumulation in Canada shows that regional investment is strongly influenced by the relative growth rate of a region, the relative size of its capital stock, local labour costs adjusted for productivity, and the level of past profits. The thesis found that one of the impediments to rapid growth of capital accumulation in the poorer regions is the limited availability of finance. Access to capital has an important influence on capital accumulation and, therefore, on regional growth. The effect of capital accumulation on productivity growth is estimated from a productivity function which relates growth in productivity to growth in output, growth in capital-labour ratio, and technical progress. It is found that regional differences in the intensity of capital have played an important role in labour productivity differences. The second question looks at the type of policy to be implemented in order to reduce regional disparities by altering the present pattern of capital accumulation. The thesis proposed a model of optimal allocation of investment funds that takes into account both objectives of national growth and regional equity. The model is based on optimal control theory and considers both the maximization of national income and minimization of regional inequalities in one objective function. It is shown that in such a case the optimal policy is not to concentrate investment in the more prosperous regions, but to increase capital where it is scarce. This will stimulate growth in the poor regions and provide opportunity to reduce disparities in employment and income.

This thesis searches for the presence of economic motives in professionals, who left Poland circa 1980-81. Through this case study of so-called "political refugees", the wider goal is to examine the dichotomy between political flight and economic migration. At issue is the depoliticization of poverty in the Third World, as well as the effect of the cold war on immigration policy in Canada. The results indicate that economic factors constituted important motives for departure in our target population. It is suggested that members of the latter were therefore not political refugees by UN-defined standards.