One of the tenets of personalisation was that people using services could achieve greater citizenship and help to design better supports if they were able to direct innovation in services. Implicit in this was an assumption that people using services would be able to utilise their social capital (resources based on social networks), an asset which was not prioritised by previous approaches to service delivery. This thesis sought to identify if social capital was present and if it was being accessed to support the personalisation of services, comparing and contrasting the situation in services for older people and for people with learning disabilities. Whilst an initial hypothesis was that service providers for these different groups charged different rates due to different levels of social capital, no difference in social capital was established between these two groups. People did have social capital, but it was not mobilised by individuals or state actors responsible for commissioning support. This led to a consideration of street-level bureaucracy and the environment shaped by austerity and the Care Act. The study concludes that the implementation of personalisation has frustrated the use of social capital, such that it has not contributed to the transformation of care.

This thesis includes three independent empirical studies that examine the relationship between trade and wages for Chinese manufacturing industries for the period 2002-2006. Chapter 2 uses highly detailed firm-level industrial production data merged with product-level trade transaction data to make a direct test of Amiti and Davis (2011) model. The potential endogeneity issue of tariffs is addressed in several ways although our results support the premise that post-WTO period tariff reductions were exogenous. In Chapters 3 and 4 we pay close attention to processing trade. Chapter 3 reexamines the relationship between tariff reductions and firm wages taking into account the special tariff treatment given to processing firms. We find that processing firms pay higher wages following a fall in firm output tariffs. However, non-processing firms pay higher wages after a fall in firm input tariffs. Finally, Chapter 4 examines the impact of tariff reductions on the decision of firms to switch between different modes of exporting and explores how export switching affects firm wages through trade liberalization. The results highlight that input tariff reductions at the firm level determine a firm’s decision and direction of export switching. The future research ideas are also concluded.

Ce travail de thèse est consacré à la construction et l'optimisation d'un dispositif de mesure de corrélations en courant à très basse température.

This paper empirically analyses the interest rate transmission mechanism from money market rate to lending rate by utilizing the bank-level data in the distinction of cash, automobile, housing and corporate loans in Turkey. The main objective is to reveal the possible asymmetries of the adjustment process as well as the extent of the pass through. Empirical results indicate that mark-up value is the minimum for corporate rates on average, followed by housing, automobile and cash rates, respectively. Additionally, while large banks follow small mark-up pricing, small banks follow large mark-up pricing for corporate loans. Furthermore, a complete pass through is detected in 75 percent of the corporate loans, whereas the rates of banks that completely react to money market changes are 58 percent for cash and housing loans and 50 percent for automobile loans. We also find evidence that cash loans having high mark-up values do not adjust completely to variations in money market rate. Based on TAR and MTAR models of Enders and Siklos (2001), substantial asymmetries exist for all lending types. In general, adjustment towards the long-run equilibrium is faster when the disequilibrium or change in disequilibrium is above the threshold (upward rigidity).

One of the key steps of the liberalization of the Turkish electricity market has been the estab- lishment of PMUM (Turkish day ahead electricity market). The aim of this study is to explore the dynamics of electricity prices observed in this market and their relation with temperature observed in Turkey. The electricity price process is studied as a univariate process and the same process is studied along with temperature together as a two-dimensional process. We give a fairly complete model of temperature. We observe that the electricity prices in Turkey exhibit many of the features that similar prices exhibit in other world markets. In particular, Turkish day ahead prices are seasonal / every year the price seems to follow a path similar to the one years preceding it. To simplify our analysis we focus our study to a 35 day pe- riod where every year the prices show a relatively simple behavior. We study the effects of the fluctuations in temperature in this period on the fluctutations in the day ahead electricity price.

Many economists and politicians have blamed fixed exchange rate regimes for several crises taking place in developing countries after the 1980s. According to them, since the beginning of the 2000s, widespread implementation of flexible exchange rate regimes and high international reserves have prevented developing countries from experiencing similar catastrophic experiences. This interpretation seems to be misleading. We believe that even flexible exchange rate regimes with high international reserves do not have a magic to prevent a financial crisis. Although flexible exchange rate regimes and high international reserves might have played some positive roles in the relatively calm period of 2001-2008 / the main reason behind the calmness of this period is the fact that developing countries did not face a strong financial shock during this period. In the presence of &ldquo / safe havens&rdquo / , which implies existence of safe developed countries for financial capital to move into, flexible exchange rate regimes and the accumulated large reserves may not be adequate when a wave of financial shocks, as in the form of sudden stops and capital reversals, hit developing countries. Indeed, the absence of safe heavens and very low yields in developed countries eased the pressure on developing countries during the recent financial crisis of 2008-2009. If developed economies get their safe haven status back, developing countries might face new financial shocks. In this sense developing countries would experience new financial crises in this new period. We will elaborate on the possible conditions of these prospective financial crises in this thesis.

Tax systems are used for economic and social concerns such as promoting the economic growth or decreasing the income inequality and tax evasion, increasing the social welfare, etc. Researchers argue that the consumption taxes are quite high in Turkey compared to other OECD countries. Therefore, the proposed tax reform in this study is to decrease the Value Added Tax (VAT) rate and to increase the top statutory income tax rate. This thesis constructs and presents first set of a 55-period overlapping generations (OLG) model for Turkey to analyze and evaluate the impact of tax reform on the Turkish macroeconomic variables and welfare. The results show that the proposed tax reform provides welfare gains to the low and middle income individuals while high income individuals are suffered.

The effects of occupational sex segregation on wage differentials and poverty, and the factors behind the differentiation on occupational choices are analyzed in various studies. There are also recent studies analyzing Turkish case. However, there are limited attempts combining both segregation and occupational decision in Turkish labor market. This thesis wants to fill this gap and as well as contribute the literature of Turkish labor market and OSS, with analyzing the most current data of Household Labor Force Survey (HLFS) 2004-2010. It is expected to find stability in segregation in the period under consideration as verified by the thesis. It is found that the contribution of different occupations to the extent of segregation also differs. In addition, differentiation with regard to factors on occupational choices of men and women are also found. Further analysis should be carried to make relevant and effective policies to reduce occupational sex segregation.

This study analyzes the relationship between financial development and income inequality by using panel data of 60 developing and developed countries for the period 2000-2010. We find evidence for the linear negative relationship between financial development and income inequality which asserts that financial development reduces income inequality. We also find evidence supporting Kuznets inverted u-shaped hypothesis on development-income inequality link, except that for the developed countries where we find evidence for u-shaped hypothesis. It is also concluded that the panel is stationary without unit root, indicating that shocks on income inequality is not persistent.

The purpose of this thesis is to examine Turkey&rsquo / s export competitiveness in the first 15 members of the European Union (EU-15 market) against non-EU-15 competitors. The study covers the recent period since the Customs Union agreement signed between Turkey and the EU at the end of 1995. Turkey&rsquo / s position in the EU-15 market is analyzed in detail by focusing upon major dimensions of export competitiveness / such as &lsquo / export similarity&rsquo / , &lsquo / export diversification&rsquo / , &lsquo / intensive and extensive margins&rsquo / , &lsquo / revealed comparative advantages&rsquo / , &lsquo / dynamic market positioning&rsquo / and &lsquo / competitive threat&rsquo / . We use various indexes from the literature and develop some original indexes as our own contributions. In terms the subject-matter, time dimension and data-detail of our study, all indexes utilized in this thesis are applied to Turkey&rsquo / s case for the first time. Examining price and quantity differences across countries and within each industry, Turkey&rsquo / s competitive position in the EU-15 market is analyzed as compared to 30 countries for more than 3000 export-product groups classified according to their technological characteristics. Based on the results, suggestions at the levels of countries, products and technological categories are made for Turkey to improve its export strategy in terms of seizing the existing but unexploited opportunities in the EU-15 market against its competitors. Policy possibilities are also discussed for directing Turkey&rsquo / s competitiveness towards higher value-added products in a rational and strategic way.