Pension is a subject that soon or later affects all individuals in society. Within the premium pension system mutual fund fees are an important factor to consider since it can erode savings. This study investigates fees and performance of all mutual funds that existed in the premium pension system (PPS) between 2004 and 2016. Risk-adjusted performance and fees are adjusted to reflect the discount that is given for fees within the premium pension system to reflect actual investor experiences. The data needed to make these adjustments were obtained from the Swedish Pension Agency. The main purpose of this study is to investigate if there is a relationship between fee and risk-adjusted return within the Swedish premium pension system. Further on this study aims to explain what mutual fund characteristics can be used to predict performance and fees within the premium pension system.Theories used in this study are efficient market hypothesis, agency theory, behavioral finance, economies of scale and portfolio theory. The factors from the Carhart 4-factor model is used to construct the factor model utilized in this study to estimate risk-adjusted returns. This study adapts a quantitative research method and panel data regressions were conducted to determine how fee and risk-adjusted performance is related to various mutual fund characteristics. Hausman tests were conducted to evaluate if the fixed effects model or random effects model was the most appropriate to use. The result of the Hausman test proved that fixed effect model was the most appropriate model to use.This study will draw conclusions about whether the fee that the mutual fund companies charge can be justified given their risk-adjusted performance. The results for the sample of all mutual funds and the sample of equity funds imply that there exists a positive relationship between fee after discount and performance. Therefore, mutual funds in the premium pension system compensate for increasing fees with a higher risk-adjusted return. The sample of balanced funds differs since there is a negative relationship between risk-adjusted returns and fees. This study finds that size is a determinant of risk-adjusted performance, with larger mutual fund performing better than smaller funds. Because of this finding, it can be concluded that economies of scale do exist among the mutual funds in the premium pension system. Actively managed mutual funds charge higher mutual fund fees on average than passively managed funds. Further on, there is significant evidence that actively managed equity funds perform worse than passively managed equity funds. This suggests that investors are better off investing into cheaper equity index funds rather than expensive actively managed equity funds.

This study investigated whether the funding of section 21 schools improves the quality of teaching and learning in six schools in the Mthatha Education District, in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. Despite the large funds that are pumped into schools by the Department of Education, the schools appear to be under resourced, underdeveloped and therefore underperforming. The researcher used the theories of school improvement to ground this study and to investigate whether the schools improve or not, and are offered support where necessary, as they are continuously being funded by the Department of Education. The study had these objectives: To investigate how the funds are spent by Section 21 schools in the Mthatha district of Education: to assess whether the SGB manages the spending of funds and whether there is any collaboration between the Principal and the SGB in financial issues and: to evaluate whether Procurement procedures are followed when purchasing. Systematic random sampling, amongst 6 schools, has been conducted. A questionnaire was administered to the school Principals, 2 Finance committe members, 1 Educator and 1 learner and SGB chairpersons from each of the 6 schools. Thus, both qualitative and quantitative methods of inquiry were used in this study. 3 Junior Secondary and 3 Senior Secondary schools were considered in the sample. The findings that emerged were a lack of capacity, on the part of SGBs to monitor recurrent allocations as stipulated in the South African Schools Act (No 84 of 1996). Another factor that emerged was that schools still need training and workshops on procurement procedures. Also evident was that there appeared to be little evidence of collaboration between principals and SGBs, especially in financial matters. Finally, recommendations and suggestions were made that schools need to be provided with a series of workshops on procurement procedures and policies. SGBs were to be capacitated so that they could be on board on financial management. The principals were to be encouraged to cooperate and be transparent on financial matters especially since, as stipulated in SASA, as an official of the Department of Education, the principal has a responsibility to advise the governing body when they issue instructions or act in a manner that contravenes departmental instructions or policy.

The graduation thesis concerns on questions of financial management of municipal waste in municipality Dacice. Profits and costs, related to waste management, are analyzed. Relevant economic theories are presented in the first chapter. Consequent chapters describe economic instruments and legislative regulation of waste policy in Czech Republic. The practical application of the theoretical findings is presented in the final chapter. Pursuant to analysis of waste management the deficiencies are mentioned and recommendations are given.

The thesis analyses the influence of reimbursement regulatory fee for hospitalization which was introduced in regional hospitals in 2009 in Czech Republic. The difference in differences analysis was used to study the possible relationship between reimbursement of the fee for length of hospitalization in acute care hospitals and in after-care facilities. In acute care the influence was 0,5-1 % of the length and in after-care facilities between 8-12 %. This relationship may be biased because of introduction of DRG system which may decrease the length of stay and may be differently distributed between the treatment and control groups.

Masters in Public Administration - MPA / There is a growing body of literature on no-fee public schools in South Africa. The vision of this policy is to ensure that all citizens have equal access to quality basic education. This study, conducted an assessment of the funding-management strategies in three no-fees public primary schools within the Western Cape Education Department. This is vital as post-1996 the African National Congress embarked on the transformation of education in the country to ensure that all citizens have unfettered access to quality education as stipulated in the 1996 Constitution Section 29 (1) (a) which expresses that everyone has the right to basic education. This is also supported by the White Paper on Education, the School Act of 1996 and the policy document on School Fee Exemption and no-fee of Schools of 2007. As a follow-up to the no-fee policy, there was the creation of no- fees schools in Cape Town.

As a part of the Swedish pension system all participants in the working population are given the control of an investment account, which is funded with their pension contributions. The purpose of the account is to allow everyone the possibility to tailor their pension investments in accordance with personal values about risk and expected returns. However, it is shown that many Swedish adults lack the knowledge needed to make informed financial decisions and are therefore at risk of hurting their pension when investing in these accounts. This thesis tries to identify whether a simple but effective investment criterion, namely the size of the management fee, can increase the probability of higher risk-adjusted returns for uninformed investors when participating in the Swedish pension plan. It uses the Graham-Harvey volatility matched approach to evaluate fund performance on an individual basis. The corresponding analysis is then conducted based on grouped statistics of the projected performance measures. The results indicate stronger risk-adjusted returns of low fee funds in two out of the three analyzed categories. Carhart computations of Jensen´s alpha is then used as a robustness check and it provides support for the results found using the Grayham-Harvey method. When testing for difference in performance using the entire sample, 1.2 percent higher risk-adjusted returns were concluded statistically significant in the sample of low fee funds.

Using the 2009 National Survey of Substance Abuse Treatment Services (N-SSATS), this paper uses logistic regressions to explore the effect of facility ownership on a facility’s show of altruism. Facility’s show of altruism is operationalized as a facility offering free treatment to all its clients, free treatment to some of its clients, or a facility offering a sliding fee scale to its client base in order to absorb some of the cost of treatment based on a potential client's income. Region, receipt of public funds, and religious affiliation are added as covariates in order to gauge whether the potential relationship between facility ownership and a facility’s show of altruism is genuine. Results indicate that private, for-profit ownership status of a facility is associated with a lower likelihood that a substance-abuse treatment facility would engage in altruistic behavior. However, receipt of public funds acts as a mediating variable, in that, its inclusion raises the likelihood that a private, for-profit facility would engage in shows of altruism. Furthermore, it appears that religious-affiliation increases the likelihood that a facility would display altruism by providing free treatment, to some of its clients, or to all, but less likely to display altruism by employing a sliding fee scale. Overall, inclusion of region, receipt of public funds, and religious affiliation all produce statistically significant results, along with facility ownership. This suggests that there are a variety of variables, apart from facility ownership alone, that might be influential over a facility's show of altruism.

In the current situation in the housing market and in particular the inner city much attention is directed towards achieved prices per square meter in sales. The indicator is as a principle an appropriate measure of the housing market’s health and development, and can to some extent be used to make approximations of the general economic health status of municipalities and counties. It occurs occasionally that questions about whether prices are based on fundamentals at all times.The thesis questions that very issue, not from a macro accompanying financial perspective but rather from a microeconomic perspective, where each tenant ownership in the study is a micro-object. Are the observed prices per square meter rational relative to housing cooperative’s assets or is there a lack in the observed prices anchoring the respective association's finances. A result that does not enhance the image that the observed prices are rational in relation to housing cooperative’s assets should be seen as a warning signal that the macro-economic part of the housing market in the area may be subject to irrational pricing, and as a consequence one might argue that the market as a whole is unbalanced. The result is that there are variations in the observed square meter prices and net assets. In most cases, the net asset is not huge, the average is just over 3000 sek per square meter, which means that the market is definitely not completely out of balance. But in this study, an image that reinforces the theory that the market would be rational has not been found. The link between the square meter price and net asset is not linear, in fact there is little to no correlation. The correlation between the fee and net assets, however is stronger, although it is not fully capitalized. The difference is that net assets is a key that shows how strong economy housing cooperative has, and as such it is directly connected to have large fee the cooperative has to charge its members to retain a sustainable economy. It has been shown in previous studies that the fee capitalization on housing prices is not very strong, at least not in Stockholm's inner city, especially Östermalm 1. With that conclusion in mind it is not entirely surprising that the net asset would have even smaller capitalization effect. There are some measures that reasonably ought to change the way the market is acting. Greater financial accountability of developers and estate agents and a better understanding and deeper insight into the economic factors that are directly related to the ownership of the housing cooperative sought. The market is not out of balance, but it would be more rational if the market looked beyond prices per square meters. / I dagens situation på bostadsmarknaden och i synnerhet innerstan riktas stor fokusering på uppnådda kvadratmeterpriser vid försäljningar. Nyckeltalet är som princip ett lämpligt mått på hur bostadsmarknaden utvecklas och mår, och kan i viss mån användas för att göra generellare ekonomiska hälsostatusar på kommuner och län. Det uppkommer emellanåt frågetecken kring om priserna är baserade på fundamenta alla gånger. Examensarbetet ifrågasätter just denna fråga, inte ur ett makroekonomiskt perspektiv utan snarare ur ett mikroekonomiskt perspektiv, där varje bostadsrätt i studien utgör ett mikro-objekt. Är de faktiska kvadratmeterpriserna rationella i förhållande till föreningars tillgångar och låneskulder eller saknar de observerade priserna koppling till respektive förenings ekonomi. Ett resultat som inte stärker bilden av att de observerade priserna är rationella i förhållande till föreningens ekonomiska situation bör ses som en varningssignal att den makro ekonomiska bostadsmarknaden för området inte är i balans. eftersöks. Marknaden är inte ur balans, men den skulle kunna bli mer rationell om marknaden tittade längre än kvadratmeterpriset Resultatet är att det finns variationer i de observerade kvadratmeter priserna och respektive objekts nettotillgångar. I de flesta fall är substansvärdena inte enorma, den genomsnittliga netto tillgången är drygt 3000 kronor per kvadratmeter, vilket innebär att marknaden definitivt inte är helt ur balans. Men i denna studie har en bild som som förstärker bilden av att marknaden skulle vara rationell inte funnits. Kopplingen mellan priset per kvadratmeter och netto tillgångar är inte linjär, i själva verket finns det liten eller ingen korrelation mellan dessa. Korrelationen mellan avgiften och nettotillgångar är starkare, även om det inte är helt kapitaliserad. Skillnaden mellan de två korrelationerna är att nettotillgångarna är en faktor som visar hur stark ekonomi bostadsrättsföreningen har, och som sådan är direkt ansluten till hur stor avgift föreningen måste belasta sina medlemmar med för att upprätthålla en hållbar ekonomi. Det har visats i tidigare studier att avgiftens kapitalisering på bostadspriserna inte är särskilt stark, åtminstone inte i Stockholms innerstad, särskilt beträffande Östermalm. Med den slutsatsen i åtanke är det inte helt förvånande att nettotillgångarna har ännu mindre kapitaliserings effekt. Ökad finansiell redovisningsskyldighet för föreningar och en bättre förståelse och djupare insikt i de ekonomiska faktorer som är direkt relaterade till ägandet av bostadsrättsföreningen borde eftersträvas. Marknaden är inte ur balans, men det skulle vara mer rationellt om marknaden såg bortom priserna per kvadratmeter.

Stormwater user fees (SUFs) are an increasingly popular method of generating revenue for municipalities responsible for implementing complex stormwater regulations through the NPDES permit program. These fees can be created in a multitude of ways, including a flat fee for each parcel, charging by parcel area, charging based on a runoff factor, and many others. As a case study, eight SUFs were applied to the City of Roanoke and the Town of Blacksburg, both in Virginia, to determine the effect each SUF has on how land use type impacts the revenue composition. The City of Roanoke is larger and includes more industrial areas, but less multifamily impervious areas than Blacksburg, which translates differently in the SUFs. Residential parcels comprise the highest percentage of the revenue in all eight SUFs in Blacksburg and four in Roanoke. Open space parcels don't contain much impervious area yet account for up to 27% of the revenue. Industrial parcels comprise more of the revenue in Roanoke, averaging 11.1% compared to 4.6% in Blacksburg. A detailed digitized land cover dataset was compared to Blacksburg's land cover dataset, which resulted in maximum difference of $0.02 per parcel for residential parcel fees. Exemptions of large parcels in Roanoke, like the railroad and airport, if enacted would result in a maximum increase in fees of 15% and a shift of $7,491 of the monthly revenue to the residential parcels. / Master of Science

The nation's Section 404 permitting program, of the Clean Water Act (CWA), represents one of the longest regulatory histories of designing and implementing credit trading programs to satisfy regulatory requirements. The role and the function of in-lieu fee (ILF) programs in supporting this regulatory structure have undergone a substantial change. For the first time in the history of the Sec. 404 program, 33 CFR Part 332 and 40 CFR Part 230, Subpart J (the "2008 mitigation rule" or "rule"), prioritizes the use of off-site mitigation over on-site-mitigation. Additionally, the rule prioritizes advanced, third-party mitigation; especially as achieved through mitigation banks; over any off-site compensatory mitigation provided by ILF programs (33 CFR 332.3(b)(1)). This new regulatory environment favors the use of commercial mitigation bank credits while acknowledging that the limited permittee demand of off-site mitigation credits, in particular areas, justifies the continuing need for ILF programs (Corps and EPA 2008, p.19606,19611). This research examines how regulatory officials use ILF programs under the 2008 mitigation rule, and, it determines the extent to which ILF programs are capable of fulfilling the role envisioned for them under the 2008 mitigation rule. Simulation results indicate that commercial mitigation banks cannot meet risk adjusted returns under limited credit demand conditions. ILF programs offer some additional financial capacity to fill the void in commercial bank coverage; but, this potential is limited in low demand conditions. Furthermore, empirical case studies of a Virginia and Georgia provide evidence that regulatory officials rely on ILF programs to provide off-site compensatory mitigation almost exclusively in the absence of private credit supply, as intended in the 2008 rule. Evidence in Georgia and Virginia also indicate that, in some situations, ILF programs face difficulties in providing mitigation under the constraints of limited demand and more stringent regulatory requirements. / Master of Science / National permitting programs require people that impact wetlands or streams to offset unavoidable, adverse impacts by improving wetlands or streams elsewhere, a process called compensatory mitigation. A new regulatory rule, approved in 2008 (33 CFR Part 332 and 40 CFR Part 230, Subpart J), prioritizes that mitigation is provided at larger projects off-site of the impact. Key policy questions of “who should provide the mitigation?” and “when the mitigation should be provided” were an important part of the debate during the rule’s development. Wetland and stream mitigation may be provided by commercial (for profit) businesses, called mitigation banks. Commercial banks make wetland/stream improvement projects before permitted (adverse) impacts occur in anticipation of selling wetland/stream “credits” (quantified levels of improvement). Off-site mitigation may also be provided by in-lieu fee (ILF) programs operated by the government or nonprofit organizations. ILF programs first accept funds from permittees and then construct mitigation projects once sufficient funds have been collected, thus creating a lag between adverse impact and compensatory mitigation. The 2008 regulatory rule favors the use of commercial mitigation bank credits over ILF credits, but allows regulatory officials, under certain circumstances, to use ILF credits when commercial bank credits of the appropriate type are unavailable. This research examines how regulatory officials use ILF programs, and it investigates the extent to which ILF programs are financially capable of providing off-site mitigation in situations where the appropriate commercial credits are unavailable. A financial simulation model is developed to examine the feasibility of mitigation projects under different costs and credit demand conditions. Results indicate that commercial mitigation banks cannot meet financial objectives under limited credit demand conditions. ILF programs offer some additional financial capacity to fill the void in commercial bank coverage, but ILF programs also face financial limitations under conditions with low demand for credits. Empirical case studies of Virginia and Georgia provide evidence that regulatory officials rely on ILF programs to provide off-site compensatory mitigation almost exclusively in the absence of a private credit supply, as intended in the 2008 rule. However, evidence in Virginia and Georgia also affirm that ILF programs face difficulties in providing mitigation in some situations of limited demand and stringent regulatory requirements.