THE LONG-RUN ECONOMIC IMPACTS OF FEDERAL,STATE, AND LOCAL FISCAL POLICIES IN METROPOLITAN AREAS*

ABSTRACT. This paper uses new estimates of metropolitan factor demand and output supply functions to study how federal, state, and local fiscal policies affect metropolitan economies. We illustrate our work with findings for ten metropolitan areas in five states for changes in state corporate income taxes, local property taxes, the federal corporate income tax, an investment tax credit, interest rates, public capital stocks, output prices, and tax and regulatory policies affecting gross wages. It is clear from these simulations that a policy that is nominally the same everywhere will have repercussions that vary widely across regions and cities.     

THE OPTIMAL LOCATIONS OF BRANCH FACILITIES AND MAIN FACILITIES WITH CONSUMER SEARCH*

ABSTRACT. This paper examines the socially optimal locations of branch facilities (or small stores) and main facilities (or large stores) on a finite linear market that is uniformly populated from position 0 to position 1. Each consumer has a probability w of finding the desired service (or product) at a branch facility, and a probability 1 of finding the desired service (or product) at a main facility. Two types of consumer search are considered: phone search and visit search. Different assumptions are made about the numbers of branch facilities and main facilities (each involving one or two facilities of each type). Under visit search, the socially optimal locations of branch facilities tend to be closer to main facilities than under phone search, and this tendency is more pronounced for smaller values of w.     

Markov Models of Inertia and Dynamism on Two Contiguous Ohio Landscapes

This study examined landcover change during 1940–1988 in two contiguous landscapes of approximately 12,400 hectares in central Ohio, USA: an inertial till plain area and a more dynamic moraine area. Agriculture dominated both landscapes throughout, however, the cover of natural vegetation and urban-suburban development increased over time on the moraine while natural vegetation decreased and agriculture increased on the till plain. Markov process models for landcover change were constructed for three 14–17-year time intervals and for the entire forty-eight-year study period. Probabilities of self-replacement for agricultural lands (0.91–0.97) were higher and those for forests (0.54–0.65) lower than those reported for other landscapes. Predictions of landcover percentages for fifty years in the future were made using Markov process models derived from actual cover changes in 1940–1957, 1971–1988, and 1940–1988. All three models produced similar predictions for the inertial till plain area. In contrast, the three models' predictions differed considerably for the moraine area. Only the 1971–1988 transition matrix was sensitive to increases in urbanization and reforestation which began on the moraine in the 1970s. These results indicate that reliance on lengthy study intervals and net rates of change can obscure spatial and temporal patterns of landcover change that are caused by natural and socioeconomic factors operating on shorter time scales.     

GRAVITY MODEL APPLICATIONS IN HEALTH PLANNING: ANALYSIS OF AN URBAN HOSPITAL MARKET*

ABSTRACT. In this paper a gravity model is formulated to model a hospital patient flow system. Both spatial and nonspatial measures of separation are used to estimate the model. Travel time was found to provide improved fits over linear distance in modeling patient flow behavior. Transformations of travel time (square root and log) were found to improve model performance further. Model diagnostics suggested additional spatial separation measurw, separation measure parameters demonstrated stability over time. The model is used to forecast the effects of health care financing reform and hospital closure on patient flows in an urban hospital market. Universal health coverage was found to dramatically improve access to hospital services for lower income patient populations. Hospitals at risk for closure were forecast to receive increased patient flows. Medical school hospitals are expected to lose patients after implementation of health reform, with important implications for graduate medical education. Hospital closures were shown to have negative effects on access to services in poor neighborhoods, but relatively little effect on access in the system as a whole.     

TEMPORAL and SPATIAL VARIABILITY OF CANADIAN INVENTIVE COMPANIES and THEIR INVENTIONS: AN ISSUE OF OWNERSHIP

Inventing is an important prerequisite for industrial economies to remain technologically competitive. Yet it is not well known how inventive companies of domestic or foreign ownership can affect a nation's technological base and, ultimately, its spatial-economic system. The present study examines this relationship in Canada by investigating the performance of its indigenous and foreign-owned inventive companies at the national, subnational, and urban levels. The results indicate that: (1) Canada's indigenous inventive companies are distinct from their foreign-owned counterparts in that they are generally smaller, are more apt to have teams of inventors, are more likely to develop product inventions, have come to manage a greater share of this nation's inventions, and are increasing their role in key Canadian industries; and (2) geographically, Canada's two largest cities and its core region were adversely affected by the declining inventiveness of American-controlled companies during the 1980s. L'esprit ?invention est une nécessité pour que les économies industrielles restent en conditions de concurrence technologique. Cependant, on connaît très peu de la manière que les entreprises inventives de propriété domestique ou étrangère affectent la base technologique ?un pays et, enfin, affectent son système spatio-écono-mique. La présente étude considère ces rapports au Canada au niveau national, sous-national et local, en exminant les performances des entreprises inventives indigènes et étrangères. Les résultats indiquent (1) qu'au Canada les entreprises indigènes et inventives diffèrent de leurs analogues étrangers: en général elles sont plus petites, ont plus tendance à consister en équipes ?inven-teurs, sont plus susceptibles de développer les inventions produites, produisent une plus grande part des inventions canadiennes, et sont en train ?augmenter leur rôle dans les industries canadiennes; et (2) que le déclin de ?esprit ?invention dans les entreprises dirigées par les américains a affecté défavorablement les deux villes les plus grandes au Canada, ainsi que la partie centrale du pays, pendant les années 1980. Mots-clés: invention, Canada, propriétéétrangère, technologie, produit     

AN ASSESSMENT OF BACK-SCATTERED ELECTRON PETROGRAPHY AS A METHOD FOR DISTINGUISHING MEDITERRANEAN OBSIDIANS

The recent application by Burton and Krinsley (1987) of back-scattered electron (BSE) petrography to obsidians from sources located in the south-western United States established that this method can effectively resolve and characterize included micro-crystalline phases that have proven difficult to analyse by optical thin-section microscopy. In the first extension of their original study, we have examined, using BSE petrography, obsidians from island sources located in the Mediterranean, including sources known to have been exploited in prehistory. Because of the kinetic contrasts on their crystallization, these microcrystalline phases reflect the magmatic history of the obsidian, providing information about superheating, supercooling, sub-solidus processes, and other phenomena. This information is of significance for the chemical analysis of Mediterranean obsidians and also as the basis for a powerful alternative to existing non-destructive analytical methods for the sourcing of archaeological and art-historical obsidian.     

HISPANO-MORESQUE POTTERY PRODUCTION OF THE FOURTEENTH-CENTURY WORKSHOP OF TESTAR DEL MOLÍ (PATERNA,SPAIN)

Excavation of Testar del Molí, the only workshop found in the Manises-Paterna area, revealed the existence of a fourteenth-century ceramic workshop covering the remains of the thirteenth-century workshop. This study is concerned with the fourteenth-century production, and forthcoming papers will connect both epochs following the findings of current excavations. The chemical and mineralogical characterization of the ceramic production of this workshop shows the presence of three groups of ceramic pastes which could also be distinguished by, and, thus, related to, their daily use. The raw materials found in the excavation have also been mineralogically and chemically characterized, and a model of possible mixtures of raw materials has also been developed in order to determine their possible use in the manufacture of the pottery previously characterized.     

MULTICOIN: A TOOL FOR CLASSIFYING COINS IN A MULTIMEDIA ENVIRONMENT

Classifying coins found during excavation is a challenging task for the archaeologist. This paper describes a multimedia system designed to assist the archaeologist by enabling him either to classify coins based on a pre-existing catalogue or to draw up his own catalogue for specific purposes. The system can also be used to train novices in the field: following an initial screening, the archaeologist only has to examine coins specifically requiring his expertise. A case study uses coins minted in Salerno 800–1200 AD, but the system has been designed to classify any set of coins by simply changing the underlying knowledge base. Very little training is required to operate the user-friendly system, which runs on multimedia PCs, as it is written using the C++ language and makes full use of the advanced features of Windows 3.11.