Modeling Commuting Flows via Fixed Components

The basic, reasonable hypothesis underlying this paper is that many individuals are comfortable with their current combination of job and residential location and have no intention of changing job location or moving from where they live. This causes autocorrelation in the time series of commuting flows and provides a rationale for introducing fixed components in the trip distribution model. The fixed components are assumed to be constant in time and separated from the observed trip distribution. We next consider the residuals and fit the model by a constrained entropy-maximization procedure. Based on commuting data from Stockholm County in Sweden, the fixed component spatial interaction model is demonstrated to lead to a substantial improvement in goodness of fit compared with conventional spatial interaction models. The identification of fixed components leads to significantly lower estimates of the distance deterrence parameter, and fixed components are further argued to be potentially useful in a prediction perspective. The distance deterrence parameter in the fixed component model reflects the spatial interaction of workers who are actually considering changes in their residential and/or job location. We also compare alternative measures of spatial separation and discuss differences in commuting behaviour by gender.

Visualization of job availability based on text analytics localization approach

<span>Rate of employment is a strong indicator of economic stability of a country. It relates to the number of volumes of produced products and services. If the unemployment rate is high, the amount of gross domestic product (GDP) of a country may be declined. One of the main factors that contributes to low rate of employment is the mismatch between job seeker and the requirement of the job applied. This is due to the limited analysis performed on the relevant information on job advertisement; such as, skills, responsibilities of the job, location and expectation of the employers. The obscure job descriptions provided in the advertisement may result in application of unsuitable candidates that can cause rejection of the candidate and the potential employer may take a long time to filter and evaluate the applications. A system that is able to provide relevant information in a simple and catchy way is needed to simplify the task of job searching. In this paper we proposed a text analytics technique to extract users’ comments from social media such as Twitter and Facebook on job advertisement. The result is then displayed in a geotagged map that can reveal the density of job availability based on geographical location. The job seekers can easily observe and select their desired job location. The initial system shows potential of the inclusion of the proposed approach in job advertisement websites. In comparison to other job searching websites, this system can provide additional information on public view about the advertised job obtained from the social media text analytics. With this additional information, jobseekers have more confidence in job selection and allows employers to receive more suitable candidates for the available positions. It is hoped that the proposed system can tailor the job advertisements to the need of the jobseeker and making the job application more relevant hence reducing the potential employers’ processing time.</span>

PARENTS’ SOCIAL NETWORK, JOB LOCATION, AND GRADUATE WAGES: EVIDENCE BASED ON THE FIRST JOBS OF GRADUATES FROM A CHINESE COLLEGE

This study investigates the effects of parents’ social network (PSN) and job location on graduate wages by using a unique dataset from one Chinese college. First, PSN significantly increases wage premium. Secondly, although graduates who work in their hometowns do not earn higher incomes than those who work outside their hometowns, the former significantly benefit from their PSN. Thirdly, the nepotism channel of PSN may be more important than the information channel, and PSN is more important for female graduates. Our results exhibit robustness to endogeneity. This paper emphasizes the importance of social networks and provides evidence on the intergenerational immobility of socioeconomic status, which raises significant policy implications.

Existence

A functioning em is the result of information representing an em mental state being placed in compatible signal-processing hardware. When this hardware “runs,” it repeatedly calculates the next mental state by combining the previous mental state with inputs from outside systems, and then sends resulting signals to outside systems. In this situation, an em can be said to experience this succession of mental states, while interacting with outside systems. As em hardware and supporting resources are not free, ems are not free; someone must pay to create an em. When an em is copied, the em mental state sitting in compatible hardware is fi rst read out as bits, and then those bits are copied, transmitted, and read into new compatible hardware. Then at the new hardware those bits are converted into the exact same em mental state, now ready to run on this new hardware. Immediately after this copy action, the evolution of the mental states in the two different hardware systems would be exactly the same, if it were not for errors and differences in environmental inputs, and differences in random fluctuations within a fault-prone emulation process. Just as ems are not free but costly, copies are also not free but costly. Typically, an em with an established role in the em world is asked if they want to approve the creation of a new copy, who would have a new life with a new role in that world. Before agreeing to create this new life, the original could ask about the new em’s intended job, location, friends, etc. On occasion, offers for new life roles might be made to archived copies. That is, ems might agree to allow the storage of archive copies, who can then be awoken later to consider new life offers. If the revived copy rejected the offer, it might be retired or ended, as previously agreed. To actually make a copy, an em may invoke a special viewing mode, wherein the em specifies or approves a description of the set of em roles that would result from this copying act. When an em initiates a copy event, it should be ready and willing to take on any of the roles of the resulting copies. Immediately after the copy event, each em copy is informed of its assigned role. Typically one of the ems is assigned to continue its previous role, while other ems are assigned to take on new roles.