Outlier analysis: Natural resources and immigration policy

This replication underlines the importance of outlier diagnostics since many researchers have long neglected influential observations in OLS regression analysis. In his article, entitled “Primary Resources, Secondary Labor,” Shin finds that advanced democracies with increased natural resource wealth, particularly from oil and natural gas production, are more likely to restrict low-skill immigration policy. By performing outlier diagnostics, this replication shows that Shin’s findings are a statistical artifact. When one outlying country, Norway, is removed from the sample data, I observe almost no significant and negative relationship between oil wealth and immigration policy. When two outlying countries are excluded, the effect of oil wealth completely disappears. Robust regression analysis, a widely used remedial method for outlier problems, confirms the results of my outlier diagnostics.

Taxation of copper and nickel ores mining in Australia, Canada, Chile, Kazakhstan and USA

The subject. This article discusses the taxation of copper and nickel extraction in Australia, Canada, Chile, Kazakhstan and USAThe purpose of the article is to confirm or disprove the hypothesis that the experience of taxation of copper and nickel extraction in Australia, Canada, Chile, Kazakhstan and USA may be used for modifying the mineral extraction tax (MET) in Russia in order to increase the share of resource rent collected by the government.The methodology of research includes legal interpretation and economic analysis of the tax legislation in United States, Canada, Australia, Chile and Kazakhstan as countries with a well-developed tax system and a significant size of the mining sector in overall GDP.The authors select the legislative acts of these countries and regions that determine the procedure for collecting taxes in the extraction of metal ores, including those containing copper and nickel, as well as in the production of copper and nickel. The selected legislative acts are analyzed to determine the essential parameters of taxation. Particular attention is paid to the method of calculating the tax base, taking into account the approach to assessing the value of the taxable object, permissible tax deductions and exceptions, which allows authors to test the hypothesis put forward by determining which part of the value of a mineral resource is withdrawn during taxation.The main results, scope of application. Mineral extraction tax is the main tool for collecting natural resource rent in Russia. However, the level of taxation of solid minerals and coal is disproportionately low compared to their share in the production and export of raw materials. Thus, in 2018, the amount of MET on all minerals totaled 100.5 billion rubles, while the MET collected from oil and natural gas amounted to 5,979.6 billion rubles, i.e. 60 times as much. At the same time, the role of solid minerals in the Russian economy is comparable to the role of oil and gas. The share of the main types of minerals in the exports of the Russian Federation in 2018 was 20.4% compared to 56% for oil and gas, i.e. the difference of less than three times. The contribution of the industries related to the extraction of minerals and production of metals (mining of coal, ores, diamonds, metallurgy, fertilizer production) to the Russian GDP is about half as much as that of industries involved in the extraction and processing of oil and natural gas (7% and 14% of GDP respectively).In view of the above, it is important to develop a new approach to the taxation of solid minerals in Russia based on the world’s best practices. In order to identify the general principles of their taxation, we have conducted a detailed analysis of the tax legislation in a number of countries with a well-developed tax system and a significant size of the mining sector (the United States, Canada, Australia, Chile and Kazakhstan). We focused on the taxation of copper and nickel ores mining.Conclusions. The analysis of the international experience of taxation of copper and nickel mining sector reveals the following trend: the tax is calculated based on the market value of the extracted minerals, which is linked to the price quotes for the relevant product on an organized metal exchange (for example, the price of pure metal on the London Metal Exchange). This approach can be used in the Russian tax practice in several ways. First, Russia can adopt the Australian model where royalty on a mineral resource can be levied at the time of sale of the useful component irrespective of the processing stage (ore, concentrate or metal). The second potential model is based on the actual sale price of the product (provided it is sold in an arm’s length transaction) after deducting the costs of processing (i.e., smelting, enrichment etc., depending on the stage of processing) to arrive at the market value of the ore at the "mine mouth". The third is the Canadian model which is similar to the second one, but with the extraction costs also deducted from the sale price.

Senior Entrepreneurship and Family Business Vitality in Saudi Arabia

The Saudi economy constitutes 30% of the Arab world's GDP (gross domestic product). Traditionally focused on oil and natural gas, the economy is in the process of a structural transformation in which entrepreneurship has a pivotal role to play. Sixty percent of Saudi Arabia's population is under the age of 30. Against this background, this chapter will analyze senior entrepreneurship and the creation of family businesses in Saudi Arabia. Finally, the authors propose some measures for their generation.

Relationships among the Fossil Fuel and Financial Markets during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Evidence from Bayesian DCC-MGARCH Models

This study examined how the relationships among the fossil fuel, clean energy stock, gold, and Bitcoin markets have changed since the COVID-19 pandemic took place for hedging the price change risks in the fossil fuel markets. We applied the Bayesian Dynamic Conditional Correlation-Multivariate GARCH (DCC-MGARCH) models using US daily data from 2 January 2019 to 26 February 2021. Our results suggest that the fossil fuel (WTI crude oil and natural gas) and financial markets (clean energy stock, gold, and Bitcoin) generally had negative relationships in 2019 before the pandemic prevailed, but they became positive for a while in mid-2020, alternating between positive (0.8) and negative values (−0.8). As it is known that negative relationships are required among assets to hedge the risk of price changes, this implies that stakeholders need to be cautious in hedging the risk across the fossil fuel and financial markets when a crisis like COVID-19 occurs. However, our study also revealed that such negative relationships only lasted for three to six months, suggesting that the effects of the pandemic were short term and that stakeholders in the fossil fuel markets could cross hedge with the financial markets in the long term.

Forecasting Energy Needs with Logistics

The logistic function is used to forecast energy consumed worldwide and oil production in the U.S. The logistic substitution model is used to describe the energy mix since 1965 presenting a picture significantly different from the one covering the previous 100 years. In the new picture coal gently gains on oil and hydroelectric gains on natural gas even if it is three times smaller. Finally, renewables—wind, geothermal, solar, biomass, and waste—grow exclusively on the expense of nuclear, and are poised to overtake it by the late 2030s. By mid-21st century, coal, oil, and natural gas still remain the main players of comparable size. Hydroelectric has almost doubled in size. The only significant substitution is that of renewables having replaced nuclear albeit remaining at less than a ¼ the size of the other three energy sources. U.S. oil produced by fracking is forecasted to cease by mid-21st century, while oil produced by traditional methods should continue on its slowly declining trend. US oil production is likely to represent less than 1% of the oil consumed worldwide by mid-21st century.

Climate Risks and the Realized Volatility Oil and Gas Prices: Results of an Out-Of-Sample Forecasting Experiment

We extend the widely-studied Heterogeneous Autoregressive Realized Volatility (HAR-RV) model to examine the out-of-sample forecasting value of climate-risk factors for the realized volatility of movements of the prices of crude oil, heating oil, and natural gas. The climate-risk factors have been constructed in recent literature using techniques of computational linguistics, and consist of daily proxies of physical (natural disasters and global warming) and transition (U.S. climate policy and international summits) risks involving the climate. We find that climate-risk factors contribute to out-of-sample forecasting performance mainly at a monthly and, in some cases, also at a weekly forecast horizon. We demonstrate that our main finding is robust to various modifications of our forecasting experiment, and to using three different popular shrinkage estimators to estimate the extended HAR-RV model. We also study longer forecast horizons of up to three months, and we account for the possibility that policymakers and forecasters may have an asymmetric loss function.

Forward Osmosis for Produced Water Treatment: A Comprehensive Review

During crude oil and natural gas extraction from a reservoir, a large amount of water is also produced. The water fraction contains oil, grease, organic and inorganic constituents, called produced water (PW). Over the years, efficient treatment of PW has been concerned. PW has been treated with various technologies, namely floatation, filtration, coagulation/flocculation, or biological processes. Those technologies were assembled to achieve discharge standards while minimizing the cost. Exploration of membrane-based technologies for the treatment of PW has recently been reported, including the emerging forward osmosis (FO) process. This paper reviews the research progress on the FO process for PW treatment. A brief introduction to the traditional treatment technologies is first provided. Next, the basics of the FO process and research progress on the application of FO on PW treatment are discussed. Finally, techniques for fouling control in FO are reviewed, namely osmotic backwashing, ultrasound, chemical cleaning, and air sparging.