“The Contagion of Her Wretchedness”: Rousing Interest in the Highland Widows of Scott and McQueen

Walter Scott’s “The Highland Widow” proved to be a challenging text to teach online during the pandemic; put off by antiquated language, embedded narratives, and the temporal distance of the widow and her history, my students had little to offer in our discussion. In order to rouse their interest and restore “classroom affect,” I incorporated streaming video of two Alexander McQueen fashion shows with thematic resonance—Highland Rape (1995) and Widows of Culloden (2006). Like Scott, McQueen compels his audience to confront the violence and forced assimilation of Scotland’s past, but in a visually provocative and immediate fashion that captures the attention of easily distracted, languishing students. Together, the two artists offer a recursive model for engaging students in remote and difficult texts, encouraging instructors to prolong the intensity of the affective encounter and defer the moment of instructional resolution.

Budget efficiency of tax incentives for innovative activity

The article is devoted to the topical issues of determining the budget effectiveness of the use of tax incentives for innovation. The conceptual difference between “budgetary effect” and “budget efficiency” has been defined. A reasonable criterion of the budgetary effect, which is proposed to calculate as the difference between financial results of innovation and expenditures (temporary budget losses) to stimulate innovation. The method of justifying the budgetary effect of tax incentives for innovation by applying an increased standard of write-offs on the cost of spending on scientific and scientific and technical works has been proposed. The proposed methodology uses a recursive model for calculating tax revenues starting with the development of innovative products, which occurs as a result of the reinvestment by the subject of innovation in the first stage – savings from tax cuts, in the second and subsequent stages – the said savings and part of the increase in profits. The increments of investment resources of the subject of innovation and budget revenues are determined taking into account the factor of time of their receipt by the method of discounting. The budgetary effect is proposed to assess during the regulatory period of return on investment. The article contains a logical illustration of the recursive model of tax revenues and the calculation formula. Based on the data of the innovative enterprise, the indicators of the budget effect, the internal rate of budget revenue and the payback period of its losses, which arise due to the introduction of an increased rate of write-off for the cost of scientific and scientific-technical works have been calculated . It is recommended when making decisions on the feasibility of tax incentives for innovation to take into account the stimulating function of taxes, which is manifested in increased motivation of entrepreneurs to innovate. Keywords: taxes, tax policy, innovation, budget efficiency.

Peer Relatedness, School Satisfaction, and Life Satisfaction in Early Adolescence: A Non-recursive Model

Cumulative evidence suggests that, for children and adolescents, peer relatedness is an essential component of their overall sense of belonging, and correlates with subjective well-being and school-based well-being. However, it remains unclear what the underlying mechanism explaining these relationships is. Therefore, this study examines whether there is a reciprocal effect between school satisfaction and overall life satisfaction (Hypothesis 1), and whether the effect of peer relatedness on life satisfaction is mediated by school satisfaction (Hypothesis 2). A non-recursive model with instrumental variables was tested with econometric and structural equation modeling methodologies, using a cross-sectional sample of n = 5,619 Chilean early adolescents (49.2% girls), aged 10, 11, and 12 (46.13, 44.99, and 8.88% respectively). Results were highly consistent across methods and supported the hypotheses. First, the findings confirmed a significant reciprocal influence between school satisfaction and overall life satisfaction, with a greater impact from school to life satisfaction. Second, the effect of peer relatedness on overall life satisfaction was fully mediated by school satisfaction. The study further suggests the importance of considering reciprocal effects among domain-specific satisfaction and overall life satisfaction and illustrates the application of non-recursive models for this purpose.

Studying the course of Covid-19 by a recursive delay approach

In an earlier paper we proposed a recursive model for epidemics; in the present paper we generalize this model to include the asymptomatic or unrecorded symptomatic people, which we call dark people (dark sector). We call this the SEPARd-model. A delay differential equation version of the model is added; it allows a better comparison to other models. We carry this out by a comparison with the classical SIR model and indicate why we believe that the SEPARd model may work better for Covid-19 than other approaches.In the second part of the paper we explain how to deal with the data provided by the JHU, in particular we explain how to derive central model parameters from the data. Other parameters, like the size of the dark sector, are less accessible and have to be estimated more roughly, at best by results of representative serological studies which are accessible, however, only for a few countries. We start our country studies with Switzerland where such data are available. Then we apply the model to a collection of other countries, three European ones (Germany, France, Sweden), the three most stricken countries from three other continents (USA, Brazil, India). Finally we show that even the aggregated world data can be well represented by our approach.At the end of the paper we discuss the use of the model. Perhaps the most striking application is that it allows a quantitative analysis of the influence of the time until people are sent to quarantine or hospital. This suggests that imposing means to shorten this time is a powerful tool to flatten the curves.

Non recursive model of consumer satisfaction and trust

This study was designed to identify and analyze the effect of perceived value, differentiation, and emotional branding on customer satisfaction and trust; non-recursive influence between customer satisfaction and customer trust of the vivo smartphone in Medan. Respondents consist of adults who use vivo smartphones domiciled in Medan. The analysis technique uses a structural equation model with the robust maximum likelihood method. Data processing is assisted by Lisrel software and the results indicate in case the direct effect coefficient of the same latent variable is positive in the non-recursive and recursive models, the coefficient will be higher in the recursive model. Therefore, it is important for vivo smartphone management to verify first, whether the relationship between customer satisfaction and trust is reciprocal. In case it is one way, where satisfaction affects customer trust, then the strategy or program of increasing perceived value and differentiation directly at customer satisfaction is more optimal. Furthermore, it will have an impact on customer trust since the satisfaction mediating effect is higher than the customer trust mediating effect in the recursive model. The program of increasing consumer trust with emotional branding through customer satisfaction is good, since the mediation of satisfaction is significant in both non-recursive and recursive contexts.