Macro Trends Research Articles

A multiple time series-based recurrent neural network for short-term load forecasting

Electricity, an indispensable resource in daily life and industrial production, is hard to store, so accurate short-term load forecasting (STLF) plays a vital role in resource allocation, capital budgeting of power companies, energy deployment and government control. In recent decades, the strong dependency relationships of time series have been considered in many researches, but the discrete information has not proven to be very useful in their experiments. In general, while discrete information is weak, it can provide macro trends compared to the micro trends of continuous information. In this research, we aim to combine macro and micro information by continuous and discrete time series to generate multiple time series (MTS). The MTS comprise four information sequences: short-term, cycle, long short-term and cross-long short-term. These MTS are used to build a STLF system using a recurrent neural network (RNN) model that can learn sequential information between continuous and discrete series. Therefore, the RNN model with MTS information can improve the forecasting performance for short-term load forecasting. The experimental results show that our proposed forecasting system outperforms the state-of-the-art approach.

Spatial Trends of Towns in Europe: The Performance of Regions with Low Degree of Urbanisation

AbstractThe paper contributes to the understanding of socio‐spatial trends and urban systems in Europe, with a specific focus on smaller settlements. First, a morphological delimitation of urban settlements as geographical base is used to identify the different settlement structures that characterise regions across Europe. Secondly, an analysis of population and GDP performances of NUTS 3 regions for the 29 countries of the European space (growth rates in 2001–2011) provides evidence of the variety of territorial phenomena that characterise smaller‐settlement regions across Europe. Finally, the paper highlights the diversity and complexity of urbanisation structures in Europe and how general trends observed at larger scale are articulated locally according to prevailing structures of urbanisation. It shows the character of ‘embeddedness’ of smaller settlements within urban systems and territorial structures and how the socio‐economic performances of smaller‐settlement regions are defined by a combination of macro trends, national contextualisation, local dynamics and regional path dependency.

Valuation of Late-Stage Companies and Buyouts

This note focuses on the valuation of late-stage companies with a particular emphasis on leveraged buyouts (LBOs). In addition to LBOs, late-stage investments can arise in situations involving growth equity, turnarounds, mezzanine investments, and distressed debt. In contrast to venture capital, where firms are typically at an early stage of development, late-stage investments involve more established businesses that have an ability to take on higher levels of leverage to augment investor returns. While in practice there are several approaches to valuation, the approach chosen often comes down to which provides the most accurate representation of the situation and perspectives of the parties involved. This note takes the perspective of a PE investor and assumes some basic familiarity with the structure of PE investing. It provides a basic overview of the primary sources of financing and the metrics used to gauge LBO capital structures and a step-by-step example of an LBO analysis. Excerpt UVA-F-1639 Rev. Aug. 7, 2013 VALUATION OF LATE-STAGE COMPANIES AND BUYOUTS Private equity involves a wide range of investment opportunities from venture capital to buyouts. The methods of valuation used to analyze private equity (PE) investments depend on the maturity of the company and the extent of financial information available to forecast company, industry, and macro trends. This note focuses on the valuation of late-stage companies with a particular emphasis on leveraged buyouts (LBOs). In addition to LBOs, late-stage investments can arise in situations involving growth equity, turnarounds, mezzanine investments, and distressed debt. In contrast to venture capital, where firms are typically at an early stage of development, late-stage investments involve more established businesses that have an ability to take on higher levels of leverage to augment investor returns. While in practice there are multiple approaches to valuation, the approach chosen often comes down to which provides the most accurate representation of the situation and perspectives of the parties involved. This note takes the perspective of a PE investor and assumes some basic familiarity with the structure of PE investing. It provides a basic overview of the primary sources of financing and the metrics used to gauge LBO capital structures and a step-by-step example of an LBO analysis. What is a Leveraged Buyout? A leveraged buyout is simply the purchase of a firm by an outside individual, another firm, or the incumbent management using large amounts of debt to finance the purchase. Most often, LBOs are undertaken by private equity firms that specialize in these transactions (e.g., Blackstone, Carlyle Group, and KKR). PE firms that specialize in LBOs are often referred to as sponsors, because they in effect sponsor or propose the deal. Unlike strategic buyers, who often have assets or expertise to combine with the target firm, sponsors are typically financial buyers whose expertise lies in arranging the financing and incentives for management to perform in a highly leveraged transaction (HLT). That said, sponsors must also have a keen eye to identify opportunities for operating improvements. . . .

Macro Trends and the Future of Public Health Practice.

Public health practice in the twenty-first century is in a state of significant flux. Several macro trends are impacting the current practice of governmental public health and will likely have effects for many years to come. These macro trends are described as forces of change, which are changes that affect the context in which the community and its public health system operate. This article focuses on seven such forces of change: the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, public health agency accreditation, climate change, health in all policies, social media and informatics, demographic transitions, and globalized travel. Following the description of each of these, this article then turns to possible approaches to measuring, tracking, and understanding the impact of these forces of change on public health practice, including the use of evidence-based public health, practice-based research, and policy surveillance.

Applied epidemiology and public health: are we training the future generations appropriately?

To extend the reach and relevance of epidemiology for public health practice, the science needs be broadened beyond etiologic research, to link more strongly with emerging technologies and to acknowledge key societal transformations. This new focus for epidemiology and its implications for epidemiologic training can be considered in the context of macro trends affecting society, including a greater focus on upstream causes of disease, shifting demographics, the Affordable Care Act and health care system reform, globalization, changing health communication environment, growing centrality of team and transdisciplinary science, emergence of translational sciences, greater focus on accountability, big data, informatics, high-throughput technologies (“omics”), privacy changes, and the evolving funding environment. This commentary describes existing approaches to and competencies for training in epidemiology, maps macro trends with competencies, highlights an example of competency-based education in the Epidemic Intelligence Service of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and suggests expanded and more dynamic training approaches. A reexamination of current approaches to epidemiologic training is needed.

Evolution of the types of shopping and spatial organization of retail trade in the post-Soviet metropolis

The relationship of stratification of shopping types, development of certain types of retail facilities, and major macro trends in the spatial organization of the tertiary sector of the city economy is described by with a case of St. Petersburg, one of the leaders and innovators in Russian retail. Shopping periodization from 1989 to 2016 is proposed based on the author’s multiyear field surveys and interviews as well as the above criteria. Six periods are distinguished. The features of the latest, modern stage are described in particular detail taking into account consumer stratification by income groups. The data also argue in a more general discussion about the completion or continuation of social transformation in the post-Soviet metropolis. The data on the different stages and regularities in the development of the spatial organization of retail trade for this innovative leader give grounds to make forecasts for other major cities of Russia.

The global society and its impact on public relations theorizing: Reflections on major macro trends

This article contributes to the discussion on societal changes and their impact on communication disciplines by focusing on public relations and its role in contemporary global society. The thesis is that the public relations profession has been affected by contemporary societal changes that challenge the existing body of knowledge and its underpinning theories. To understand the role of public relations in 21st century global societies and pursuing future public relations theorizing, the authors argue it is paramount to comprehend which factors at macro, meso, and micro levels lie beneath the substantial changes in today’s global society. The article presents and reflects on four major macro trends of contemporary global society and concludes with suggestions for future directions for public relations scholarship and practice that are rooted in the concept of community and the idea of being part of and at the service of a community.

The Macro-Micro Model, Trends vs. Noise, and SSA - I

The Macro Micro (MM) model contains different time scales and deals with risk as it occurs in the real world, especially trend risk. A new methodology - Singular Spectrum Analysis (SSA) – is introduced to identify historical trends, trend volatilities, and noise-reduced trend-trend correlations. Application is for a long-term PFE risk simulation, including realistic quasi-random Macro trends. Two Macro versions of the MM model are presented – a statistical trend model and a historic “time-slice” trend model.

Macro-Micro, Trends vs. Noise, and SSA - II

We describe some details of extensions of the Macro Micro (MM) model. Applications include a long-term real-world PFE risk simulation, including realistic quasi-random Macro trends. The details elaborated here include the use of the 3rd order skew Green function to obtain micro mean reversion, a random time distribution for the Macro component, sliding down the yield curve, and approximate no-arbitrage in the MM model.

The influence of tax and regulatory policies on entrepreneurs’ opportunity evaluation decisions

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to investigate effects of policy initiatives on entrepreneurs’ opportunity evaluation decisions.Design/methodology/approach– Factors were selected from real world policy initiatives. The model pricing power as a traditional economic base rate attribute and then considering how variance in use fees and reporting requirements changes the base rate relationship. The factors served as decision attributes in a conjoint analysis experiment. A total of 126 entrepreneurs made 2,268 opportunity evaluation decisions.Findings– While increases in pricing power result in a positive upward base rate opportunity evaluation, government mandated use fees and reporting requirements diminish the base rate toward the negative. This suggest that that even though the likely profits are much higher with the significant pricing power opportunity, entrepreneurs heavily discount these opportunities because they view the combination of economic costs of paying high use fees and the non-pecuniary costs of reporting requirements as unappealing. Further, the authors find entrepreneurs’ disproportionately discount higher margin opportunities when the regulatory burden is higher revealing the importance of policy factors in new product introduction decisions.Practical implications– Policy has traditionally focussed on the macro-level effects of initiatives and how they directly affect issues like economic growth. This study reveals that this is only part of the equation because changes in government policy impact entrepreneurs’ opportunity evaluation decisions that underpin macro trends. In order to be effective, policy makers need to pay greater attention to not only the economic, but also the non-pecuniary costs that policy changes evoke. This is especially true for those policies like reporting requirements that may be perceived as threats to entrepreneurs’ sense of autonomy.Originality/value– This research brings to the foreground the relationship between the policy environment and the cognitions and decision of individual entrepreneurs whose collective actions move the economy. The net effect is new insight regarding how policy factors coalesce to influence entrepreneurs’ assessments of opportunities, often in ways that negatively affect these assessments beyond what simple economic calculations would suggest.

Advertising from the perspective of festivals: the present and future of commercial communication in the categories of awards (2013-2014)

Since the very beginning of research on the structure of the advertising system, advertising awards and acknowledgements have been referred to as one of its essential elements. In the specialised sector, a particular interest in advertising festivals has been acknowledged which tends to mirror the continuous evolution of the commercial communication system. With a clear interaction, festivals are forums in which professionals find suitable inspiration which has an impact on what is suggested by each festival each year for future ones. Hence, they become benchmarks for the present and future. Specifically, in order to show the latter aspect, this paper focuses on the organization of festivals and shows the major present and future advertising trends. In advertising, five major macro trends are addressed (Digitisation, New Alternatives, Innovation, Integration and Results) and following the results of our research, they are all covered in the festival awards. Specifically, according to the way the categories of advertising awards are presented, we have concluded that the digitisation of communications has come to an end; the of communication in advertising are very present in all contests as the result of the current marketing communication campaigns in which new ways of communication are gradually gaining a more relevant role; innovation is essentially an advertising value; the context of integrated marketing communications is inherent to current advertising; and the effectiveness and results in festivals are significant.

World trends from 2017

Issue of prognosis, analyses of future trends is companion to statecraft, political, economic and military planning. How we plan, what does IR says about scientific prognosis. Jankovic starts with this set of issues in order to pass into prognosis itself based on observable world trends. He claims that European Union has entered its climax comparing it foreign policy situation with that of war situation of Third Reich in 1943. Article is divided in five parts. After presenting and criticizing Anglo-American approach in prognosis, he starts with analysis of the world order changes, of EU trends, Middle, Far East and some trends regarding Africa. Author presents macro trends in North - West Pacific, in Israel-Palestine, in Syria, Iraq, in Europe.

Macro Trends of Sustainable Income for Sustainable Development; Case Study of Tehran Municipality

Macro Trends of Sustainable Income for Sustainable Development; Case Study of Tehran Municipality

Vertentes da Educação Ambiental: da conservacionista à critica

Ao longo de sua história a Educação Ambiental recebeu várias denominações, desse modo o presente trabalho visou analisar as vertentes da educação ambiental presentes atualmente, assim como, entender sua formação histórica. Para isto foi realizada revisão de literatura utilizando como aporte teórico, o trabalho de Layrargues e Lima (2011). A Educação Ambiental surge em 1965 em um contexto de preocupação com os recursos naturais. No Brasil, porém, esta prática educativa só foi instituída na década de 1980. Até este período a educação ambiental possuía enfoque estritamente ambiental. Atualmente existem várias vertentes e, neste trabalho, foram consideradas três macrotendências principais, conservacionista, pragmática e crítica, que se diferenciam principalmente por seus objetivos com relação ao meio ambiente e à sociedade.Palavras chave: História; Macrotendências; Sociedade.

Futures of privacy protection: A framework for creating scenarios of institutional change

The future of privacy is a topical issue in the context of debates on mass surveillance and the increasing prevalence of social media sites in everyday life. Previous scenario studies on privacy have focused on macro trends and on forecasting technological developments, and claims about causal influences have remained implicit. This article presents an alternative approach for constructing scenarios of privacy protection. The article focuses on privacy protection as a social institution and builds on the theory of gradual institutional change. The article presents a scenario framework which includes three stages: (1) outlining the dynamics of privacy protection, (2) tracing historical processes and constructing a causal narrative, and (3) creating event-based scenarios. The resulting scenarios are narratives of plausible chains of events which are based on the results of the previous stages. The key difference to typical scenario approaches is the focus on specific actors and types of event sequences in privacy protection. The argument is that by lowering the level of abstraction in this way, researchers and decision-makers can gain a more profound understanding of possible future challenges in privacy protection and of key leverage points in the institutional change process.

An Integrated Approach to Visioning for Peripheral Farming Villages: A Case Study of Japan

This paper demonstrates a case study to comprehensively understand Japanese rural society, proposing an integrated approach to visioning sustainable rural society in the context of developed countries. We first provided an overview of Japanese agricultural history and conducted interviews with individuals regarding their life histories in two peripheral research fields in Japan. We then analyzed these life histories and compared them with the macro trends of agricultural policy. In particular, our analyses shed light on the interactions between agricultural policies, individuals’ life and local resource endowments in rural areas. Specifically, human, natural and man-made capitals in Japanese rural society have changed in the way they are used while agricultural policies have exclusively focused on rice production. Based on the observation, we argue that Japanese policy might have hindered farmers’ efforts and attempts in the country’s periphery. We conclude that integrating macro analysis and field research facilitates the understanding of local resources and residents’ wellbeing for conceptualizing and approaching the future of farming villages.

Social Vulnerability in European Cities: The Role of Local Welfare in Times of Crisis

PART I: MACRO TRENDS 1. New Social Risks and the Role of Local Welfare: An Introduction Costanzo Ranci, Taco Brandsen and Stefania Sabatinelli 2. Social Cohesion and Global Competitiveness: Clustering Cities Marianna d'Ovidio and Costanzo Ranci PART II: Structural Mechanisms and Social Policy in Local Welfare Systems 3. Changing Labor Markets and the Place of Local Policies Manuel Aguilar Hendrickson and Stefania Sabatinelli 4. Changing Family Needs and Local Childcare Policies Laurent Fraisse and Anna Escobedo 5. Cities of Migration: the Challenges of Social Inclusion Giuliana Costa and Benjamin Ewert 6. Urban Housing Systems in Times of Crisis Giuliana Costa, Goiko Bezovan, Pietro Palvarini and Taco Brandsen PART III: VULNERABLE GROUPS: COPING WITH UNCERTAINTY 7. Young People Experiencing Work Precariousness: Risks and Opportunities Lara Maestripieri and Stefania Sabatinelli 8. Lone Mothers: Care Arrangements Between Support and Isolation Renata Siemie?ska and Ilona Matysiak 9. Vulnerable Migrants: Coping Strategies and Multiple Paths to Social Exclusion Sandro Cattacin and Patricia Naegeli PART IV: CONCLUSION 10. Local Welfare Systems in Europe in the Age of Austerity Costanzo Ranci, Taco Brandsen and Stefania Sabatinelli

Charting a future for epidemiologic training

PurposeTo identify macro-level trends that are changing the needs of epidemiologic research and practice and to develop and disseminate a set of competencies and recommendations for epidemiologic training that will be responsive to these changing needs. MethodsThere were three stages to the project: (1) assembling of a working group of senior epidemiologists from multiple sectors, (2) identifying relevant literature, and (3) conducting key informant interviews with 15 experienced epidemiologists. ResultsTwelve macro trends were identified along with associated actions for the field and educational competencies. The macro trends include the following: (1) “Big Data” or informatics, (2) the changing health communication environment, (3) the Affordable Care Act or health care system reform, (4) shifting demographics, (5) globalization, (6) emerging high-throughput technologies (omics), (7) a greater focus on accountability, (8) privacy changes, (9) a greater focus on “upstream” causes of disease, (10) the emergence of translational sciences, (11) the growing centrality of team and transdisciplinary science, and (12) the evolving funding environment. ConclusionsAddressing these issues through curricular change is needed to allow the field of epidemiology to more fully reach and sustain its full potential to benefit population health and remain a scientific discipline that makes critical contributions toward ensuring clinical, social, and population health.

Armed conflict, land grabs and primitive accumulation in Colombia: micro processes, macro trends and the puzzles in between

Armed conflict is widely believed to disrupt agricultural production and ‘reverse’ development, but it may also involve the violent transformation of rural economies from subsistence to commercial agriculture. The case of Las Pavas, an estate in northern Colombia, provides further evidence that armed conflict created opportunities for violent land grabs and the expansion of commercial agriculture in Colombia. However, aggregate data suggest that primitive accumulation may be only part of the story behind the massive scale of forced displacement and dispossession. A research strategy that accounts for the diversity of subnational contexts, processes and outcomes is needed.

Shifting Horizons: Assessing Macro Trends Before, During, and Following Systemic Banking Crises

This paper assesses the trends of some main macroeconomic and macro-financial variables across different time horizons related to systemic banking crises. Specifically, by gradually shifting the observation horizon of the same statistical model across time, it observes how these variables are associated with banking crises in the past, present and future. The associations vary considerably when shifting horizons. Domestic house price growth increases the probability of observing a crisis in the future, but its effect disappears when moving closer to a crisis. The inverse holds true for the effect of the global credit gap, while global credit growth consistently and significantly increases the probability of a future banking crisis. Also, banking crises seem to be spatially correlated in the very short run. In all, the results can help policy makers by shedding light on the temporal horizon of the variables they monitor in addition to evaluating their predictive power.