•Political corruption and legislative complexity.•Economic impact of legislative complexity on economic growth.•The effects of legislative complexity on welfare and per capita income ...distribution.•Fiscal policies and legislative measures of economic policy.
This paper investigates the macroeconomic impact of legislative complexity in relation to political corruption on growth rate, welfare level and income distribution. After reviewing economic literature on corruption and legislative complexity, an endogenous model is provided. The main theoretical findings of the analysis are that a high level of legislative complexity, like political corruption, constitutes a constraint to growth, reduces the welfare and determines a redistribution of income in favor of the politicians.
In this paper we study the impact of regulatory complexity, a measure of institutional quality, on the GDP, on per capita income and on the growth rate of the Italian regions. For comparative reasons ...we also use the duration of civil disputes as a further indicator of institutional quality used in the regressions as an alternative to the indicator of regulatory complexity. From the theoretical point of view, we use the approach of negative co‐ordination externalities, among the four sources of regulatory production that are at work at the same time. Our approach may be applied in all the countries with a multi‐level government system. Using the random effects and quantile regressions models we are able to quantify the effects of an improvement in institutional quality on the GDP and the growth rate, making a comparison between the results obtained using regulatory complexity or the duration of civil disputes as covariates. We also check for spatial dependence among variables. Econometric analysis supports the theoretical assumption that regulatory complexity is an impediment to the growth of regional GDP and per capita income. The main finding of our analysis is that a reduction in regulatory complexity would be more effective than a reduction in the duration of civil disputes in increasing the income and growth rate. This result could be useful for the policy‐maker because by reducing regulatory complexity we may obtain a considerable by‐product in the shorter duration of civil disputes.
Resumen
En este artículo se estudia el impacto de la complejidad regulatoria, que es una medida de la calidad institucional, en el PIB, en ingresos per cápita y en la tasa de crecimiento de las regiones italianas. Por razones comparativas, también se utilizó la duración de las disputas civiles como un indicador adicional de la calidad institucional empleada en las regresiones como una alternativa al indicador de complejidad regulatoria. Desde el punto de vista teórico, se utiliza el enfoque de las externalidades de coordinación negativas entre las cuatro fuentes de producción reguladora que funcionan al mismo tiempo. El enfoque de este artículo se puede aplicar en cualquier país con un sistema de gobierno multinivel. Mediante el uso de modelos de efectos aleatorios y regresiones cuantílicas se pudo cuantificar los efectos de una mejora en la calidad institucional sobre el PIB y la tasa de crecimiento, lo que permitió una comparación entre los resultados obtenidos utilizando la complejidad regulatoria o la duración de las disputas civiles como covariables. También se comprobó la dependencia espacial entre variables. El análisis econométrico apoya el supuesto teórico de que la complejidad regulatoria es un impedimento para el crecimiento del PIB regional y los ingresos per cápita. El principal hallazgo de este análisis es que una reducción en la complejidad regulatoria sería más efectiva que una reducción en la duración de las disputas civiles para aumentar los ingresos y la tasa de crecimiento. Este resultado podría ser útil para quienes formulan políticas, ya que al reducir la complejidad regulatoria se puede obtener un subproducto considerable en forma de una menor duración de las disputas civiles.
抄録
本稿では、制度の質の指標となるregulatory complexity(規制の複雑さ)が、GDP、一人当たり所得、イタリアの地方の経済成長率に及ぼす影響を検討する。また比較検討のために、民事紛争の期間をregulatory complexityの代替となる、制度の質のより詳細な指標として回帰分析に使用する。理論的観点から、同時に進行する規制立案の4つの情報源の中から、協調の負の外部効果のアプローチを使用する。このアプローチは、マルチレベルの行政システムのあるすべての国に応用できる可能性がある。変量効果モデルと分位点回帰モデルを使用することにより、制度の質の改善がGDPと経済成長率に与える影響の定量が可能となり、regulatory complexityまたは民事紛争の期間を共変量として用いて得られた結果を比較する。また、変数の中に空間依存性がないか確認を行う。計量経済学的分析から、regulatory complexityが地域のGDPと一人当たり国民所得の増加の障害となるという理論的仮説が裏付けられた。今回の分析の主な知見は、regulatory complexityの減少は、所得と経済成長率の増加に関する民事紛争の期間の減少よりも効果的であると考えられることである。regulatory complexityを減少させることにより、より短期間の民事紛争の間に、かなりの副次的結果が得られる可能性があるため、本結果は政策立案者にとって有用となる。
This article analyses the relationship between corruption and legislative complexity, their impact on growth rate, and per capita income distribution. An econometric analysis is performed using a new ...index of legislative complexity, built in a way that makes it internationally comparable. In the dataset, 67 countries are considered, for a period of 21 years from 1995 to 2015. The OLS and 2SLS regressions are provided. The results of the econometric analysis support the hypothesis that legislative complexity is a constraint to growth, and that in countries with a long history of liberal democracy legislative complexity determines an income redistribution to the detriment of the poorer social classes.
Hippo signaling pathway is considered a key regulator of tissue homeostasis, cell proliferation, apoptosis and it is involved in cancer development. In skeletal muscle, YAP, a downstream target of ...the Hippo pathway, is an important player in myoblast proliferation, atrophy/hypertrophy regulation, and in mechano-trasduction, transferring mechanical signals into transcriptional responses. We studied components of Hippo pathway in muscle specimens from patients with Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), Becker muscular dystrophy, limb-girdle muscular dystrophy type 2A and type 2B and healthy subjects. Only DMD muscles had decreased YAP1 protein expression, increased LATS1/2 kinase activity, low Survivin mRNA expression and high miR-21 expression. In light of our novel results, a schematic model is postulated: low levels of YOD1 caused by increased inhibition by miR-21 lead to an increase of LATS1/2 activity which in turn augments phosphorylation of YAP. Reduced amount of active YAP, which is also a target of increased miR-21, causes decreased nuclear expression of YAP-mediated target genes. Since it is known that YAP has beneficial roles in promoting tissue repair and regeneration after injury so that its activation may be therapeutically useful, our results suggest that some components of Hippo pathway could become novel therapeutic targets for DMD treatment.
In this paper the impact of legislation on the GDP growth rate is investigated, both before and after the great economic and financial crisis of 2007–2008. The analysis has been performed using data ...from the twenty Italian regions from 1995 to 2016. Using several econometric models, the most significant result shows that flows of legislation can push economic growth into a recovery phase of the business cycle, while they should be reduced during recession phases, as they constitute a constraint to economic growth.
Food-related diseases are a topic of concern for the population and institutions; therefore, regulations have been envisaged to improve consumer knowledge about food properties and to guide them ...towards healthy food consumption. Europe has addressed the use of claims on labels with two important regulations in 2006 and 2012. The use of claims allows for the differentiation of food products, particularly functional foods, i.e., those that can provide health benefits as part of a standard diet. The study aims to describe the interest of researchers on the topic of functional foods and health claims by observing the trend of publications and highlighting the role of the country on the topic through a network analysis. Another objective is to evaluate the role of lifestyle, psychological and socio-demographic predictors in the choice of functional foods bearing label claims or not, using a systematic literature review. To this aims, a bibliometric and a network analysis were assessed. The results reveal a positive trend in publications and a growing interest in the topic, thus showing that socio-demographic characteristics and lifestyle variables partially influence consumer behaviour. In particular, it emerges that educated people and women are more interested in functional foods, showing a higher willingness to pay for them. In addition, physical activity and beliefs regarding the nutritional quality of functional foods are positively correlated with WTP. However, several contradictory results were observed for some variables in the collected studies. For these reasons and considering the high number of functional foods and claims yet to be evaluated, further investigations are recommended.
Around the world, interest is growing in the circular economy in response to the current unsustainable model of production and consumption based on increased use and depletion of resources. This ...paper provides a review of the academic literature on the circular economy in agri-food systems, with the aims of understanding its main characteristics and perspectives, and summarizing and discussing the literature in this field. This review provides a deeper understanding of the opportunities provided by the circular economy as a solution to the current need to reduce the environmental impacts of business-as-usual economic systems and the state of the art of the circular economy in the academic debate. The results are discussed based on the chosen topic-core investigated in this review: business model and organization management, food loss and waste along the supply chain, analytical tools for the circular economy, stakeholder acceptance of the circular economy, and mitigation strategies and political approach. The findings show the need for the implementation of cleaner production models and consequent increases in stakeholder responsibilities and awareness, from both producers and consumers, as well as the need for the implementation of suitable policies and tools.
Spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) type 1 is a severe infantile autosomal-recessive neuromuscular disorder caused by a survival motor neuron 1 gene (
) mutation and characterized by progressive muscle ...weakness. Without supportive care, SMA type 1 is rapidly fatal. The antisense oligonucleotide nusinersen has recently improved the natural course of this disease. Here, we investigated, with a functional proteomic approach, cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) protein profiles from SMA type 1 patients who underwent nusinersen administration to clarify the biochemical response to the treatment and to monitor disease progression based on therapy. Six months after starting treatment (12 mg/5 mL × four doses of loading regimen administered at days 0, 14, 28, and 63), we observed a generalized reversion trend of the CSF protein pattern from our patient cohort to that of control donors. Notably, a marked up-regulation of apolipoprotein A1 and apolipoprotein E and a consistent variation in transthyretin proteoform occurrence were detected. Since these multifunctional proteins are critically active in biomolecular processes aberrant in SMA, i.e., synaptogenesis and neurite growth, neuronal survival and plasticity, inflammation, and oxidative stress control, their nusinersen induced modulation may support
improved-expression effects. Hence, these lipoproteins and transthyretin could represent valuable biomarkers to assess patient responsiveness and disease progression.
This review aims to assess consumer choices of sustainable fish products, considering a number of attributes that have been considered in the academic literature on this topic. In order to examine ...the effectiveness of sustainable labels, the research question was focused on the relation between sustainable fish labels and consumers’ willingness to pay (WTP). The findings showed how, overall, consumers have positive perceptions regarding sustainable fish products and show a willingness to pay a premium price for the attribute of sustainability. According to the results, the country of origin attribute was found to be the most important attribute in relation to consumer choice. The results indicated a high WTP for local fish products, relative to imported alternatives. Consumers prefer wild-caught fish for its perceived quality, better safety and health aspects, and taste perception than the farm-raised option. As for animal welfare, the results show that consumers are willing to pay a moderate premium price for products that have an improved fish welfare or those that avoid by-catch, such as products with eco-labels like “turtle safe”. With regard to organic labels, the studies identified a positive organic price premium for fish products. However, organic labels do not play a major role in consumer choice, when compared with other attributes.
PurposeAs is well known, there are several aspects that characterise honey consumption and the reasons for purchasing it. Despite this, little attention has been paid to the drivers that move ...consumers towards the use of honey for its health benefits and therapeutic properties. The aim of this study is to define which drivers move the consumption of honey for its health benefits.Design/methodology/approachThe study, conducted on 640 Italian honey consumers, applied inferential tests (Chi-square) and an econometric model (logit regression), and showed that about 66% of the respondents stated that they consume honey for its health properties.FindingsThe main drivers of honey consumption are both among the intrinsic (Colour) and extrinsic (Origin and Organic certification) attributes of the product. What also emerges is that the propensity to consume honey for health purposes is influenced by the consumer characteristics and habits, such as Age cohort, Gender, BMI and Large retail buyer. Moreover, we observed that consumption is influenced by BMI but not by lifestyle characteristics such as sport and diet.Originality/valueThis study could be a support tool for policymakers who are interested in promoting good nutrition and improving public health, since there is great interest in the functional properties of foods and the need to enhance the value of products, while at the same time ensuring consumer protection.
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