A Cost-Efficiency Theory of Dispersed Network Equilibria

1988 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 231-266 ◽  
Author(s):  
T E Smith
Keyword(s):  
Cost Efficiency ◽  
Statistical Estimation ◽  
Spatial Interaction ◽  
Flow Patterns ◽  
Smoothing Techniques ◽  
Interaction Behavior ◽  
Estimation Procedures ◽  
Efficiency Theory ◽  
Cost Efficient ◽  
The Cost

The purpose of this paper is to unite two current approaches to modeling dispersed spatial-interaction behavior: the entropy-smoothing approach, and the cost-efficiency approach. The main result of the paper is to show that those interaction flows determined by entropy-smoothing techniques correspond (for large flows) to the most probable flow patterns consistent with cost-efficient spatial-interaction behavior. In addition, it is shown that under very general conditions, these flow patterns are indeed overwhelmingly most probable. Thus, these results establish a clear behavioral foundation for entropy-smoothing techniques in terms of the cost-efficiency theory. Finally, a number of statistical estimation procedures are developed for operationalizing this theory.

scholarly journals Cost Analysis of a Novel Method for Ecological Compensation—A Study of the Translocation of Dead Wood

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (11) ◽  
pp. 6075
Author(s):  
Ola Lindroos ◽  
Malin Söderlind ◽  
Joel Jensen ◽  
Joakim Hjältén
Keyword(s):  
Cost Efficiency ◽  
Dead Wood ◽  
Road Transportation ◽  
Ecological Value ◽  
Ecological Compensation ◽  
Work Time ◽  
Delivery Times ◽  
Novel Method ◽  
Cost Efficient ◽  
The Cost

Translocation of dead wood is a novel method for ecological compensation and restoration that could, potentially, provide a new important tool for biodiversity conservation. With this method, substrates that normally have long delivery times are instantly created in a compensation area, and ideally many of the associated dead wood dwelling organisms are translocated together with the substrates. However, to a large extent, there is a lack of knowledge about the cost efficiency of different methods of ecological compensation. Therefore, the costs for different parts of a translocation process and its dependency on some influencing factors were studied. The observed cost was 465 SEK per translocated log for the actual compensation measure, with an additional 349 SEK/log for work to enable evaluation of the translocation’s ecological results. Based on time studies, models were developed to predict required work time and costs for different transportation distances and load sizes. Those models indicated that short extraction and insertion distances for logs should be prioritized over road transportation distances to minimize costs. They also highlighted a trade-off between costs and time until a given ecological value is reached in the compensation area. The methodology used can contribute to more cost-efficient operations and, by doing so, increase the use of ecological compensation and the benefits from a given input.

scholarly journals Cost efficiency of the Czech and Slovak banking sectors: an application of the data envelopment analysis

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Iveta Palecková
Keyword(s):  
Data Envelopment Analysis ◽  
Cost Efficiency ◽  
Commercial Banks ◽  
Banking Sector ◽  
Banking Industry ◽  
Returns To Scale ◽  
Data Envelopment ◽  
Cost Efficient ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Variable Returns To Scale

The aim of the paper is to estimate the cost efficiency of the Czech and Slovak commercial banks within the period 2010-2014. For empirical analysis the Data Envelopment Analysis input-oriented model with variable returns to scale is applied on the data of the commercial banks. The intermediation approach is adopted to define the inputs and outputs. The Czech commercial banks are more cost efficient than Slovak commercial banks. The development of average cost efficiency is similar in the Czech and Slovak banking industry. The most efficient Czech banks are Ceská sporitelna and Sberbank in the Czech banking sector, the most efficient Slovak bank is Privatbanka with 100% efficiency.

scholarly journals Global Prospects of the Cost-Efficiency of Broiler Welfare in Middle-Segment Production Systems

Animals ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (7) ◽  
pp. 473 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luuk S.M. Vissers ◽  
Ingrid C. de Jong ◽  
Peter L.M. van Horne ◽  
Helmut W. Saatkamp
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
Animal Welfare ◽  
Cost Efficiency ◽  
Production Systems ◽  
Production Costs ◽  
Middle Segment ◽  
Efficient Manner ◽  
Cost Efficient ◽  
The Cost

In the 2000s, the idea of a so-called middle-segment arose in North-West Europe to address the criticism on intensive broiler production systems. Middle-segment systems being indoor housing of slower-growing broiler strains at a stocking density ≤38 kg/m2. Previous literature showed that Dutch middle-segment systems entail a relatively large gain in animal welfare at a relatively low increase in costs, i.e., have a high cost-efficiency. The question is to what extent these findings are applicable to other countries. Therefore, the aim of this study is to gain insight in the global prospects of middle-segment systems by exploring the cost-efficiency of these systems in other parts of the world. A set of representative countries, containing the Netherlands, United States and Brazil were selected. Cost-efficiency was defined as the ratio of the change in the level of animal welfare and the change in production costs. The level of animal welfare was measured by the Welfare Quality (WQ) index score. Data was collected from literature and consulting experts. Results show that in the Netherlands, United States and Brazil a change from conventional towards a middle-segment system improves animal welfare in a cost-efficient manner (the Netherlands 9.1, United States 24.2 and Brazil 12.1). Overall, it can be concluded that in general middle-segment production systems provide a considerable increase in animal welfare at a relatively small increase in production costs and therefore offer good prospects for a cost-efficient improvement of broiler welfare.

scholarly journals Cost-efficient inter-robot delivery for resource-constrained and interdependent multi-robot schedules

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 172988141982804 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yin Chen ◽  
Xinjun Mao ◽  
Shuo Yang ◽  
Qiuzhen Wang
Keyword(s):  
Cost Efficiency ◽  
Resource Constrained ◽  
Task Execution ◽  
Robot System ◽  
Sequential Execution ◽  
Constrained Environments ◽  
Cost Efficient ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Multi Robot

A multi-robot system in resource-constrained environments needs to obtain resources for task execution. Typically, resources can be fetched from fixed stations, which, however, can be costly and even impossible when fixed stations are unavailable, depleted or distant from task execution locations. We present a method that allows robots to acquire urgently required resources from those robots with superfluous residual resources, by conducting rendezvouses with these robots. We consider a scenario where tasks are organised into a schedule on each robot for sequential execution, with cross-schedule dependencies for inter-robot collaboration. We design an algorithm to systematically generate such rendezvouses for entire multi-robot system to increase the proportion of tasks whose resource demands are satisfied. We also design an algorithm that periodically reallocates tasks among robots to improve the cost-efficiency of schedules. Our experiment shows the synergetic effectiveness of both algorithms, when fixed stations are unavailable and all resources are fetched through inter-robot delivery. We also investigate the effectiveness of inter-robot delivery in scenarios where fixed stations are existent but distant from the locations of tasks.

National Cost Efficiency of Supported Employees With Intellectual Disabilities: 2002 to 2007

2010 ◽  
Vol 115 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-29 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert E. Cimera
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Intellectual Disabilities ◽  
Vocational Rehabilitation ◽  
Cost Efficiency ◽  
The United States ◽  
Considerable Variability ◽  
United State ◽  
Cost Efficient ◽  
The Cost

Abstract The cost efficiency of supported employees with intellectual disabilities who were served by vocational rehabilitation agencies throughout the United State from 2002 to 2007 was explored. Findings indicate that, on average, supported employees with intellectual disabilities were cost-efficient from the taxpayers' perspective regardless of whether they had secondary disabilities. In addition, no changes in cost efficiency were found during the period investigated. The data, however, did demonstrate considerable variability in cost efficiency throughout the United States and its territories.

scholarly journals Performance of a Fly Ash Geopolymeric Based Binder with Calcium Hydroxide, Portland Cement and Metakaolin as Additives

2018 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 167-186 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Kheradmand ◽  
Z. Abdollahnejad ◽  
F. Pacheco-Torgal
Keyword(s):  
Mechanical Properties ◽  
Fly Ash ◽  
Portland Cement ◽  
Calcium Hydroxide ◽  
Circular Economy ◽  
Cost Efficiency ◽  
Efficient Solution ◽  
Mixed Design ◽  
Cost Efficient ◽  
The Cost

Background:Geopolymeric binders are especially indicated when reusing a wide diversity of wastes. This is an important feature, especially in the European context, in which a circular economy and future zero waste are targeted. Still, the cost of these materials, due to the use of high purity activators, prevents their commercialization as they are simply not competitive enough.Objective:The reduction in the amount of activators could be a cost-efficient solution if the associated decrease in the mechanical properties turned not to be excessive. This means that it is important to investigate the manner in which these additives can be used on their composition in order to compensate that mechanical reduction.Results and Conclusion:This paper discloses results concerning the mixed design of fly ash based geopolymeric mixtures using metakaolin, Portland cement (OPC) and calcium hydroxide as additives. Their influence on the mechanical properties, microstructure and cost-efficiency was studied. The results showed that the use of Portland cement as an additive leads to lower compressive strength. Results also show that geopolymers with different additives have different optimum Na2SiO3/NaOH ratios.

scholarly journals Group Testing Can Improve the Cost-Efficiency of Prospective-Retrospective Biomarker Studies

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wei Zhang ◽  
Zhiwei Zhang ◽  
Julia Krushkal ◽  
Aiyi Liu
Keyword(s):  
Cost Efficiency ◽  
Random Sampling ◽  
Sampling Design ◽  
Group Testing ◽  
Molecular Alteration ◽  
Predictive Values ◽  
Standard Design ◽  
Estimation Procedures ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Testing Design

Abstract Background: Cancer treatment is increasingly dependent on biomarkers for prognostication and treatment selection. Potential biomarkers are frequently evaluated in prospective-retrospective studies in which biomarkers are measured retrospectively on archived specimens after completion of prospective clinical trials. In light of the high costs of some assays, random sampling designs have been proposed that measure biomarkers for a random sub-sample of subjects selected on the basis of observed outcome and possibly other variables. Compared with a standard design that measures biomarkers on all subjects, a random sampling design can be cost-efficient in the sense of reducing the cost of the study substantially while achieving a reasonable level of precision.Methods: For a biomarker that indicates the presence of some molecular alteration (e.g., mutation in a gene), we explore the use of a group testing strategy, which involves physically pooling specimens across subjects and assaying pooled samples for the presence of the molecular alteration of interest, for further improvement in cost-efficiency beyond random sampling. We propose simple and general approaches to estimating the prognostic and predictive values of biomarkers with group testing, and conduct simulation studies to validate the proposed estimation procedures and to assess the cost-efficiency of the group testing design in comparison to the standard and random sampling designs.Results: Simulation results show that the proposed estimation procedures perform well in realistic settings and that a group testing design can have considerably higher cost-efficiency than a random sampling design. Conclusions: Group testing can be used to improve the cost-efficiency of biomarker studies.

scholarly journals Role of community health workers in improving cost efficiency in an active case finding tuberculosis programme: an operational research study from rural Bihar, India

BMJ Open ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (10) ◽  
pp. e036625
Author(s):  
Tushar Garg ◽  
Manish Bhardwaj ◽  
Sarang Deo
Keyword(s):  
Health System ◽  
Community Health ◽  
Cost Efficiency ◽  
Health Workers ◽  
Case Finding ◽  
Active Case Finding ◽  
Notification Rate ◽  
Intervention Region ◽  
Cost Efficient ◽  
The Cost

ObjectivesCost-efficient active case finding (ACF) approaches are needed for their large-scale adoption in national tuberculosis (TB) programmes. Our aim was to assess if community health workers’ (CHW) knowledge about families’ health status can improve the cost efficiency of the ACF programme without adversely affecting the delivery of other health services for which they are responsible.DesignQuasi-experimental design.InterventionsWe evaluated an ACF programme in the Samastipur district in Bihar, India, between July 2017 and June 2018. CHWs called Accredited Social Health Activists generated referrals of individuals at risk of TB and conducted symptom-based screening to identify patients with presumptive TB. They also helped them undergo testing and provided treatment support for confirmed TB cases.Primary and secondary outcome measuresWe compared the notification rate from the intervention region with that from a control region in the same district with similar characteristics. We analysed operational data to calculate the cost per TB case diagnosed. We used routine programmatic data from the public health system to estimate the impact on other services provided by CHWs.FindingsCHWs identified 9895 patients with presumptive TB. Of these, 5864 patients were tested for TB, and 1236 were confirmed as TB cases. Annual public case notification rate increased sharply in the intervention region from 45.8 to 105.8 per 100 000 population, whereas it decreased from 50.7 to 45.3 in the control region. There was no practically or statistically significant impact on other output indicators of the CHWs, such as institutional deliveries (−0.04%). The overall cost of the intervention was about US$134 per diagnosed case. Main cost drivers were human resources, and commodities (drugs and diagnostics), which contributed 37.4% and 32.5% of the cost, respectively.ConclusionsACF programmes that use existing CHWs in the health system are feasible, cost efficient and do not adversely affect other healthcare services delivered by CHWs.

scholarly journals Group testing can improve the cost-efficiency of prospective-retrospective biomarker studies

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Wei Zhang ◽  
Zhiwei Zhang ◽  
Julia Krushkal ◽  
Aiyi Liu
Keyword(s):  
Cost Efficiency ◽  
Random Sampling ◽  
Sampling Design ◽  
Group Testing ◽  
Molecular Alteration ◽  
Predictive Values ◽  
Standard Design ◽  
Estimation Procedures ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Testing Design

Abstract Background Cancer treatment is increasingly dependent on biomarkers for prognostication and treatment selection. Potential biomarkers are frequently evaluated in prospective-retrospective studies in which biomarkers are measured retrospectively on archived specimens after completion of prospective clinical trials. In light of the high costs of some assays, random sampling designs have been proposed that measure biomarkers for a random sub-sample of subjects selected on the basis of observed outcome and possibly other variables. Compared with a standard design that measures biomarkers on all subjects, a random sampling design can be cost-efficient in the sense of reducing the cost of the study substantially while achieving a reasonable level of precision. Methods For a biomarker that indicates the presence of some molecular alteration (e.g., mutation in a gene), we explore the use of a group testing strategy, which involves physically pooling specimens across subjects and assaying pooled samples for the presence of the molecular alteration of interest, for further improvement in cost-efficiency beyond random sampling. We propose simple and general approaches to estimating the prognostic and predictive values of biomarkers with group testing, and conduct simulation studies to validate the proposed estimation procedures and to assess the cost-efficiency of the group testing design in comparison to the standard and random sampling designs. Results Simulation results show that the proposed estimation procedures perform well in realistic settings and that a group testing design can have considerably higher cost-efficiency than a random sampling design. Conclusions Group testing can be used to improve the cost-efficiency of biomarker studies.

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