Protectiveness of Aquatic Life Criteria for Copper Against Olfactory and Behavioral Effects in Freshwater and Saltwater Fish

Stormwater runoff can result in episodic increases of copper concentrations in receiving waters of the Salish Sea basin. Based on several laboratory studies demonstrating that short-term exposures to low copper concentrations can cause olfactory and behavioral effects in Pacific salmon and trout, there is concern that these short-term increases in copper concentrations during storm events could be adversely impacting salmon and trout populations. For example, copper-induced olfactory impairment could potentially reduce the ability of juvenile salmon to avoid predators. Although behavior and olfactory impairment are more sensitive endpoints than the acute lethality endpoint commonly used for evaluating short-term exposures to chemicals, the data available to-date indicate that ambient water quality criteria (AWQC) for copper in freshwater are protective against both behavioral effects and olfactory impairment in fish, particularly when the AWQC were derived using the freshwater biotic ligand model (BLM). The BLM is a bioavailability-based model that predicts copper toxicity as a function of several water chemistry parameters, including, dissolved organic carbon (DOC), pH, alkalinity, calcium, and several other ions in freshwater. Less data on the olfactory and behavioral effects of copper on saltwater species are available relative to that available in fresh water. No experimental evidence available to-date indicates that copper concentrations in marine waters at or below the current EPA marine AWQC for copper (CMC = 4.8 µg/L, CCC = 3.1 µg/L) adversely affects the behavior of any marine fish species tested. The pending draft BLM-based saltwater AWQC for copper also appear to be protective against both behavioral effects and olfactory impairment (key water chemistry parameters in the saltwater BLM are DOC, pH, and salinity). An evaluation of copper concentrations in some representative receiving waters in the Salish Sea basin during storm events, and comparisons to BLM-based copper criteria and behavioral and olfactory effects thresholds for copper, will be presented

The Impact of Public Budgets on Overall Productivity Growth

To fulfil their tasks, governments rely on public expenditures and taxes. Both influence the incentives and shape the decisions and actions of private economic agents. As governments resort to both instruments simultaneously, their combined theoretical impact on economic performance is a priori indeterminate. Clarification can only come from empirical evaluations. This paper reviews the recent literature trying to quantify the impact of fiscal policies on productivity and growth. Unfortunately, this survey shows that the empirical literature too is inconclusive: although the growth and composition of public expenditures and taxes as well as the fiscal stance seem to have some effect in the short run, their long-run implications cannot easily be quantified because of, e.g., reverse causation and crowding-out effects. The empirical evidence on the growth effects of government size points at a non-linear relationship: For small governments additional public expenditures seem to have a positive impact on growth, while for large governments further additions tend to be growth-retarding. It is an open question, however, where the optimum is located

Decentralization and Environment: An Application to Water Policies

By means of a two-jurisdictional model, this paper analyses the optimal division of environmental policymaking functions among the different government levels, identifying the most appropriate level of decentralization in each case. The paper focuses on water resources policies, with an application to Spanish regions during the 1996-2001 period. The estimation of an environmental quality-consumption transformation function allows the implementation of a simulation to find the most efficient policies in the context of water resources

Promoting Growth, Maintaining Progressivity, and Dealing with the Fiscal Crisis: CGE Simulations of a Temporary VAT Used for Debt Reduction

Trade-offs between economic efficiency, growth, and distributional equity permeate economics, including discussions of tax policy and tax reform. Computable general equilibrium (CGE) modeling is one tool that is often used to estimate the magnitudes of the variables that determine the efficiency, growth, and equity properties of alternative tax reforms. In this article, we report the results of simulations of a CGE model that examines the economic and distributional effects of the enactment in the United States of a temporary value-added tax used to reduce the level of the national debt. The results suggest that such a reform is generally moderately progressive both for cohorts alive at the time of reform and for future generations, at least within the context of lifetime measures of tax burden, and that current middle-aged and elderly generations must bear a burden to confer a gain, relative to the status quo, on younger and future generations