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Copyright of Contemporary Accounting Research is the property of Canadian Academic Accounting Association and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Contemporary Accounting Research is the property of Canadian Academic Accounting Association and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Germany has become a high-tax country for companies over the past 15 years. There is currently a lot of discussion in politics about how the tax burden for companies can be lowered in order to enhance private investments. Compared to challenges in the areas of infrastructure or bureaucracy, the disadvantage of a high tax burden can be easily remedied by political decisions. According to simulations, a tax cut would lead to a noticeable upswing in private investments and could also act as a signal in international location competition that should not be underestimated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tax reduction is supposed to garner popular support, yet rural unrest sharply increased following the Chinese government's agricultural tax reform aiming to reduce peasants' tax burden. We argue that the tax reduction could undermine village elites' economic and political incentives to assist the state in implementing unpopular policies and achieving desirable outcomes. We exploit the exogeneous timing of the agricultural tax reform that abolished the agriculture tax and estimate its impact through a rare national representative village‐level panel dataset. We demonstrate that the tax reform led to tax noncompliance and rising social unrest. We further show that local governance worsened because village elites were disincentivized from carrying out state‐preferred yet unpopular policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tax incentives are an important driving force for enterprises to ease financing constraints and promote innovation. Current studies focus on the tax-reduction effect of corporate tax incentive policies, paying less attention to the tax uncertainty engendered by tax reform. This study explores whether the predictability of corporate tax burdens is a key restrictive factor in corporate innovation. It focuses on the impact of tax uncertainty arising from the tax reform process on enterprise innovation, proposing a multidimensional measurement method to identify corporate tax uncertainty. The results show that tax uncertainty significantly inhibits corporate innovation and that its influence channels operate mainly through corporate financing constraints and information transparency. Further heterogeneity analysis reveals that a better regional economic system environment, greater tax enforcement effort, and digital transformation can restrain the negative impact of tax uncertainty on enterprise innovation. These findings enrich the literature on the factors influencing corporate innovation behavior and extend the research on tax reform, providing an innovative perspective for interpreting enterprises' tax burden. Furthermore, it offers practical implications for tax reduction reforms and guidelines for enterprise innovation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent studies show that the tax‐induced lock‐in effect discourages CEOs from unwinding their unrestricted equity and subsequently exacerbates their risk‐aversion. I investigate how CEOs' unrealized capital gains tax liabilities (tax burdens) influence financial reporting conservatism. I find that the demand for accounting conservatism decreases with CEO tax burdens. Further analyses show that the negative relation between CEO tax burden and conservatism is stronger when the firm has high leverage and high default risk and when the CEO's incentives are more aligned with equity holders. This highlights the shareholder–creditor agency conflicts mitigation role of CEO tax burdens in reducing creditors' demand for conservatism. I exploit the Federal Taxpayer Reform Act of 1997 and staggered state‐level tax cuts that significantly decreased personal capital gains tax rates as identification strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Foco (Interdisciplinary Studies Journal) is the property of Revista Foco and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Religación: Revista de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades is the property of Religacion: Revista de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This study examines the influence of the reduction in value-added tax (VAT) rates in China during 2018 and 2019 on corporate financialization. By employing a difference-in-differences model and utilizing data from Chinese A-share listed companies between 2017 and 2020, we assess the effects of tax reduction policies. Moreover, it achieves this outcome through three main pathways: alleviating financing constraints, boosting fixed asset investment, and weakening corporate financial arbitrage motives. Further analysis demonstrates that the inhibitory effect of VAT rate reduction on corporate financialization is more pronounced for non-manufacturing companies, businesses reliant on the basic tax rate as their primary revenue source, companies with low intermediate input rates, and those with a strong ability to shift the tax burden. Additionally, debt financing costs play a crucial role in moderating the relationship between tax reduction policies and corporate financialization. The conclusions drawn from this study provide valuable empirical evidence that can contribute to the refinement of VAT reduction policies and the prevention and resolution of financialization at the micro-level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The aim of our research is to assess the impact of public debt on tax burden within the member countries of the European Union (EU) during the period from 1995 to 2021. Methodology: The assessment of the impact of the public debt on the tax burden was implemented in two stages. Each of them uses two modifications of the model. Our methodology is based on multiple regression models. Findings: Our research findings suggest a dual impact of public debt on the tax burden: a reduction in the current period followed by an increase in future periods. Additionally, our study has unveiled that the influence of public debt on the tax burden is contingent upon the specific level of public debt being considered. Our findings confirmed that when public debt reaches a critical threshold of 55.88 percent of the GDP, any further government borrowing is associated with a consequent augmentation of the tax burden. Originality/value: Our analysis includes lagged variables to empirically examine whether public debt can possibly result in a higher tax burden in the future. In our study, we explore whether there exists a particular level of public debt at which the influence of public debt on the tax burden fundamentally changes direction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to German income tax law, a large number of private expenses are deductible when determining the tax base. These are expenses that do not serve to generate income. The legislature has allowed them to be deducted in order to make it easier for the citizens concerned to finance the existential needs of themselves and those they support and to trigger incentives for certain socially desirable activities e. g. through donations to non-profit organizations. The reduction in the tax burden caused by their deduction increases with the amount of taxable income, which contradicts the principle of fair taxation. It is proposed that the relief in question should in future be regulated by a deduction of 25 percent of the permissible private expenditure from the tax liability according to tariff. Furthermore, the replacement of the current tariff regulated according to mathematical formulas by a tariff completely regulated in stages of constant marginal tax rates is proposed. Simulation calculations show that the tax reform leads to a relief for lower to middle incomes and an additional burden for higher income. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to analyse whether there is a cost stickiness phenomenon in which Chinese companies recognize costs early in the years immediately preceding the tax rate cut (hereinafter TRC) in order to minimize tax burden, and to investigate whether high-tech companies with large TRCs have a higher level than general companies. The analysis results can be summarized as follows: First, there is a phenomenon of cost stickiness in Chinese companies in the year immediately before the TRC. Second, before the 2008 TRC in China, the level of cost stickiness of high-tech companies was not statistically higher than that of general companies. The results of this study provide the following implications that Chinese companies use cost as an incentive to minimize their tax burden. Companies can use appropriate surplus resources as a buffer against environmental changes and actively utilize inefficient resource allocation to promote innovative R&D and improve corporate performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this article is to report tax strategies used in popular products with high taxation, demonstrating the positive and negative impacts caused on companies through changes in tax classifications, productions or product structures to reduce tax costs as a result of the variation in the IPI value. For this purpose, the TIPI Table (tax incidence table on industrialized products) was used, which is a list of products with their respective rates. It is a file, regulated and constantly updated by the Federal Revenue, where the industrialized products, their specific Mercosur Common Nomenclature (NCM) and their respective tax rate are gathered. The application of this table and the reclassification of some popularly known products were studied and analyzed. In this study, it was noticed that such reclassifications allowed a reduction in the tax rates on industrialized products, thus maximizing the results of the companies. Finally, it was recommended that companies, mainly whose products marketed are considered "nonessential", properly carry out the tax classification of products, as there are possibilities to legally minimize taxation, thus increasing the profit margin, reducing sales prices. and consequently generating an increase in sales and revenue. However, in the opposite situation, there may be tax penalties if errors in the tax classifications occur. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper criticizes the supply-side economic policy promoted by the UK government under Prime Minister Liz Truss. According to the conventional interpretation, the stagnation and productivity crisis in the UK economy is due to the excessive tax burden on large corporations and the tax burden on the richest 1%. If these tax liabilities were reduced, it would increase the profitability of investment, demand and the rate of growth. This would translate into better incomes and higher levels of employment. This story is based on the Laffer curve and associated with the "trickle down" hypothesis, falsified by empirical evidence. Tax reductions for the richest people worsen the distribution of income, and do not raise income or employment. The cause and effect is from profits to investment and growth; not from spending to profits and growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Die Unternehmensbesteuerung (Ubg) is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The paper investigates the impact of loan loss provisions (LLPs) on bank-specific effective tax rates (ETRs) using data of 2943 banks from European Union during 2007-2014.As control variables we used size, equity, fixed assets and return on assets (ROA), while the specific country-year tax reforms were captured using Devereux-Griffith effective tax rates. The results prove robust to different model estimators and sample selections, which suggests that LLPs act systematically towards the reduction of the bank entities' corporate tax burden. When distinguishing between two banking business models, respectively shareholders-value (commercial banks) and stakeholders-value banks (savings and cooperative banks), empirical findings indicate that provisions negatively affects the former (commercial banks) specific ETRs, whereas for the latter (savings and cooperative banks), no statistical significant effect was detected. From policy perspective, in the context of the switch from the incurred-loss model to the expected-loss model with respect to LLPs (IFRS 9), this may signal additional tax bill reduction for bank entities, if decision makers fail to react promptly. Finally, looking at types of banks investigated, the results show that among all three categories of banks, commercial banks manage to avoid the increase of tax bill driven by some bank-specific determinants (i.e. ROA), while maximizing the tax savings driven by others (i.e. capital intensity), thus suggesting more tax planning oriented behaviour as compared to savings and cooperative banks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The state and other public-legal bodies dispose of an important part of the national income. They appear on the demand side of the market and directly buy goods and pay for the services they use, just like non-public entities. From public revenues, the state pays retirement, compensations during unemployment, and other social assistance. This affects the increase in the purchasing power of those who use these payments and with thos actions, the governement indirectly affects the increase in demand in the market. However, the increase in demand is also influenced by the reduction of the tax burden of taxpayers, tax benefits and exemptions. With the reduction of the tax burden, the purchasing power of taxpayers increases, which results in an increase in aggregate demand. In our nation the primary changes that happened in market and in the labor market were in the mid-1990s, when the nation's financial framework changed. In the years preceding 1990 the framework was with the end goal that it empowered all job seekers to work contingent upon their capabilities. Until at that point, unemployment was close to none, and ordinarily everything was equilibrated. With the progress that occurred in the economy, numerous individuals lost their jobs. In the beginning periods, everybody wanted to create relations with the west of Europe and with USA. This prompted the way that the individuals who were working specialists in the years prior to 1990 couldn't accept the new thongs that started happening at those moments. For the changes in policies and the labor market we will treat this topic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper approximates the efficiency levels of the most relevant tax categories and their distributional patterns for a European country considering Spain as an illustrative example. This is done computing the 'marginal' excess burden of these taxes, taking into account the structure of the Spanish tax system before and after the major tax reforms undertaken since 2010. In doing so we use a static applied general equilibrium model, which features heterogeneous households classified according to their taxable income. In addition, and in identical terms, another alternative tax reform is evaluated: a flat value-added tax system and a reduction in employers' social security contributions. Our results indicate that the alternative tax reform would have slightly improved the degree of efficiency of these taxes while implying a lower negative impact on aggregate income. Regarding distributive effects, we do not find significant differences between the actual and the alternative tax policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is possible for the capital invested in the establishment of companies to increase or decrease over time. Both are commercial choices. When it comes to capital reduction, this preference is also seen as a way to avoid being deeply in debt. In addition to capital, companies also have assets in the form of equity according to the Tax Procedure Law. The concept of equity has some key components such as profit, loss, capital reserves, profit reserves, inflation adjustment and cost increase fund. These components have consequences on taxation following the capital reduction of a company because each component tent to affect the capital structure distinctively. The article's main claim is to discuss the inconsistencies between judicial decisions and administrative tax rulings and therefore to assess whether there is a tax liability regarding the Turkish Tax Procedural Law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper exploits a payroll tax reform in Norway and applies matched employer–employee register data on individual wages to study the incidence of payroll taxation. The contribution is to allow for heterogeneous wage effects of payroll tax cuts based on unobserved worker ability and firm productivity (measured by estimated worker and firm fixed effects, respectively). Using the difference-in-difference approach, the estimates show that on average, about 30% of the labor cost reduction is shifted to employees through higher wages and the degree of tax shifting increases gradually during the first 3 years after the reform. Among high-productivity firms, the degree of tax shifting is stable at 40–50% throughout the post-reform period. In low-productivity firms, none of the labor cost reduction is shifted to employees in the short term, but there is a delayed wage response in the medium term. On average, the wage effect of reduced payroll taxes is twice as large in high-productivity compared to low-productivity firms. The difference in wage response is mainly between firms, rather than between workers within firms, although low-ability workers in low-productivity firms miss out on the wage gain from the reduced labor costs. The analysis does not find any robust employment effect of the payroll tax cut, neither in low- nor in high-productivity firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is determined that in investment processes, each percentage of returns is important. The hypothesis was considered that active management of the stock portfolio through intensive trading is a potential way of significantly improving the level of efficiency of investments in the stock market. The purpose of the work was to study the feasibility of using trading to increase the profitability of the securities portfolio and, in particular, for institutional investors. Trading of shares (intensive purchase and sale) is considered as a factor in increasing the profitability of investments in shares. The shortcomings of the intensification of trading are specified, which consists in an increase in taxes, brokerage commissions and lost profits due to the expectation of a better date for entering the transaction. As a research method, modeling based on the data of a three-year period of dynamics of Microsoft shares and hypothetical companies was used. The corresponding modeling made it possible to draw the following conclusions: the increase in trading intensity does not guarantee an increase in the level of investment efficiency; the increase in trading intensity leads to an increase in the tax burden and risk level, which ultimately neutralizes efforts on intensive trading. Investment funds which are actively managed and use intensive trading in activities do not have a significant advantage over funds that have passive management. The basis of the efficiency of investment funds is the minimization of overhead costs, including by minimizing taxes due to the reduction of the level of trading intensity to zero. It is important to preenvisage promising shares for purchase, and keep them in their own portfolio for a long period of time with a minimum level of portfolio balancing intensity. Rebalancing the stock portfolio on the principle of profit fixing leads to an increase in tax payments and neutralizes capital growth opportunities due to the sale of shares with high growth potential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act made significant changes to the U.S. taxation of foreign earnings. The most significant change is the 100 percent dividends-received deduction that generally applies to income earned by foreign subsidiaries. This represents a shift from U.S. tax deferral to U.S. tax exemption of foreign profits, which increases the potential benefit to shifting U.S. income to low-tax foreign jurisdictions. To limit this potential income shifting, Congress enacted new rules, known as GILTI, to supplement the already existing Subpart F rules. In this article, we briefly review the history of U.S. international tax policy and analyze the technical aspects of GILTI. We then discuss some general tax planning strategies and propose four specific tax strategies for companies to consider for minimizing the increased tax burden associated with GILTI. Last, we consider whether GILTI is good tax policy and make recommendations to improve the legislation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Ankara Review of European Studies (ARES) / Ankara Avrupa Çalışmaları Dergisi (AAÇD) is the property of Ankara University European Union Research Centre and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

We present a modified version of the entrepreneurial choice model, where it is shown that the expected utility of becoming an entrepreneur is decreasing in both the levels of taxes and the tax administrative burden. We extend previous empirical findings by examining how these variables influence entrepreneurs at different stages in the entrepreneurial life cycle. Our findings imply that the effect of the tax administrative burden varies over the entrepreneurial life cycle from strongly negative to insignificant. The most pronounced negative effects appear in the early stages of entrepreneurship. We conclude that a 10% reduction in the tax administrative burden increases the propensity for new business establishments by 4%. Our findings support the idea that tax simplification is one way to encourage entrepreneurship, without any reduction in tax revenues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tax evasion refers to the illegal activities deliberately undertaken by a taxpayer in order to release himself from the tax burden. Tax avoidance, on the other hand, usually denotes a situation in which the taxpayer has arranged his business in a perfectly legal way, resulting in either a reduced taxable income or an income for which to pay tax. The taxpayer is not obliged to pay an amount higher than the legal tax due, in accordance with the tax law. It is also not excluded that a taxpayer enters into a bona fide transaction which, when carried out, has the effect of avoiding or reducing the obligation to pay tax, provided that there is no provision in the law which prevents the avoidance or tax reduction. The purpose of this paper is to identify in the literature specialty which are identified determining factors regarding the taxpayer's behavior towards taxation in terms of compliance or non-compliance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Management Analysis / Revista Gestão em Análise is the property of Revista Gestao em Analise and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Tax avoidance can range from reduction of the corporate tax burden by legitimate use of tax rules to violation of tax laws. In this paper, we endeavor to synthesize the major findings of tax avoidance research from the accounting and finance literatures over the past ten years. We consider theoretical developments and the related empirical findings about the interconnected issues of measuring tax avoidance, and the possible causes and outcomes of corporate tax avoidance. We present some ideas for further research to examine underexplored topics regarding tax avoidance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine whether the Chinese government's anti‐corruption enforcement reduces corporate tax burdens. Using a difference‐in‐difference approach, we find tax burdens of firms located in corrupt political leaders' jurisdictions are lower after these leaders were deposed. An analysis of two tax policy changes shows that the reduction in tax burden is more pronounced when corrupt politicians had more power in levying taxes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: To determine the impact of changes in tax burden in Ukraine on the country's economic freedom. Methodology: The study applies qualitative methods for historical analysis, periodization of reforms, and classification of their key priorities and influences. Quantitative methods are applied to compare tax burden (tax-to-GDP ratio) in Ukraine and OECD countries. The overall success and failure of tax reforms was measured by the index of economic freedom, including its component, the index of tax burden (fiscal freedom). The first hypothesis suggested that a reduction in tax burden positively impacted the level of economic freedom in Ukraine; the second hypothesis stated that a reduction in tax burden positively affected the fiscal freedom of Ukraine. Regressions in average tax burden and the index of economic freedom, including the index of tax burden, were built in R software. Findings: Regression analysis did not confirm the first hypothesis. The second hypothesis was confirmed. Reduced tax burden does not affect the level of economic freedom of Ukraine. This is explained by the slow progress of institutional reforms in Ukraine. The reduction of tax burden has a significant positive impact on the level of fiscal freedom. Practical Implications: The results obtained have practical relevance for the elaboration of fiscal policies in developing countries, in accordance with the country's economic and political development priorities. Research Limitations/Implications: Future research will include a more in-depth comparative analysis of tax reforms in Ukraine, focusing on the key taxes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The analysis of tax planning tools proved the feasibility of using the criteria: the essence of the tax burden on the enterprise and the stage of the tax planning process. The first criterion relates to the value of transaction costs, such as "price of obedience to law" and "price of independence". This led to the study of the integrated assessment of the tax load. The article proves that the taxes reduction in the amount of transaction costs does not lead to a decrease in all transaction costs, and therefore proposed the technology of developing non-periodic plans with the calculation of indicators of control and regulation of individual types of taxes. Analytical models were used to plan the tax expenditures: a model for calculating the extreme value in the presence of one main goal and meeting the set limits, and a model for calculating the extreme value in the presence of several goals and meeting the set limits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Baghdad College of Economic Sciences University is the property of Republic of Iraq Ministry of Higher Education & Scientific Research (MOHESR) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Background: Excessive consumption of sugar has a well-established link with obesity. Preliminary results show that a tax levied on sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) by the Portuguese government in 2017 led to a drop in sales and reformulation of these products. This study models the impact the market changes triggered by the tax levied on SSBs had on obesity incidence across various age groups in Portugal.Methods and Findings: We performed a national market analysis and population-wide modelling study using market data for the years 2014-2018 from the Portuguese Association of Non-Alcoholic Drinks (GlobalData and Nielsen Consumer Panel), dietary data from a national survey (IAN-AF 2015-2016), and obesity incidence data from several cohort studies. Dietary energy density from SSBs was calculated by dividing the energy content (kcal/gram) of all SSBs by the total food consumption (in grams). We used the potential impact fraction (PIF) equation to model the projected impact of the tax-triggered change in sugar consumption on obesity incidence, through both volume reduction and reformulation. Results showed a reduction of 6.6 million litres of SSBs sold per year. Product reformulation led to a decrease in the average energy density of SSBs by 3.1 kcal/100 ml. This is estimated to have prevented around 40-78 cases of obesity per year between 2016 and 2018, with the biggest projected impact observed in adolescents 10 to <18 years old. The model shows that the implementation of this tax allowed for a 4 to 8 times larger projected impact against obesity than would be achieved though reformulation alone. The main limitation of this study is that the model we used includes data from various sources, which can result in biases-despite our efforts to mitigate them-related to the methodological differences between these sources.Conclusions: The tax triggered both a reduction in demand and product reformulation. These, together, can reduce obesity levels among frequent consumers of SSBs. Such taxation is an effective population-wide intervention. Reformulation alone, without the decrease in sales, would have had a far smaller effect on obesity incidence in the Portuguese population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study identifies the reflexes of management control in the tax planning of a small industrial company. For this, an exploratory research using a qualitative approach was performed in a small industrial company whose activities are manufacture of goods, industrial commissioning and equipment maintenance. Data collection was done in documents provided by the accounting services company, in addition to a direct interview with the managing partner, responsible for the administration of the company analyzed. The results show that management controls, in this case, fixed asset control, accounts receivable control, inventory control, cost control and profitability control, when properly structured, tax planning to achieve tax savings for the company. It concludes with the required parsimony within the limits of the case study that management controls are reflected in tax planning, allowing for the reduction of tax burden. However, such analyses are limited to companies that can choose between different forms of taxation, and so further studies are required to investigate if this planning is carried out in small companies with this condition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]