Additive manufacturing can be considered an innovative and high-technology and one of its characteristics is that it has limited dependency on the location. The purpose of this study is to examine this aspect by investigation how additive manufacturing is spreading globally. The focus is on established manufacturers of industrial additive manufacturing machines. It was found that the early-stage diffusion of this technology is primarily in advanced economies. Furthermore, many of the currently established companies that manufacture industrial 3D printers come from already existing companies that expanded into AM or that led to spin-off companies. The complexity of AM which requires expert knowledge across a range of fields may be the key reason for this finding. Recommendations for further research are provided.

ObjectiveTo measure the association of raising the minimum legal age of tobacco sales to 21 years (T21) statewide with monthly sales of cigarette packs in California and Hawaii, the first two states to implement T21 statewide.MethodsState monthly cigarette tax revenues from state departments of taxation were analysed for 11 states from January 2014 through December 2018 (n=660). Monthly cigarette packs sold were constructed using cigarette tax revenue and cigarette tax rate in each state. A difference-in-differences regression method was used to estimate the association of statewide T21 policies with monthly cigarette packs sold in California and Hawaii, separately, compared to the western states that did not implement such policies. Both models were controlled for year–month fixed effects, cigarette tax rates, smoke-free air laws, Medicaid coverage of smoking cessation, minimum legal sales ages for e-cigarettes and state marijuana laws, in addition to state demographic characteristics (sex, age, education, race/ethnicity and population size).FindingsImplementation of T21 statewide was associated with a reduction of 9.41 (95% CI=–15.52 to –3.30) million monthly packs sold in California and 0.57 (95% CI=–0.83 to –0.30) million monthly packs sold in Hawaii, compared to regional states. These translate to a reduction of 13.1%–18.2%, respectively, in monthly packs sold relative to mean values before the implementation of T21.ConclusionsRaising the minimum legal age for tobacco sales to 21 years could reduce cigarette sales as part of a comprehensive tobacco control strategy that complements and builds on proven approaches to achieve this goal.

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The slowdown of China’s economic growth in the middle-income stage has caused widespread concerns. Based on the analysis of economic structures to explain the downward trend of economic growth, this study expanded the Solow-Swan model to investigate the structural imbalances and evaluated their impacts during the structural transformation in different stages and regions on the economic downturn. Considering the processes of production, distribution, and consumption, six structures were chosen for national and prefecture-levels in China from 1997 to 2017, including sectoral structure, population structure, investment and consumption structure, import-export structure, urban-rural income structure, and financial structure. The study found that China’s comprehensive economic structure was significantly different before and after the middle-income stage, and structural bonus tended to decline. Structural imbalance presented a U-shaped pattern of decreasing first and then increasing, and the impact on economic growth underwent stages of suppression-promotion-suppression. There was a significant difference in the imbalance of six sub-structures and their impacts; furthermore, in the four regions of east, center, west, and northeast the observations were very different. Taken together, the imbalance of economic structure and economic transformation coexisted, and the economic growth slowed down. Based on the experiences from China, this paper provided some evidence for promoting structural optimization and transformation.

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