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This Adverse Outcome Pathway (AOP) describes the linkage between Deiodinase 2 inhibition and increased mortality via reduced anterior swim bladder inflation. The swim bladder is a gas-filled organ found in many bony fish species and typically consists of two gas-filled chambers. The posterior chamber inflates during early development (embryo), while the anterior chamber inflates during late development (larva). Both chambers are important for fish to control buoyancy and the anterior chamber has an additional role in hearing. This AOP is part of a network of 5 AOPs describing how disruption of the thyroid hormone system can affect developmental processes involved in swim bladder inflation. The network includes three molecular initiating events representing the inhibition of enzymes that are important for thyroid hormone synthesis and activation. It describes how inhibition of thyroperoxidase and/or deiodinase, leads to reduced swim bladder inflation, resulting in reduced swimming performance, increased mortality and ultimately, decreased population trajectory in fish. This AOP network is currently mainly based on experimental evidence from studies on fish species with a two-chambered swim bladder. This AOP is referred to as AOP 156 in the Collaborative Adverse Outcome Pathway Wiki (AOP-Wiki).

This Adverse Outcome Pathway (AOP) describes the linkage between Deiodinase 2 inhibition and increased mortality via reduced posterior swim bladder inflation. The swim bladder is a gas-filled organ found in many bony fish species and typically consists of two gas-filled chambers. The posterior chamber inflates during early development (embryo), while the anterior chamber inflates during late development (larva). Both chambers are important for fish to control buoyancy and the anterior chamber has an additional role in hearing. This AOP is part of a network of 5 AOPs describing how disruption of the thyroid hormone system can affect developmental processes involved in swim bladder inflation. The network includes three molecular initiating events representing the inhibition of enzymes that are important for thyroid hormone synthesis and activation. It describes how inhibition of thyroperoxidase and/or deiodinase, leads to reduced swim bladder inflation, resulting in reduced swimming performance, increased mortality and ultimately, decreased population trajectory in fish. This AOP network is currently mainly based on experimental evidence from studies on fish species with a two-chambered swim bladder. This AOP is referred to as AOP 155 in the Collaborative Adverse Outcome Pathway Wiki (AOP-Wiki).

Firms are at the forefront of digital transformation and drive production, innovation and the greater deployment of digital technologies into economies and societies. As digital transformation progresses, how firms use data, and how that use affects markets and influences competitive dynamics, has risen to the top of policy agendas. This report highlights that too few firms use data, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises, despite data’s potential to boost productivity, foster innovation and new business models. This report analyses how this uneven use of data affects productivity dispersion, industry concentration and shape competitive dynamics in markets. Finally, the report outlines key policy lessons to increase the ability of the full business population to thrive in the data-driven age and enhance long-term prosperity and welfare.

Digital technologies underpin the creation, generation, collection, transfer and use of data, and digital technological development and deployment shape data governance policy debates. This report analyses how technological development can raise different issues for data governance through the example of connected and automated vehicles, which collect large volumes of data that are likely to be personal. Through the example of these vehicles, this report explores data governance in an evolving technological landscape, and offers recommendations to ensure policies remain resilient to technological change over time.

Digital technologies have transformed the global economy. This paper discusses three underlying digital enablers of the economy and the challenges they pose for policy makers: (1) Online platforms, which support global transactions and interactions but are also disrupting existing consumer and competition policy frameworks; (2) Cross-border data flows, which facilitate global trade and co-operation but also amplify policy concerns that have motivated countries to place conditions on these data flows; and (3) Digital security, which should be prioritised to embed trust into the digital economy, but has often remained an afterthought owing to knowledge asymmetries across the market. Given that these challenges are all international in nature, a global response is needed to address them. The OECD is well-suited to foster international co-operation on these digital enablers and support countries’ ambitions for global digital policy frameworks.

Financial and commodity markets have been impacted by high inflation and a deteriorating growth outlook. The necessary tightening of monetary policy has cascaded through markets, contributing to rising yields, significant asset price corrections, and rising debt costs for sovereigns, households and corporates. Existing high debt levels in these sectors raise concerns about the prospects of debt servicing. In some emerging markets, tightening financial conditions combined with weak fundamentals and large outflows could accelerate debt distress. The growing potential for broad-based credit losses could affect the resilience of various financial intermediaries, with negative impacts on credit intermediation and economic growth going forward.

There is mounting concern that dark commercial patterns may cause substantial consumer detriment. These practices are commonly found in online user interfaces and steer, deceive, coerce, or manipulate consumers into making choices that often are not in their best interests. This report proposes a working definition of dark commercial patterns, sets out evidence of their prevalence, effectiveness and harms, and identifies possible policy and enforcement responses to assist consumer policy makers and authorities in addressing them. It also documents possible approaches that consumers and businesses may take to mitigate dark commercial patterns.

This paper explores the relationship between adoption of ultra-fast broadband (UFB) and the export propensity of New Zealand firms. Previous literature have shown that the Internet facilitates exports by reducing search costs and informational frictions in establishing trade relationships. However, the role of faster Internet that enables the use of more recent, advanced, data-intensive digital technologies has not been well explored. This paper shows empirically that adoption of fibre broadband is associated with a higher propensity to enter exporting by New Zealand firms, suggesting that faster Internet has an additional role over traditional Internet in facilitating exporting. The paper also shows that firms that were already using the Internet more intensively prior to adopting fibre experience a stronger increase in export propensity following fibre adoption than those with less intensive Internet use, and that the positive relationship between fibre uptake and exporting is primarily observed among services firms. Instrumental variable analysis to assess the causal relationship between fibre uptake and exporting suggests that the higher export entry among fibre users is driven by self-selection of firms with higher export propensity into fibre uptake.

Spectrum is a limited national resource that enables our digital world. Mobile broadband services rely on these invisible airwaves to function, making spectrum indispensable to bridge connectivity divides. It also supports the provision of wireless services across the economy, from education to healthcare to industry, and enables applications such as satellites, GPS and the Internet of Things. Spectrum must be efficiently managed to achieve broader social and economic goals. As such, the stakes of spectrum management decisions are high and the challenges complex. This report discusses the effective stewardship of this essential asset in the context of wireless communication services, presents trends in policy, and discusses future considerations for management. It finds that well-designed and transparent licensing regimes, including auctions, foster investment and innovation, and that flexible frameworks (e.g. sharing or unlicensed spectrum) can promote efficient use.

Individuals’ access to finance is particularly low in Mexico. Widening access to finance would boost growth and inclusion. This paper uses microdata from the National Survey for Financial Inclusion to assess the drivers of and the barriers to people’s financial inclusion in Mexico. Results show that working in the formal sector, the level of wealth and income, educational attainment, and age are the socio-economic characteristics that most affect the likelihood of holding any formal financial product. The relative importance of these characteristics, however, varies across financial products. Economic barriers to individuals’ financial inclusion are strongly associated with widespread informality and a low level of education and income. These results suggest that financial education programmes and credit registries considering a wider set of data to assess informal workers' credit worthiness would be promising avenues to help more Mexicans access financial services.

This paper discusses key priorities and policy recommendations to accelerate Slovenia’s digital transformation. The government’s ambitious digitalisation strategy (Digital Slovenia 2030 Strategy) aims at putting Slovenia among the five most digitalised countries in Europe. Achieving this objective would foster productivity growth and help offsetting the negative effects of a declining labour force. While Slovenia performs well in several areas of the digital transformation, further efforts are needed to achieve the government’s ambitious objective. These include reducing the urban-rural gap in high-speed broadband access, supporting the digital transformation of businesses, fostering digital innovation, improving digital government, upgrading ICT-related skills and attracting foreign ICT specialists.

This paper addresses the implications of digitalisation on corporate governance. It focuses in particular on the potential for digitalisation to improve market supervision and enforcement of corporate governance related requirements and the efficiency of disclosure; its use for remote and hybrid participation in general shareholder meetings; the implications of digital security risks and the role of the board in their management; and how digitalisation can encourage the development of primary public equity markets.

Trucks account for one-fifth of transport sector emissions in Europe. To decarbonise, heavy-duty road freight must switch to zero-emission vehicles quickly. This report examines whether battery electric vehicles, electric road systems and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles could compete with diesel-driven vehicles. It looks at the total cost of ownership across nine different vehicle-size segments in Europe. The report gives six recommendations to accelerate the transition to zero-emission trucks, including the provision of necessary infrastructure.

Over the last two decades, reading has shifted from taking place on paper to, increasingly, screens. As digitalisation spreads, there have been growing concerns about unbalanced access to new types of resources between socio-economically advantaged and disadvantaged students. PISA 2018 results show that while disadvantaged students are catching up in terms of access to digital resources, their access to cultural capital like paper books at home has diminished, and the socio-economic gap has been persistent over the last two decades. This policy brief draws education stakeholders’ attention to this issue and provides evidence for the discussion of equity in education by examining how access to books at home is related to students’ prevalent mode of reading books, their performance in reading and their enjoyment of reading.

This paper aims to support better-targeted and more homogeneous data collection and comparative analysis of regulatory oversight bodies (ROBs). To do so, it builds on relevant academic literature and available data to sharpen the definition of ROB used in OECD analytical work and policy discussions. It also discusses ROBs’ role within the regulatory governance cycle as well as various aspects related to regulatory oversight and co-ordination, with special attention to the overall institutional setting (including the relationships between various ROBs), context and objectives of regulatory reform, tasks and responsibilities, and associated accountability arrangements.

Social protection systems play a key stabilising role for individuals and societies, especially in the recent context of heightened uncertainties. This paper proposes a new empirical approach for quantifying the accessibility and value of income transfers following an earnings loss. The approach allows to estimate and monitor gaps in the accessibility and value of social transfers between so-called “standard” and “non-standard” workers. It first presents a methodology for assessing support levels for jobless individuals in specific circumstances that allows for comparisons across countries and over time. It then illustrates the approach using longitudinal survey data in 16 OECD countries.