Employee financial wellness programs: Opportunities to promote financial inclusion?

ABSTRACT

Employee financial wellness programs (EFWPs) are a new practice that may promote financial inclusion by making it easier for workers with low- and moderate-incomes (LMI) to access financial services. We examine the strengths and limitations of workplace financial counseling, credit-building services, and small-dollar loans, and describe community collaboration to promote employee financial wellness. Findings suggest that these services are reaching a population that experiences financial exclusion, though evidence is mixed concerning how these services help workers with LMI resolve key financial challenges. Community collaboration focused on employee financial wellness presents opportunities to advocate for higher wages and better benefits.     

Evaluation of Multicriteria Decision Analysis Algorithms in Food Safety: A Case Study on Emerging Zoonoses Prioritization

Decision making in food safety is a complex process that involves several criteria of different nature like the expected reduction in the number of illnesses, the potential economic or health-related cost, or even the environmental impact of a given policy or intervention. Several multicriteria decision analysis (MCDA) algorithms are currently used, mostly individually, in food safety to rank different options in a multifactorial environment. However, the selection of the MCDA algorithm is a decision problem on its own because different methods calculate different rankings. The aim of this study was to compare the impact of different uncertainty sources on the rankings of MCDA problems in the context of food safety. For that purpose, a previously published data set on emerging zoonoses in the Netherlands was used to compare different MCDA algorithms: MMOORA, TOPSIS, VIKOR, WASPAS, and ELECTRE III. The rankings were calculated with and without considering uncertainty (using fuzzy sets), to assess the importance of this factor. The rankings obtained differed between algorithms, emphasizing that the selection of the MCDA method had a relevant impact in the rankings. Furthermore, considering uncertainty in the ranking had a high influence on the results. Both factors were more relevant than the weights associated with each criterion in this case study. A hierarchical clustering method was suggested to aggregate results obtained by the different algorithms. This complementary step seems to be a promising way to decrease extreme difference among algorithms and could provide a strong added value in the decision-making process.     

Building Strength Through Challenging Homophobia: Liberation Workshops with Younger and Midlife Irish Lesbians

Drawing on the theoretical framework of liberation psychology, this article details workshops on liberation psychology conducted in Ireland with lesbian and transgendered persons aged from early 20's to late 50's. Both younger and older lesbians in the workshops benefited from the opportunity to focus on oppression and to explore options for transformation. The workshops illustrated many of the strengths and vulnerabilities associated with living with homophobia and demonstrated the value of action and engagement. Midlife lesbians were more aware of the systemic nature of homophobia and of the negative emotions related to that. They saw many of these as understandable and even necessary reactions to oppression rather than as negative patterns. These older lesbians tended to be more accepting of the course their lives had taken and of the ways in which choices had been influenced by homophobia and heterosexism. They tended to be more relativistic in their views on coming out, viewing coming out as a decision for each context rather than an overall principle. They valued the importance of community and of activism, and though they were aware of some of the challenges, they also had more positive experiences in this area. These strengths can facilitate managing both homophobia and aging more effectively.     

The Relationship Between Hope,Eustress, Self-Efficacy,and Life Satisfaction Among Undergraduates

The construct of eustress was studied alongside hope and self-efficacy, to explore how these constructs are related to life satisfaction among undergraduates. Questionnaires were administered to undergraduates to test the hypotheses that (1) as eustress levels increase, so will life satisfaction levels; (2) when eustress, hope, and self-efficacy are examined together, they will predict life satisfaction better than eustress alone; (3) eustress, hope, and self-efficacy will all be positively correlated with life satisfaction; and (4) self-efficacy will be the most positively correlated with life satisfaction. The results revealed a significant positive correlation between eustress and life satisfaction. A Hierarchical Linear Regression analysis revealed significant results supporting hypotheses 2 and 3, but not hypothesis 4. Results indicated that hope is the best predictor of life satisfaction. The work reported provides a reliable tool for measuring eustress, examines eustress in a new way at the academic level, and provides helpful information about student wellness to college administrators.     

Impact of Empowerment Training on the Professional Work of Family Peer Advocates

A pilot study using a prospective design examined the impact of a collaboratively developed training model, called the Parent Empowerment Program (PEP), for professionally-employed family peer advocates who work with caregivers of children with mental health needs. This training used a combination of didactic, practice exercises, and group discussion. It targeted specific mental health knowledge content and collaborative skills to facilitate the work of family peer advocates in empowering caregivers. Co-delivered by a family peer advocate and clinician, the training consisted of a 40-hour face-to-face training, followed by six monthly face-to-face booster sessions. A total of 15 advocates participated in assessments conducted at baseline and post-training. This group of experienced family peer advocates showed no significant increase in knowledge about mental health content, but post-training assessments indicated increased collaborative skills and mental health services self-efficacy. This initial evaluation has implications for expanding training and support for the emergent workforce of professionally-employed family peer advocates in children's mental health.     

Projecting Australia's Fertility—Postscript

An accelerated decline in family size has led to a downward revision of projected fertility. Replacement fertility could be reached in the 1980s with births numbering about 250,000 a year. The population is approaching stability at the younger ages. The potential for poverty arising from large families may be halved in ten years.     

An Experiment in Helping Foster-Carers Manage Challenging Behaviour

A randomized controlled trial was implemented with groups offoster-carers to test the effectiveness of cognitive–behaviouralmethods in the management of difficult behaviour. Contrary toexpectations, no statistically significant differences werefound between the groups with regard to behaviour managementskills, the frequency and/or severity of behavioural problems,and placement stability. In contrast, foster-carers expressedsatisfaction with the overall training programme and increasedconfidence in dealing with difficult behaviour. Discussion ofthe results focuses on a number of competing explanations forsuch findings and concludes with recommendations for futurework.     

A specification of marital fertility by parents’ age,age atmarriage and marital duration

The positive association between wife's age at marriage and fertility experienced at the older reproductive ages, cited in recent natural fertility literature, is explored using Mormon birth cohorts from 1840 to 1879. When this relationship is specified by husband's age at marriage and marriage duration, the results indicate that older-aged husbands depress marital fertility only at higher marriage durations. The general decomposition of age-specific fertility utilizing both mother's and father's age is also considered. The results show that mother's aging is the most important factor, while father's aging has a moderately negative effect under a natural fertility regime.