Child Care Costs and Women's Employment: A Comparison of Single and Married Mothers With Pre-School-Aged Children

Objectives . The effects of child care costs on the employment of single and married mothers with pre-school-aged children were analyzed. Methods . Both demographic and employment data from the March Current Population Survey were used, supplemented by child care data from various sources. Results . We find that child care costs have strong effects on employment for women with pre-school-aged children and that these effects are larger for single mothers than for married mothers. Conclusions . Our simulation results suggest that policies that reduce the costs of child care could raise the employment rate of married mothers by 3 to 14 percentage points and the employment rate of single mothers by 5 to 21 percentage points.     

Employment and Wage Trajectories for Mothers Entering Low-skilled Work: Evidence from the British Lone Parent Cohort

UK government policy encourages mothers of young children in low-income families to enter or return to work, via tax credit subsidies and support for childcare. Maternal employment is seen a central plank in the campaign against child poverty, both because it raises income immediately and because working now is seen as paving the way to better employment prospects in the future. But there is little evidence about medium- and long-term outcomes for mothers entering low-skilled employment. We know little about how likely such women are to remain in work, let alone how likely they are to progress to higher-skilled and better-paid jobs. This article uses the British Lone Parent Cohort, a data set which tracked lone mothers from 1991 to 2001, to examine employment trajectories for up to 560 mothers with a youngest child under five at the start of the period. It creates a typology of trajectories over the decade, identifying the share of women broadly stable in work, those remaining at home and those following unstable pathways between the two. It goes on to explore the factors associated with different pathways, asking whether individual and household characteristics, job characteristics, or changes in circumstances such as new health problems are most important. Finally, the article examines differences in wage progression across groups of women following different pathways, and similarly tries to identify the main factors associated with faster progress.     

Metropolitan Earnings Inequality: Union and Government‐Sector Employment Effects*

Objective. This study examines the effects of union density and government‐sector employment on earnings inequality in Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) in the United States. Methods. Data on 167 MSAs from the 2000 Census are analyzed using standard regression techniques. Four measures of Atkinson's index (e=0.5, 1.0, 2.0, 3.0) are used as the measure of earnings inequality for full‐time, year‐round workers. Results. MSAs with greater union density and greater government‐sector employment have lower earnings inequality. The progressive effect of union density is strongest for earners in the middle of the distribution and less beneficial for workers at the bottom of the distribution. Government employment is generally associated with lower levels of earnings inequality, but state and federal government employment have the strongest effects. Conclusion. Even in the late 1990s, unions and government‐sector employment remain effective at reducing earnings inequality.     

Post‐Hurricane Katrina Employment Recovery: The Interaction of Race and Place*

Objective. The mass migrations, infrastructure decimation, and widespread impact zone make Hurricane Katrina an especially difficult disaster from which to recover. Employment is an important aspect of effective disaster recovery. The purpose of this article is to examine determinants of employment recovery approximately one month and one year after Hurricane Katrina. Methods. The data are from a two‐stage survey of Hurricane Katrina survivors conducted by the Gallup Organization in September/October 2005 and August 2006. A series of logistic regression models were preformed on data from the two time points. Results. The results suggest a complexity to inequality where race and place interact to determine employment recovery. Displacement, gender, income, and homeownership were also significant. Conclusions. Recovery efforts and future research need to incorporate more complex understandings of vulnerability, with particular attention paid to the issues of employment and reemployment.     

Migration and Employment Among the Civilian Spouses of Military Personnel*

Objectives. This article attempts to directly observe the effect of being a tied migrant on the economic status of the civilian husbands and wives of military personnel in order to confirm whether previously observed trailing‐wife effects are consistent with being a tied migrant. Methods. A sample of the civilian husbands of women in the military and the civilian wives of men in the military are drawn from the Public Use Microdata Sample of the 1990 U.S. Census. Ordinal logit models of labor‐market status and tobit models of hours worked are estimated, which include a migrant status variable. Results. Migration is associated with a 10 percent decline in employment among all civilian wives and a four‐hour decline in hours worked per week among civilian wives who remain employed. Migration is associated with a statistically insignificant but very similar 6 percent drop in employment among all civilian men and a five‐hour decline in hours worked per week among civilian men who remain employed. Conclusions. The results provide solid evidence that being a tied migrant, irrespective of gender, is disruptive to both labor‐market status and hours worked. Thus, the assumption that wives are harmed because of their disproportionate status as tied migrants is supported.     

Becoming mother and father in late adoption: a case study

Adoption in Brazil has long been related to practices of not disclosing the child's history and origins, which become a family secret. As a consequence, most couples who apply for adoption prefer newborns. Late adoption is still an uncommon practice and requires a 'family project' which accepts a different family model, new meanings of motherhood and fatherhood, and different ways of building affectionate bonds. It is important to investigate how a man and a woman become parents under those circumstances. This study aimed to follow up the emergence of adoption, motherhood and fatherhood meanings, in the discursive practices involved in the construction of adoptive parenthood in the Brazilian setting. This paper presents important meanings regarding parenthood produced by a couple who adopted two sisters, aged 4 and 5 years. Analysis revealed that to better understand the late adoption process, the meanings that emerge in the discursive practices should be considered. Those meanings pervade and circumscribe the family relationships, influencing how the individuals constitute their roles in the family. It is through the analysis of this dialogical process of construction that it is possible to identify the challenges in late adoption and to unravel the process of constructing affectionate relationships.     

Underage Females' Experiences of Sexual Relations,Motherhood, and Married Life

Any substantial progress in the study of the nature of schizophrenia is predicated on overcoming a number of difficulties, and one of the most crucial factors in ensuring that this will be achieved is making the study of schizophrenia problem number one in every country. Yet to be successful such research requires setting up costly and complicated investigations, including multifaceted, general pathological studies of the brain, pharmacological studies, epidemiological studies, etc. This is a basic prerequisite for international scientific cooperation. Effective study of schizophrenia requires that variations among different countries in their views about the mind be overcome, since such variations make uniform clinical diagnosis of mental illnesses impossible. The difficulties are also due to the peculiar features of the clinical method in psychiatry, which still remains essentially functional, i.e., divorced from study of the material substrate of the illness. Despite the considerable progress it has made, psychiatry to this day still finds it impossible to dispense completely with the linear principle of Kraepelin's classification. An evaluation of the true value of any scientific system depends not only on how well it fits the facts but also on how effectively it meets the requirements of the time, the level of development of science, and the method employed. (1)     

Authoritarians, the Next Generation: Values and Bullying Among Adolescent Children of Authoritarian Fathers

The author comments on an article by Altemeyer (2003) . The implications of authoritarianism to social phenomena are extended to the values and bullying behaviors of adolescent children of authoritarian fathers. Eighty-two authoritarian and 252 nonauthoritarian Israeli fathers participated with their adolescent children. Authoritarian fathers expected their children to give high importance to power, tradition, and conformity values and lower-than-average importance to benevolence, universalism, and self-direction values. In comparison with offspring of nonauthoritarian fathers, offspring of authoritarian fathers gave more importance to power values and less importance to universalism values. Offspring of authoritarian fathers also tended to associate more with bully friends. The combination of high adolescent power values and their fathers' authoritarian parenting was associated with the highest degrees of bullying by adolescents. The social implications of the findings are discussed.     

Explaining Self‐Employment Success and Failure: Wal‐Mart Versus Starbucks,or Schumpeter Versus Putnam*

Objectives. Two powerful socioeconomic innovations are sweeping the nation, led by Wal‐Mart Stores, Inc. and Starbucks Corp. These innovations both affect and are driven by profound labor market changes, but exactly how they affect self‐employment or entrepreneurship has not been investigated. We examine the independent effects of these phenomena on the returns to self‐employment, which is itself an underresearched topic in labor economics. Methods. We apply spatial econometric analysis to data from more than 3,000 U.S. counties to analyze how big‐boxes and drinking places that facilitate social networking affect self‐employment earnings. Findings. The presence of Wal‐Mart stores is associated with higher returns to self‐employment, whereas the results for coffee shops and drinking places are mixed. A negative interaction effect on earnings emerges when Wal‐Mart stores and drinking places exist in the same county. Conclusions. We confirm both Schumpeter's and Putnam's assertions about the importance of creative destruction and social networking in raising the productivity of entrepreneurs, although the latter effect is not as clear‐cut as the former.     

The Prison Industry: Carceral Expansion and Employment in U.S. Counties, 1969–1994*

Objectives. Despite the interest that social scientists have displayed in the rising rate of incarceration, little attention has been devoted to understanding its consequences for local areas. This is an important omission because prison construction has become a component of state and local economic development schemes. Indeed, there is a widespread belief that prison construction provides significant economic benefits to local areas. Methods. We analyze data on all existing and new prisons in the United States since 1960 and examine the impact of these prisons on the pace of growth (as measured by public, private, and total employment growth) in U.S. counties from 1969 to 1994. To our knowledge, our study is the first comprehensive and longitudinal assessment of the impact of prison construction on local areas. Results. We find no evidence that prison expansion has stimulated economic growth. In fact, we provide evidence that prison construction has impeded economic growth in rural counties that have been growing at a slow pace. Conclusion. Despite sharp ideological and intellectual differences, the critics and the advocates of the prison construction boom share the assumption that prisons can contribute to local growth, especially in hard‐pressed local areas. This belief flies in the face of mounting evidence that state and local initiatives rarely have a significant impact on growth; this belief is also contradicted by our analyses.     

Attachment to Mothers and Fathers during Middle Childhood: Associations with Child Gender, Grade, and Competence

Attachment relationships of first, third, and fifth graders with their mothers and fathers, and their associations with self‐perceived and teacher‐rated competence, were investigated. Children rated their attachment security with mothers and fathers using the Kerns security scale. Children's perceptions of academic and peer competence were measured using Harter's self‐perception profile, and teachers also rated children's competence. Girls felt greater attachment security to their mothers than to their fathers, and boys felt greater attachment security to their fathers than did girls. Greater attachment security with both mothers and fathers was associated with children's perceptions of greater peer and academic competence, and this association was stronger for older children. A greater sense of attachment security with both parents was associated with greater competence than a sense of attachment security with only one parent. Teacher‐rated competence was significantly related to attachment security with mothers but not fathers.     

Revisiting the Impact of Prison Building on Job Growth: Education,Incarceration, and County‐Level Employment, 1976–2004*

Objectives. It is widely believed that prison construction offers significant economic benefits to local areas. We review the popular and scholarly literature and provide a quantitative analysis of claims. Methods. We analyze data on all existing and new prisons in the United States since 1960 to assess the impact of these prisons on the pace of public, private, and total employment growth in U.S. counties from 1976 to 2004. Results. Our results suggest that enhanced human capital is associated with employment gains and cast doubt on the assertion that prisons provide economic benefits to local areas. We provide evidence that prison construction impedes economic growth in rural counties, especially in counties that lag behind in educational attainment. Conclusions. Based on empirical results, this research casts further doubt on claims that prisons offer a viable economic development option for struggling rural communities. Possible explanations for the failure of prisons to help local areas are explored, including existing corrections officers moving to fill openings, adverse local impacts of prison labor, and paucity of local multipliers when a prison opens.     

Becoming involved in raising a relative's child: reasons, caregiver motivations and pathways to informal kinship care

Interviews with 207 informal kinship caregivers describe a dynamic process that influences how children come to live with a relative other than their parent. This process involves three overlapping and often simultaneously occurring factors: (1) the reasons the children's parents were unable to care for them; (2) the caregiver's motivation for assuming responsibility for the child; and (3) the pathways or routes that children took to the caregiver's home. Understanding these factors and their mutual and simultaneous influence is important as we shape policies, programs and interventions to support families as they consider whether to care for a relative's child and once they assume this responsibility.     

On Becoming a Group Member: Personal Growth and Effectiveness in Group Counseling by Schakoor,M.

No abstract available for this article.     

Failing the Transition from Welfare to Work: Women Chronically Disconnected from Employment and Cash Welfare*

Objectives. Although employment among welfare mothers increased substantially following the 1996 welfare reform, some former welfare recipients failed to find stable employment. We review the extent to which low‐income mothers are without work and cash welfare for long periods of time and seek to understand the correlates of becoming chronically disconnected. Methods. We analyze data from a 1997–2003 panel study of single mothers who received cash welfare in an urban county in Michigan in February 1997. We develop a new measure of the extent to which former recipients are “chronically disconnected” from both employment and cash welfare and estimate regression models of the correlates of this economic outcome. Results. About 9 percent of respondents became chronically disconnected, defined as being without employment and cash welfare during at least one‐quarter of the months during the 79‐month study period. Important correlates of becoming chronically disconnected include having a physical limitation, having a learning disability, using illegal drugs or meeting the diagnostic screening criteria for alcohol dependence, and having no car or driver license. The chronically disconnected are more likely to have lost a job than to have lost welfare benefits and are more economically disadvantaged than those with regular sources of economic support. Conclusions. To reduce the number of women who fail to make a successful transition from welfare to work, more attention should be given to programs and policies that attempt to reconnect disconnected women to regular sources of economic support.     

Paraplegics in Scotland: a Survey of Employment and Facilities

Summary The results of a survey of employment facilities and socialservices available to 50 paraplegics living in Glasgow or thesurrounding counties are reported. The degree of unemployment in the group (74%) was far greaterthan has been reported in other surveys and although the generalunemployment level in the area is high, services to help thedisabled gain employment were only partially utilized. Liaison between social workers was not always successful. Someparaplegics were visited at home by both a medical social workerand a local authority social worker, while others were not supportedby either. There was no apparent attempt by local authoritiesto identify the disabled as is required in England under Section1 of the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act (1970) andseveral paraplegics lacked facilities which are covered by Section2 of the Act. It appeared that the exclusion of Scotland fromSections 1 and 2 of the Chronically Sick and Disabled PersonsAct might widen the differences between the two countries asthe Scottish legislation is less specific. (This work led to the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons(Scotland) Act, 1972; see note, p. 37.)