WOMEN'S MARITAL TIMING AT THE TURN OF THE CENTURY:

This article utilizes accelerated failure time models to estimate the effect of immigration, generation, and ethnicity on timing of first marriage among women living in the United States in 1910. Although historical research suggests that family need resulted in marital delay, I argue that family strategies for socioeconomic mobility is a more likely explanation. Second-generation women from groups experiencing substantial socioeconomic mobility across the generations demonstrate the greatest likelihood of marital delay; this is particularly notable for Jewish women. Migration does not have the expected delaying effect on marriage; those arriving as children or single adults marry at younger ages than either those who wed in the country of origin or their second-generation counterparts. Findings are discussed in light of ethnic group stratification and the importance of integrating women into mobility frameworks.     

THE DEVELOPMENTAL EFFECT OF STATE ALCOHOL PROHIBITIONS AT THE TURN OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

We examine the quasi‐randomization of alcohol consumption created by state‐level alcohol prohibition laws passed in the United States in the early part of the twentieth century. Using a large dataset of World War II enlistees, we exploit the differential timing of these laws to examine their effects on adult educational attainment, obesity, and height. We find statistically significant effects for education and obesity that do not appear to be the result of pre‐existing trends. Our findings add to the growing body of economic studies that examine the long‐run impacts of in utero and childhood environmental conditions. (JEL I18, D10, N41, N42)     

THE FIRST THINGS FIRST MANIFESTO AND THE POLITICS OF CULTURE JAMMING: TOWARDS A CULTURAL ECONOMY OF GRAPHIC DESIGN AND ADVERTISING

Advertising has long been recognized as an important cultural force by media and cultural studies scholars. Graphic design, despite its comparable ubiquity, has rarely been the subject of this kind of critique. Where these activities have been discussed, the emphasis has been overwhelmingly on their textual manifestations (graphics, ads, commercials) and, occasionally, on their reception. In the interest of working towards a fuller account of the overall circulation and reproduction of an increasingly commercial contemporary culture, then, this paper turns to the generative source of these ephemeral artefacts and, in particular, professional graphic design practice. By paying especial attention to the framing of current debates about accountability and social responsibility within this profession, this paper seeks to explore the constraining and enabling effects of commercial practice. Advertising and design are readily distinguishable from other economic institutions because of their declared expertise in creating specifically cultural forms of communication. Further, these practices rely on the skills of cultural intermediaries: individuals whose job it is to develop these forms to mediate between, or more properly, articulate, the realms of production and consumption. Graphic designers, it seems, enjoy much greater latitude for personal expression than ad creatives – or at least enjoy a professional culture, or habitus, that supports debate and dissent through a variety of activities, and recognizes non-commercial design projects as legitimate forms of expression. While the designers interviewed here may claim that advertising is a creative practice entirely subsumed by commercial constraints, they also recognize that their own professional activities involve only a limited degree of subjective control. Personal and non-commercial projects, often indirectly funded by income from business clients, appear to provide a more reliable means to creative fulfillment.     

THE MEANING OF RACE TO EMPLOYERS:

The unemployment problems of blacks in the United States have been the subject of considerable research in the social sciences since the 1980s. One way of studying the barriers to employment faced by blacks has been to interview employers, face to face, and directly ask them about their racial attitudes. These studies have concluded that a majority of employers believe that blacks, compared with other racial and ethnic groups, are uncooperative, unreliable, and lack sufficient skills for entry-level employment. The present study critically reexamines employer racial attitudes toward blacks and other groups through a case study of employer hiring in the electronics industry in Los Angeles. Using a different set of interview questions, employers reported (1) that blacks are reluctant to accept unskilled jobs due to a higher reservation wage, not because they lacked skills or a work ethic, (2) that employer racial attitudes varied by level of occupational skill, and (3) that affirmative action regulations modified the hiring process such that employers were less likely to rely on negative racial stereotypes in their hiring and more likely to rely on objective criteria when screening job seekers. I conclude by suggesting that employer racial attitudes are dynamic and, in large measure, shaped by institutional relationships within the workplace.     

EMERGENCY PSYCHIATRY AND THE FAMILY: THE DECISION TO ADMIT

The author's work with families presenting to a psychiatric emergency service points to the prominence of families' wishes that one family member be hospitalized. The pressure on the cliniciancan be extreme. A number of studies in the literature on the decision to admit contain similar observations emerging from varied methodologies and vantages. The author draws from clinical practiceand the literature to focus on an interpersonal dimension to emergency interventions. Awareness ofinterpersonal forces upon mental health clinicians is crucial to allow mature balancing of the many factors involved in the decision making process. An integration of family and systems thinking into the practice of emergency psychiatry can enhance comfort and effectiveness in many difficult crisis situations.     

THE EXCESS SUPPLY-PURE DEMAND APPROACH TO INTERNATIONAL COMMODITY TRADE: THE CASE OF JAPANESE STEEL EXPORTS TO THE UNITED STATES

The purpose of this paper is twofold: 1) to develop a theoretical framework for the analysis of export supply which is empirically more fruitful than existing approaches, and 2) to present an empirical application of the theory to the market for Japanese steel, thereby quantifying important export supply elasticities not dealt with in the past. Evidence is presented which indicates that the supply of Japanese steel exports to the U.S. is price elastic, and sensitive to Japanese and rest of world demand conditions.     

THE INFLUENTIALS: BACK TO THE CONCEPT OF OPINION LEADERS?

The concept of opinion leadership has been related to a lingeringtheoretical and methodological debate. The present study examinesa new measure to identify opinion leaders (the Strength of PersonalityScale) developed by the Allensbach Survey Center in Germany.The results of applying this measure in Germany and Israel allowedthe testing of its validity and efficiency. The findings, however,do not suggest that the influentials identified by this scaleare opinion leaders according to the original conceptualization,but fit better the more sophisticated characterization of opinionleadership that stemmed from modifications of the original conceptof opinion leaders.     

THE OBSESSION TO FORECAST: PRE-ELECTION POLLS IN THE ISRAELI PRESS

The generous coverage of pre-election polls in the media hasstimulated a debate on the effects of publicized polls on voters.Data for this study come from a content analysis of all pressreports on polls during six pre-election campaigns in Israel(1969–88). The findings highlight the impressive increaseof poll reports both by space and by prominence in the press.Analysis of the reports' content reveals that the style of reportingpolls has become dominated by "horse-race" journalism, wherepredictions and popularity ratings are the leading themes. Inaddition, although the reports have become more detailed andinformative, they still do not adequately define or interpretmethodological deficiencies. Finally, the analysis examinesthe intercorrelations between attributes of coverage and predictionserrors. The fact that the independent variable, media coverageof polls, has changed significantly calls for the inclusionof this factor in any study of polls' effects.     

FROM THE CRADLE TO THE GRAVE: AUSTRO-MARXISM AND CULTURAL STUDIES

The political theory and practice of Austro-Marxism provided an understanding of culture as an area of political conflict and as a class-based way of life. As a cultural and educational movement, Austro-Marxism defined the framework for transdisciplinary extramural cultural studies. An Austro-Marxist cluster defined by a number of scholars associated by political orientation and an alternative form of academic institutionalization emerged in interwar Vienna. This cluster disagreed with the paternalistic claim of leading representatives of the SDAP. Nevertheless, the SDAP defined the pluralistic framework for the formation of Austrian cultural studies. Socialist-oriented scholars such as Otto Neurath, Edgar Zilsel, Paul Lazarsfeld and Marie Jahoda developed a materialistic idea of culture focused on the social conditions of cultural practices. Furthermore, they provided a profound understanding of mass culture and popular culture.     

COHORT DIFFERENCES IN THE TRANSITION TO MOTHERHOOD:

Although research has found that educational attainment is a major predictor of age at first childbirth, this association may not be consistent across cohorts. In this article, we examine the adult transitions of four cohorts of married white women (N = 306), born between 1907 and 1933, including in our life course model not only education but also employment before marriage. As hypothesized, employment before marriage is the best predictor of the age at first childbirth among women entering adulthood prior to the end of World War II. In contrast, women in the early postwar years were moderately more likely to postpone childbearing due to educational pursuits.     

THE LIMITS TO GROWTH

This article examines aggregate real estate firm mortality rates in a group of metropolitan areas during the 1960s and 1970s. Real estate firms play a critical role in the local growth machine, yet no research has examined the environmental limits which these firms experience. A set of ecological hypotheses are constructed which detail the influence of task and institutional environments on aggregate firm mortality rates. The findings show the sensitivity of firms to their local context, although standard market forces are not operating. In addition, period differences suggest that larger societal forces interact with the local land market, increasing aggregate mortality rates over time. Results support recent observations of the local land market made by the "new urban sociology."