Using Subsidies to Promote the Adoption of Children from Foster Care

Since 1978 the federal government has implemented a variety of programs to promote the adoption of children from foster care. A key part of these programs has been the use of subsidies to lower the cost of adopting and parenting children who have been in foster care. Although subsidies are a key part of federal policy, there has been little empirical research on the effect of subsidies on adoption rates. This paper uses data from the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System to estimate the impact of subsidy rates on adoption rates. Subsidies to families have a positive and statistically significant effect on adoption rates.

Ethnic Identity Development Among Adolescents in Foster Care

Because past research indicates that stronger ethnic identity is related to better outcomes in areas such as academic achievement and mental health, it is important to provide youth in foster care with opportunities to develop their ethnic identity. Using data from in-person interviews with 188 youth aged 14–17 in foster care (88.7% response rate), this paper explores two areas related to ethnic identity: (1) youth perceptions about their own ethnic identity, and (2) attitudes about ethnic identity development specific to the experience of being in foster care. Results suggest that black youth and Hispanic/Latino youth have a stronger sense of ethnic identity than white youth. Most youth are interested in learning more about their ethnic background. Understanding how youth in foster care identify ethnically and understanding their beliefs related to ethnic identity may lead to the enhancement of services provided to youth across child welfare, education, and mental health systems.

Close to Home: A Simultaneous Equations Model of the Relationship Between Child Care Accessibility and Female Labor Force Participation

Rising rates of maternal employment among current and former welfare recipients have increased the use of non-parental child care. Little empirical work examines the relationship between women’s labor supply and the geographic supply of child care. We combine census data with child care provider information for the state of Maryland to explore the relationship between female labor supply and the geographic supply of child care. OLS and 3-SLS equations are estimated, and the findings are consistent across each estimator: Women’s labor supply is sensitive to the geographic supply of child care and vice versa. These results are important because states now spend significant money on quality improvement initiatives, many of which increase child care supply in low-income neighborhoods.

Labor Force Supply Decisions of Rural Low-Income Mothers

Employment is crucial to the economic well-being of families. Using a multi-state sample of 412 rural low-income mothers, our study identifies factors influencing two employment decisions they make: labor force entry and number of hours supplied. A logistic regression model correctly predicted 80% of mothers’ work participation decisions. Employed mothers were older, better educated, and less likely to suffer from depression; as well as, more likely to have a driver’s license and receive child care assistance and the Earned Income Tax Credit. An estimated labor supply function explained 33% of the variation in hours worked by the 208 employed rural mothers. Higher wages, availability of health insurance, and overtime benefits predicted the number of hours they were willing to work.

Focused Foster Care for Children with Serious Sexual Behavior Problems

Properly implemented, foster family care may represent a uniquely appropriate placement/treatment alternative for young children with pronounced or dangerous sexual behavior problems. A few programs have reported preliminary but promising results with such children in fostering environments specifically designed to address their special problems. This study details the salient components of one such program that has proven successful over the past six years with most of thirty youthful clients referred to it facing few alternative placement options. Rankings by program staff and program parents of the relative importance of ten program components to client success are reported, and updates on previously published outcomes with the first six clients to enter the program are offered. Subjective but important “lessons learned” by staff and parents about working with this difficult population in the fostering environment are also discussed.

The scoring rules in an endogenous election

Plurality rule is mostly criticized from being capable of choosing an alternative considered as worst by a strict majority. This paper considers elections in which the agenda consists of potential candidates strategically choosing whether or not to enter the election. In this context, we examine the ability of scoring rules to fulfil the Condorcet criterion. We show for the case of three potential candidates that Plurality rule is the only scoring rule that satisfies a version of the Condorcet criterion in two cases: 1) when preferences are single-peaked and, 2) when preferences are single-dipped.

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The Demand for Labor: An Analysis Using Matched Employer–Employee Data from the German LIAB. Will the High Unskilled Worker Own-Wage Elasticity Please Stand Up?

This paper uses matched employee–employer LIAB data to provide panel estimates of the structure of labor demand in western Germany, 1993–2002, distinguishing between highly skilled, skilled, and unskilled labor and between the manufacturing and service sectors. Reflecting current preoccupations, our demand analysis seeks also to accommodate the impact of technology and trade in addition to wages. The bottom-line interests are to provide elasticities of the demand for unskilled (and other) labor that should assist in short-run policy design and to identify the extent of skill biases or otherwise in trade and technology.

The Effects of Licensing on the Wages of Radiologic Technologists

We analyze the effect that state licensing of radiologic technologists (RTs) has had upon RT wages with a unique dataset that allows us to control for place of work and job specialization. Using OLS and several measures of licensing, we find evidence that RTs working in states with licensing statutes earn as much as 3.3% more than RTs working in states without licensing. When we control for endogeneity using instrumental variables (IV) estimation, our estimate of the licensing premium doubles (6.9%). Our results provide further support for existing theories of the effects of occupational licensing on the wages of practitioners.

The Non-Existence of the Labor Demand/Supply Diagram,and other Theorems of Institutional Economics

The most famous and influential diagram in modern (neoclassical) labor economics is the model of wage determination by supply and demand. Using concepts and ideas from institutional economics, I argue that the theory of a perfectly competitive labor market is logically contradictory and, hence, the demand/supply diagram cannot exist on the plane of pure theory. Four other fundamental theorems concerning labor markets are also derived, as are implications about the theoretical foundation of the field of industrial relations and the economic evaluation of labor and employment policy.

Credit Constraints and Human Capital Investment in College Education

Using data from the Health and Retirement Study 2001 Human Capital Investment Survey, this article examines the impact of credit market constraints on investment in college education. The effect of family income on college attendance may not be as big as perceived in some previous studies. The interest rates faced by children from middle families are the lowest in the credit market. The research suggests that various government programs aiming to help children from poor families may be effective, but only at the extensive margin—by improving their access to college education. For those who get into college, underinvestment by students from poor families remains a significant problem.

What is child care? Lessons from time-use surveys of major English-speaking countries

This paper examines the definition and measurement of time devoted to child care in the diary-based surveys administered by the United States, Canada, Australia, and Great Britain. Detailed analysis of the relationship between measures of care activity and supervisory care in the American Time Use Survey (ATUS) illustrate the larger conceptual issues at stake.

Constructing Gay and Lesbian Parent Families “Beyond the Closet”

This paper provides a multilayered analysis of how lesbian mothers and gay fathers construct their families in a social context that has been described by Steven Seidman (2004) as “beyond the closet.” We stress how our participants’ family-building experiences are comparable to other non-biologically related families, but distinct due to heterosexual dominance. Using in-depth qualitative interviews with 18 lesbian birth mothers and 22 gay fathers, the authors discuss how participants navigate heterosexual dominance in institutions and in personal interactions.

The quality of time spent with children in Australian households

Using data from the 1992 and 1997 Australian Time Use Surveys, we explore patterns in the quality of child care time spent by parents in Australia. Drawing on existing research, we construct and evaluate four alternative ways of defining child care quality. We estimate censored regression models of the time parents spend in high-quality child care, lower-quality child care, and market work according to these different definitions. We find that seemingly small changes in how the quality of time spent caring for children is conceptualized markedly affect the conclusions we draw about the associations of different household and personal characteristics with parents’ child care time.

Medicaid physician fees and the quality of medical care of Medicaid patients in the USA

When enacted in 1965, the original Medicaid legislation sought to finance access to mainstream medical care for the poor. I use data on visits to office-based physicians from the National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey in four years—1989, 1993, 1998 and 2003—to test the extent to which this goal has been achieved. Specifically, I test whether this goal has been achieved more in states that pay higher fees to physicians who treat Medicaid patients compared to states that pay lower fees. By comparing the treatment of Medicaid patients to that of privately-insured patients and by using state fixed effects, I am able to estimate the effects of changes in the generosity of Medicaid physician payment within a state on changes in access to care for Medicaid patients, therefore separating Medicaid’s effect on access to health care from any correlation between the Medicaid fee and other attributes of the state in which a patient lives. Using this method, I examine the effect of Medicaid fees on whether or not an office-based physician accepts Medicaid patients, on the fraction of a physician’s practice that is accounted for by Medicaid, and on the length of visit times with physicians. Results imply that higher Medicaid fees increase the number of private physicians, especially in medical and surgical specialties, who see Medicaid patients. Higher fees also lead to visit times with physicians that are more comparable to visit times with private pay patients.

Patterns of Gaze Between Parents and Children in European American and Mexican American Families

Mutual gaze has been shown to be a valuable channel of nonverbal communication. To examine mutual gaze between parents and children, 43 European American (EA) and 57 Mexican American (MA) families were coded on the occurrence of talking and gaze during a brief discussion. MA families showed lower levels of father-to-child gaze, mother-to-son gaze, and child-to-father gaze than EA families. MA families also showed less father–child mutual gaze, as well as less mother–child gaze for sons than EA families. Child gaze aversion was more common in European American families. Levels of gaze, father–child mutual gaze, and child gaze aversion all were positively correlated with acculturation. The importance of research exploring possible differences in function and meaning of gaze across cultural groups is emphasized.

Export, Import and Economic Growth: The Case of Transition Economies

This study analyses the relationships between export, import and economic growth for the 13 transition economies. Empirical results show that there is a unidirectional causality from economic growth to export. Empirical findings show that the growth-led export hypothesis is valid in those countries and growth is rather shaped by increase in import demand.

Efficiency Wages,Productivity and Simultaneity: A Meta-Regression Analysis

This study reports a meta-analysis of 75 estimates of the efficiency-wage effect. It reveals a strong efficiency-wage effect that depends upon whether researchers control for potential simultaneity between wages and productivity. Studies that control for simultaneity tend to report stronger effects. Clear evidence of publication selection is also found. E24, J30.

The economics of gay and lesbian couples: Introduction to a special issue on gay and lesbian households

This article presents a simple conceptual framework integrating three couple-related outcomes analyzed in this volume: wage differentials in earnings related to couple formation, household formation (including cohabitation and registration as Registered Domestic Partnership), and intra-household allocation of income. It also discusses some of the articles’ main findings.