The market for foster care: an empirical study of the impact of foster care subsidies

When parents are suspected of child abuse or neglect, their children may be placed with foster families. We estimate the relationship between the monthly subsidies paid to foster families and the quantity of foster care services provided. The empirical model uses variation in subsidies and foster care populations within 37 states and the years 1987–1995. One innovation in our approach is that we exploit the idea that states do not appear to set market clearing rates, as evidenced by a foster home shortage during this time period. In this case of excess demand, variation in the monthly subsidy traces out the supply curve. Our results show that states with high demand may be able to use economic incentives to recruit foster families.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Organizational Environments, Framing Processes, and the Diffusion of the Program to Address Global Climate Change Among Local Governments in the United States

Few researchers have examined how organizational environments and framing processes simultaneously influence the diffusion of organizational practices. This article combines insight from major perspectives on the diffusion of organizational innovations and from social movement studies, and shows that the adoption of a program to address global climate change by U.S. municipalities is shaped by social contagion and organizational linkages, as well as by the actions of change-promoting agents. The findings emphasize the potential as well as the limitation of the strategic efforts on the part of innovation promoters to frame adoption in a way that will appeal to potential adopters.

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.

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.

Understanding and Utilizing Parallel Processes of Social Interaction for Attachment-based Parenting Interventions

In an effort to meet both the parenting and treatment needs of substance-abusing women who are parents, residential drug treatment programs have been struggling to find the best approach. A qualitative-quantitative study of the parenting experience of mothers in residential drug treatment programs housing both mothers and their children found that relational processes characterized how these mothers perceived parenting as well as treatment. The findings presented the interplay and mutuality between a mother’s interactions (natural or facilitated) with the external social world that includes her child and those connected to the treatment facility and the internal formation of her sense of herself, her child, and others, along with the changes in both areas that took place in the facility. These findings lend important support to the use of attachment-based parenting interventions in residential drug treatment programs by drawing on these relational processes.

The Therapeutic Action of Play in the Psychodynamic Treatment of Children: A Critical Analysis

This paper critically appraises the therapeutic action of play in psychodynamic child therapy and identifies obstacles to utilizing play therapeutically with children. An examination of the functions of action and verbal means of communication as well as their roles in shaping therapeutic relationships in treating children is provided in light of recent theoretical advances. The significance of engaging children directly through play and for redressing the balance between action and verbalization in child therapy is 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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Effective Adolescent Substance Abuse Treatment in Juvenile Justice Settings: Practice and Policy Recommendations

Juvenile justice—increasingly the service delivery point for adolescents with substance abuse and co-occurring problems lacking resources for other assistance—can be a model for improved and expanded, yet cost-effective, adolescent substance abuse treatment. An emergent standard of care challenges systemic inequities; a new service array facilitates dialogue among justice and treatment professionals, families, and the youth themselves. Such evidence-based practice—and the policy to implement it—have the power to transform disconnected laws, programs and professionals into an effective, efficient and successful community of responders, helping youth reclaim their lives while improving public health and public safety.

The response of household parental investment to child endowments

The theoretical and empirical literature on parental investment focuses on whether child-specific parental investments reinforce or compensate for a child’s initial endowments. However, many parental investments, such as neighborhood quality and family size and structure, are shared wholly or in part among all children in a household. The empirical results of this paper imply that such household parental investments compensate for low endowments, as proxied by low birth weight.

How Living Wage Legislation Affects U.S. Poverty Rates

I investigate how living wage legislation affects poverty. I find evidence that living wage ordinances modestly reduce poverty rates where such ordinances are enacted. However, there is no evidence that state minimum wage laws do so. The difference in the impacts of the two types of legislation conceivably stems from a difference in the party responsible for bearing the burden of the cost.

Predictors of Chapter 13 Completion Rates: The Role of Socioeconomic Variables and Consumer Debt Type

This study examined whether demographic or financial variables best predict completion of Chapter 13 bankruptcy plans. Multinomial logistic regression revealed that demographic variables were more important than financial variables in predicting completion. Completion of a Chapter 13 repayment plan was not associated with a debtor’s monthly income or expenses. Never married debtors, dependent children, a previous filing, and higher mortgage arrears increased the likelihood of dismissal. Longer job tenure and home ownership improved completion rates. Discharge was associated with higher unsecured debts. Results can help improve Chapter 13 completion rates. Debtors need guidance in setting up realistic repayment plans. Financial counselors could help ensure that repayment plans are feasible and to counsel debtors who miss a plan payment.

Creating an Ecology of Hope: Arts-based Interventions with Refugee Children

This paper illustrates how human ecological theory and hope theory were used to develop arts-based research tools and program interventions with refugee children in a Canadian inner city context. Building on key ideas such as: the contextualized, reciprocal, and dynamic nature of hope, the paper identifies a series of program activities. These include the use of photographs, a hope quilt, the development of narratives, followed by opportunities for children to share their hope work with others and for parents and other adults to undertake child-focused and hope-based discussions. Policy and program implications for refugee children are then discussed.

On the influence of extreme parties in electoral competition with policy-motivated candidates

We study and compare equilibrium platforms in models of unidimensional electoral competition with two and four policy motivated parties. We first analyze the plurality game, where the party getting the most votes is elected and implements its proposed platform. Restrictions on the set of credible announcements are needed to get existence of equilibria. Comparing equilibria with two and four parties, we obtain that moderate parties react to the introduction of extreme parties by proposing the same or more extreme equilibrium platforms. We then study the proportional system, where the policy implemented is a weighted sum of the proposals, with the voting shares as weights. Here, the existence of extreme parties leads moderate ones to choose more centrist platforms. We finally test the robustness of our results with respect to, first, the enlargement of the strategy space to entry decisions and, second, to asymmetric distributions of voters' blisspoints.

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