A “brer rabbit” case for reverse mandated benefits

Reverse mandated benefits is a government-mandated policy that requires employees to provide their employers with benefits that workers would not provide otherwise. Of course, only those benefits would be mandated that are worth more to employers than they cost, as determined by political authorities. My case for such a policy argues that it is at least as sensible as policies mandating that employers provide benefits to their employees that would not be provided otherwise.     

Ecocultural Attributes: Evaluating Ecological Degradation in Terms of Ecological Goods and Services Versus Subsistence and Tribal Values

It is becoming increasingly clear that scientists, managers, lawyers, public policymakers, and the public must decide how to value what is provided by, and is a consequence of, natural resources. While “Western” scientists have clear definitions for the goods and services that ecosystems provide, we contend that these categories do not encompass the full totality of the values provided by natural resources. Partly the confusion results from a limited view of natural resources derived from the need to monetize the value of ecosystems and their component parts. Partly it derives from the “Western” way of separating natural resources from cultural resources or values, and partly it derives from the false dichotomy of assuming that ecosystems are natural, and anything constructed by man is not natural. In this article, we explore the previous assumptions, and suggest that because cultural resources often derive from, and indeed require, intact and unspoiled natural ecosystems or settings, that these values are rightly part of natural resources. The distinction is not trivial because of the current emphasis on cleaning up chemically and radiologically contaminated sites, on restoration of damaged ecosystems, on natural resource damage assessments, and on long‐term stewardship goals. All of these processes depend upon defining natural resources appropriately. Several laws, regulations, and protocols depend upon natural resource trustees to protect natural resources on trust lands, which could lead to the circular definition that natural resources are those resources that the trustees feel they are responsible for. Where subsistence or tribal peoples are involved, the definition of natural resources should be broadened to include those ecocultural attributes that are dependent upon, and have incorporated, natural resources. For example, a traditional hunting and fishing ground is less valued by subsistence peoples if it is despoiled by contamination or physical ecosystem degradation; an Indian sacred ground is tarnished if the surrounding natural environment is degraded; a traditional homeland is less valued if the land itself is contaminated. Our argument is that intact natural resources are essential elements of many cultural resources, and this aspect requires and demands adequate consideration (and may therefore require compensation).     

Intertemporal choice under timing risk: An experimental approach

This paper investigates how individuals evaluate delayed outcomes with risky realization times. Under the discounted expected utility (DEU) model, such evaluations depend only on intertemporal preferences. We obtain several testable hypotheses using the DEU model as a benchmark and test these hypotheses in three experiments. In general, our results show that the DEU model is a poor predictor of intertemporal choice behavior under timing risk. We found that individuals are averse to timing risk and that they evaluate timing lotteries in a rank-dependent fashion. The main driver of timing risk aversion is nothing but probabilistic risk aversion that stems from the nonlinear treatment of probabilities.     

Three Kinds of Anti-Intellectualism: Rethinking Hofstadter*

Hofstadter's landmark analysis of anti-intellectualism in American life is interpreted within the framework of the sociology of knowledge. His analysis suggests three analytically distinct types of anti-intellectualism: religious anti-rationalism, populist anti-elitism, and unreflective instrumentalism. Each type arises from within its own distinctive institutional matrix. Although Hofstadter fails to anticipate the growing cultural impact of mass media institutions, he demonstrates convincingly that anti-intellectualism is not a unitary phenomenon.     

Parent‐Adolescent Involvement: The Relative Influence of Parent Gender and Residence

The 1995 wave of the Add Health study is used to investigate the relative influence of parent gender and residence on patterns of parental involvement with adolescents. Adolescent reports (N =17,330) of shared activities, shared communication, and relationship quality with both biological parents are utilized. A multidimensional scaling analysis reveals that parent gender explains most of the variance in parent‐adolescent involvement, with residential status playing a secondary yet a fundamental role in accounting for these patterns. Resident mothers who do not live with adolescents’ biological fathers engage in the broadest range of activities with their children. Unpartnered resident fathers display patterns of parenting that are as similar to mothers as they are to other fathers.     

Beheimatungsprozesse begleiten — ein Werkstattbericht

Supporting processes of belonging in supervision and coachingThe contemporary employee has to cope with frequent changes. Not only does he lose his familiar environment, he also has to find ways to familiarize himself with new places and to develop a fresh sense of belonging. This process can be understood and facilitated by interpreting the German concept of “Heimat“ as something we have to create ourselves. First experiences demonstrate the usefulness of this approach in coaching processes.     

Expected sample moments of concomitants of selected order statistics

In this paper, the task of determining expected values of sample moments, where the sample members have been selected based on noisy information, is considered. This task is a recurring problem in the theory of evolution strategies. Exact expressions for expected values of sums of products of concomitants of selected order statistics are derived. Then, using Edgeworth and Cornish-Fisher approximations, explicit results that depend on coefficients that can be determined numerically are obtained. While the results are exact only for normal populations, it is shown experimentally that including skewness and kurtosis in the calculations can yield greatly improved results for other distributions.     

Two earner family migration A search theoretic approach

This paper represents the first attempt to model the two earner family decision to migrate using a joint search theoretic approach. In so doing, the paradox of a couple whose members would both migrate if single but decide not to migrate because they are married to each other is discovered and explained. Furthermore the impact of the rising number of working women and reentry of wives into the labor force on the extent and regional pattern of migration is discussed. Extensions to the model are addressed, as well as future avenues of research, both theoretical and empirical. It is suggested that the search theoretic approach, not previously applied to models of family migration, is the most appropriate.