Social Support and Government Policy on Services for the Elderly

Government policy on services for the elderly is to increase the provision of care in the community. This paper examines this policy in relation to informal help received from relatives and friends.
Drawing on the results of a pilot study of 92 people over the age of 75, registered in a group general practice, data are presented on the balance between informal and formal help over a group of activities of daily livhg. The main informal helpers are described with the range of activities for which people in the study were receiving assistance.
Community services are, at present, limited in the help they can provide for people in their own homes. If policies of community care are to be successful, then they must take into account the strengths and weaknesses of informal support. Using the data presented, suggestions are made a bout improvements in services including task specific services not currently provided and the definition of groups at risk of their social support breaking down.     

And a Hockey Game Broke Out: Crime and Punishment in the NHL

We apply the economic theory of crime to the National Hockey League. We analyze a natural experiment in which games during the 1999–2000 season had either one or two referees. We determine the effect of the number of referees on both the number of penalties called and the number of rules infractions committed by players. The results indicate that increasing the number of referees leads to greater enforcement of the rules but does not significantly deter players from committing infractions. (JEL D0 , K4 )     

THE EXXON FACTOR: The Roles of Corporate and Academic Science in the Emergence and Legitimation of a New Global Model of Sequence Stratigraphy

In the 1970s, a paradigm shift took place in petroleum exploration with the development, within Exxon's research laboratories, of a new model for oil exploration based on seismic stratigraphy and global sea level change. We demonstrate that this approach was widely accepted by the academic and petroleum geology communities outside Exxon in the absence of data, replication, or independent peer review. We attribute this acceptance to the "Exxon Factor", that is, others' perceptions of Exxon's reputational capital and control over the material means of scientific production. We further demonstrate that the model's legitimacy was not accepted within Exxon, where it was developed, until after external legitimation took place. Using Strauss's social worlds/arena analysis, concepts of technoscience, disciplines, and the new knowledge studies, and situational analysis, we consider elements and interactions in the situations in which this scientific knowledge was produced and assessed. We conclude that university and industry geologists validated the scientific knowledge of the other using nonscientific perceptions that they equated with scientific authority.     

Citizens Advice Bureaux: Problems of an Emerging Service in Rural Areas

Nineteen eighty nine marked the Golden Jubilee of the CABx in the UK. Over the past 50 years it has established itself nationally as the prime provider of generalist advice, but there are special problems associated with delivering the service in rural areas. These include: the logistical difficulties of serving remote communities with small and scattered populations; maintaining the independence of bureau, especially from the local authorities that mainly fund them; and matching the professional standards now demanded by NACAB. These issues are examined with reference to a questionnaire survey of bureaux managers in Cornwall and Devon carried out as part of the AJRBP project at the University of Exeter.     

ARE TRUSTWORTHINESS AND FAIRNESS ENOUGH? CONTEXTUAL FAMILY THERAPY AND THE GOOD FAMILY

The moral dimension of family therapy theory and practice has received increasing attention in recent years. Boszormenyi-Nagy was among the first to see that family therapy and moral questions are inseparable. His focus on relational ethics has helped us to reappropriate individual responsibility and accountability within a systemic context. Although contextual therapy has clearly enriched the field, we argue that its emphasis on trustworthiness and fairness provides a limited view of the good in family life and leads to three related problems. First, Boszormenyi-Nagy offers a compelling ethical vision of the family and then denies that he has done so, which undermines some of his key moral claims. Second, because fairness is defined subjectively, contextual therapy may not have the resources to deal with legitimate differences in family ideals. Third, the reliance on self-interest as the primary motive for trustworthy relating appears to be self-defeating. We offer a hermeneutic perspective that takes a broader approach to the good. It places greater emphasis on the social and historical context, deals squarely with different understandings of the good in family life, and recommends an approach to resolving these differences.     

LONGEVITY AND PUBLIC OLD-AGE PENSIONS

Using an overlapping generations model with endogenous but uncertain longevity, this article analyzes the effects of public old-age pensions on longevity choice and capital accumulation. When agents are not altruistic, increases in old-age pensions are longevity-neutral for golden rule economies and longevity-decreasing if interest rates exceed population growth, and saving effects are strictly negative. When agents are altruistic, longevity is independent of old-age pensions regardless of the interest rate–population growth relation. On the other hand, the longevity effect of a price subsidy on longevity extending expenditures or an advance in longevity extending technology is positive.(JEL H5 , J1 )     

DO MANUFACTURERS POLLUTE LESS UNDER THE REGULATION‐THROUGH‐INFORMATION REGIME?

Because past studies on the effects of right-to-know laws have relied on highly aggregated data, it is still unknown whether being located in a state with a funded right-to-know program has a significant effect on the environmental performance of individual manufacturing plants. Nor has it been shown that such effects exist net of other plant characteristics that are known to increase pollution. To remedy this situation, we have used plant-level data from the EPA's Toxics Release Inventory to test the effects of states' right-to-know programs on the toxic emissions of chemical plants in 1990 and 2000. Consistent with several organizational theories (neoinstitutionalism, organizational ecology, and the resource dependence framework) that stress how regulatory policies are just one of several institutional forces that bear on organizations, our findings reveal that states' right-to-know programs have had no significant net effect on plants' toxic emissions. In addition to raising questions about the efficacy of information disclosure laws, our results underscore the importance of approaching pollution as an organizational phenomenon and studying organizations where they most directly impact the environment-at the site of production.     

Welfare to What? After Workfare in Toronto

An employment survey among people in Toronto who left Ontario Works — a classic "work-first" regime — shows clear secondary labour market status. Most interventions typical of work-first programmes did not have a positive effect on job quality: contrary to the "stepping stones" theory that poor initial jobs lead to better jobs, those who changed jobs after leaving assistance experienced poorer job quality. A shift in orientation to "sustainable employment" is required to address the employment needs of those on social assistance. Policy must also address the fact that the social assistance caseload includes a size able group that face significant barriers to employment other than education or skills.     

Rationalising knowledge: IT systems, professional identities and power

This paper explores the impact of a new IT system on the knowledge claims and occupational boundaries made by professional groups within a hospital laboratory setting. Within organizational settings professional groups enjoy considerable power and status through the specialised knowledge claims they make, deploying a variety of material and discursive resources to secure these. However, when organizations introduce new technologies to manage information needs, professional boundaries and claims to expertise may be threatened. This paper examines the strategies deployed by two key professional groups – Medical Laboratory Scientific Officers and medics – to secure their knowledge claims and statuses within the new organizational context shaped in part by an IT system. Though medics were more successful here, they had to accommodate to new demands within the organization. The professional identity and organizational space of the MLSOs were also redefined but, in contrast, by being narrowed. The different experiences and strategies of the two groups reflect their unequal holding of cultural capital and their differential capacity to define their status relative to the organization itself.