Policy tenure under the U.S. National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP)

In the United States, insurance against flood hazard (inland flooding or storm surge from hurricanes) has been provided mainly through the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) since 1968. The NFIP covers $1.23 trillion of assets today. This article provides the first analysis of flood insurance tenure ever undertaken: that is, the number of years that people keep their flood insurance policy before letting it lapse. Our analysis of the entire portfolio of the NFIP over the period 2001-2009 reveals that the median tenure of new policies during that time is between two and four years; it is also relatively stable over time and levels of flood hazard. Prior flood experience can affect tenure: people who have experienced small flood claims tend to hold onto their insurance longer; people who have experienced large flood claims tend to let their insurance lapse sooner. To overcome the policy and governance challenges posed by homeowners' inadequate insurance coverage, we discuss policy recommendations that include for banks and government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) strengthening their requirements and the introduction of multiyear flood insurance contracts attached to the property, both of which are likely to provide more coverage stability and encourage investments in risk-reduction measures.     

Completing the Picture: The Challenges of Bringing “Consumption” into the Population–Environment Equation

The issue of environmentally significant consumption is closely linked to population–environment relationships, but with some exceptions the two literatures have proceeded along separate tracks. We explore three consumption–environment research agendas: household–level consumption; ecological footprints and material flow accounting; and values, attitudes, behaviors and lifestyles. In each of these we note areas of overlap with the population–environment literature, and ways in which the population–environment literature might benefit or borrow from conceptual or methodological approaches in the consumption–environment literature. We also propose ways in which consumption research might be integrated into the largest (in terms of funding) of the population–environment research agendas, land-use and land-cover change research. In the concluding section we present a conceptual framework for understanding the population–environment literature that incorporates production and consumption into the model, and we propose some population–consumption–environment (PCE) research areas to which the population-environment research community could make significant contributions.     

Socio-political,cultural and economic preferences and behaviour of the social and cultural specialists and the technocrats. Social class or education?

Do the social and cultural specialists differ from the technocrats and other social classes with respect to their socio-political, cultural and economic preferences and behaviour? If they do, is this attributable to their level and field of education? The social and cultural specialists are assumed to form ?new’ social class and the technocrats ?old’ social class. A typical social class should differentiate itself with respect to moral attitudes, socio-political behaviour and lifestyle forms. To reveal whether these assumed classes are indeed typical classes, we have studied a variety of socio-political, cultural and economic preferences and behaviour of members of these social classes using the Family Survey of the Dutch Population (FSDP) 1992, 1998, 2000 and 2003. To unravel the net differences between the social and cultural specialists and the technocrats, we controlled for the field of study, the level of education and background factors. Taking these control factors into consideration, the social and cultural specialists differentiate themselves substantially from the technocrats in their socio-political and especially economic preferences and behaviour. With respect to their cultural preferences and behaviour, they do not differ significantly from the technocrats.     

Breast feeding, fertility and infant mortality: An analysis of some early German data

Abstract Concern about high infant mortality and its suspected connection with the lack of breast-feeding stimulated the collection of statistics about the frequency of breast-feeding in several German states during the late roth and early 20th centuries. Contrary to the assumption that universal and extended breast-feeding is customary among rural agricultural populations, large regional variations existed both in the proportion of children who were breast-fed and in the average duration of the period for which they were breast-fed. An analysis of these data in connection with statistics of infant mortality and marital fertility confirms the association between high infant mortality and the absence of breast-feeding. An hypothesis linking breast-feeding and fertility, however, is not confirmed. Marital fertility appears to be much more closely associated with infant mortality than with breast-feeding.     

Fertility transition,conscious choice,and numeracy

One of the preconditions of the fertility transition, as stated by A.J. Coale, is that reproductive decisions must be within the calculus of conscious choice. It is suggested that the change in mentality which leads to family limitation includes "numeracy about children," a clear notion of what family size ought to be and the awareness of individuals of where they stand with respect to the norm. The article explores the hypothesis that numeracy about children appeared historically in various times and places, and that the conceptualization of family size was a necessary condition for adopting family limitation.     

Green giant or straw man? Environmental pressure and civil conflict, 1961–99

The proposition that environmental scarcity causes violent conflict attracts both popular and academic interest. Neomalthusian writers have developed theoretical arguments explaining this connection, and have conducted numerous case studies that seem to support the view that scarcity of biological assets such as land and other renewable resources causes conflict. So far there have been few systematic quantitative or comparative studies, and the few that exist have focused on particular forms of environmental degradation or on a small subset of resources, particularly mineral wealth. We test a more general argument about the effects of resource scarcity by examining the most widely-used measure of environmental sustainability: the ecological footprint. Contrary to neomalthusian thinking, we find that countries with a heavier footprint have a substantially greater chance of peace. Biocapacity and the ecological reserve also predict to peace, but these results are more fragile. Separate tests for smaller conflicts, for the post-Cold War period, and with additional control variables do not yield stronger support for the scarcity thesis. On the whole, the neomalthusian model of conflict receives little support from this analysis. We cannot exclude that erosion of the earth’s carrying capacity can increase conflict in the long run, but an empirical analysis with the ecological footprint measure does not provide any support for such a position.     

中国西部民族地区贫困问题研究

西部民族地区的贫困严重制约着西部地区的快速发展 ,减少贫困已经成为启动西部开发的首要动力 ,从根本上消除贫困则将成为检验和衡量西部开发成功与否的重要标准。西部民族地区是我国贫困人口的密集分布区 ,贫困面大 ,贫困度深 ,脱贫难度大 ,返贫率高。针对我国西部民族地区贫困的特殊性 ,在反贫困的战略选择上 ,一方面要进一步加强区域发展援助 ,即加快西部少数民族地区的经济开发进程 ,实现民族地区整体经济实力的增长和自我发展能力的提高。另一方面 ,反贫困战略的目标要瞄准西部民族地区的贫困人口 ,使贫困人口成为反贫困的直接受益者     

现代消费主义的理性思考

消费是人为了生存而进行的一种基本活动,一种生活方式。但随着科学技术的发展和经济的增长,现代社会已经进入到了生产过剩的时代,这必然引起大量的挥霍性消费随之而来。为此,本来作为人的生存方式的消费就成为一种违背人类可持续生存和发展利益的消费,最终也成为人类生存的最大威胁之一,因而,再次审视现代社会的消费观的理论基础是一项迫切的任务。