Scheduling Updates of Probabilistic Risk Assessments: The Arkansas Nuclear One-Unit 1 Experience

This paper presents the results of a study that identified how often a probabilistic risk assessment (PRA)should be updated to accommodate the changes that take place at nuclear power plants. Based on a 7-year analysis of design and procedural changes at one plant, we consider 5 years to be the maximum interval for updating PRAs. This conclusion is preliminary because it is based on the review of changes that occurred at a single plant, and it addresses only PRAs that involve a Level 1 analysis (i.e., a PRA including calculation of core damage frequency only). Nevertheless, this conclusion indicates that maintaining a useful PRA requires periodic updating efforts. However, the need for this periodic update stems only partly from the number of changes that can be expected to take place at nuclear power plants–changes that individually have only a moderate to minor impact on the PRA, but whose combined impact is substantial and necessitates a PRA update. Additionally, a comparison of two generations of PRAs performed about 5 years apart indicates that PRAs must be periodically updated to reflect the evolution of PRA methods. The most desirable updating interval depends on these two technical considerations as well as the cost of updating the PRA. (Cost considerations, however, were beyond the scope of this study.)     

Male Adolescents: Sexual Victimization and Subsequent Sexual Abuse

Veneziano, Veneziano and LeGrand (2000) found support for the victim to victimizer hypothesis of sexual aggression with 74 sexually abusive youth. This project, a further step in examining this theory (Burton, 2000, Burton, Miller, & Shill, 2002) builds on their ideas with data from 179 adolescent sexual abusers, and supports their findings. In an examination of relationships, gender, modus operandi, and acts, the sexually abused youth were likely to repeat what was done to them. This project also offers a further analysis of how victimization accounts for a significant portion of the variance in perpetration by these youth. Implications for research and practice are offered.     

The dilemma of recognition: Administrative categories and cultural diversity

Governments around the world combat inequality by means of group-specific redistribution. Some pursue redistribution that benefits groups, but also wish to avoid accentuating or even recognizing group distinctions. This poses a dilemma that they try to resolve by adjusting the category system used to target redistribution. There are three types of adjustment: accommodation (the multicultural approach), denial (the ideal-typical liberal solution), and replacement (a compromise). In replacement the targets of redistributive policies are constructed to avoid accentuation or recognition of inconvenient group distinctions, but still allow redistribution that benefits these groups. Replacement is increasingly in demand around the world because the disadvantages of multiculturalism are becoming apparent while denial is hard to sustain in the face of group inequality. The actual effect of replacement is little researched and less understood, however. Does it resolve the dilemma of recognition? Two examples–India and Nigeria–where replacement has been tried ever since the 1950s cast doubt on its viability.     

Sweatshops and third world living standards: Are the jobs worth the sweat?

Many studies have shown that multinational firms pay more than domestic firms in Third World countries. Economists who criticize sweatshops have responded that multinational firms’ wage data do not address whether sweatshop jobs are above average because many of these jobs are with domestic subcontractors. We compare apparel industry wages and the wages of individual firms accused of being sweatshops to measures of the standard of living in Third World economies. We find that most sweatshop jobs provide their workers an above average standard of living. The authors thank Jeffery Hummel, Charles Murray, Larry Pratt, and Edward Stringham for helpful comments on earlier drafts. Financial support from the American Institute for Economic Research is gratefully acknowledged. The usual disclaimer applies.     

A LOTTO SYSTEMS PROBLEM

A Lotto Systems bet allows the player to nominate n numbers from which (s)he believes the winning six numbers will be drawn, and to bet on all combinations of six of these n numbers. Assume that the winning six numbers come from the nominated n. How many combinations must be entered to guarantee that one combination will include at least five of the winning six numbers? The problem is generalized in this paper, and the method of simulated annealing is used to find solutions for various situations. The case where two supplementary numbers are drawn after the initial six winning numbers is also considered.     

Poor People in Poor Places: Local Opportunity Structures and Household Poverty*

Abstract Accounts of poverty generally fall into either “individualist” or “structuralist” camps. Often these are seen as irreconcilable and incompatible competing perspectives. This paper integrates individualist and structuralist accounts of poverty by examining the relationship between “person poverty” and “place poverty” in nonmetropolitan and metropolitan labor markets, using a multilevel framework. I fashion a general model of poverty production and allocation, drawing on the labor market ecology perspective. After a discussion of this perspective, I develop a multilevel framework for analyzing data from the 1990 Census PUMS‐L sample, STF‐3c, and other sources to show how compositional and contextual factors affect households' likelihoods of being in poverty. These multilevel models also allow us to estimate the degree to which labor market conditions influence the magnitude of household labor supply characteristics. Results suggest that both compositional and contextual factors contribute to the metro‐nonmetro difference in poverty rates, and that the effects of employment vary in accordance with labor market characteristics.