CITATIONS OR JOURNAL QUALITY: WHICH IS REWARDED MORE IN THE ACADEMIC LABOR MARKET?

Research quality can be evaluated from citations or from the prestige of journals publishing the research. We relate salary of tenured University of California (UC) economists to their lifetime publications of 5,500 articles and to the 140,000 citations to these articles. Citations hardly affect salary, especially in top‐ranked UC departments where impacts of citations are less than one‐tenth those of journals. In lower ranked departments, and when journal quality is less comprehensively measured, effects of citations on salary increase. If journal quality is just measured by counting articles in journal tiers, apparent effects of citations are overstated. (JEL A14, J44)     

Predator,Pet Lesbian,or Just The Nanny? LGBTQ Parents of Children With Disabilities Describe Categorization

How are lesbian/gay/bisexual/trans/queer (LGBTQ) parents of children with disabilities categorized by service providers, and how do parents anticipate, interpret, and respond to such categorizations? This intersectional study investigated the experiences of LGBTQ parents of children with disabilities with service providers in Toronto, Canada. Parents described pressures to “fit” into providers’ limited understanding of family. Some parents described facing overt discrimination, including one parent who was seen as a possible sexual predator. Some described being perceived as representatives of “diversity” for organizations, or “pet lesbians” in the words of one couple. Others described being misread as a non-parent, as in “just the nanny,” particularly in conjunction with their racial minority status. Parents described how their experiences of being “outside the mainstream” helped them challenge systems and normative beliefs. Findings suggest that a context of scarce disability resources shapes parents’ experiences of how LGBTQ identity comes to matter.     

Work Disability Among Native-born and Foreign-born Americans: On Origins,Health, and Social Safety Nets

Public debates about both immigration policy and social safety net programs are increasingly contentious. However, little research has explored differences in health within America’s diverse population of foreign-born workers, and the effect of these workers on public benefit programs is not well understood. We investigate differences in work disability by nativity and origins and describe the mix of health problems associated with receiving Social Security Disability Insurance benefits. Our analysis draws on two large national data sources—the American Community Survey and comprehensive administrative records from the Social Security Administration—to determine the prevalence and incidence of work disability between 2001 and 2010. In sharp contrast to prior research, we find that foreign-born adults are substantially less likely than native-born Americans to report work disability, to be insured for work disability benefits, and to apply for those benefits. Overall and across origins, the foreign-born also have a lower incidence of disability benefit award. Persons from Africa, Northern Europe, Canada, and parts of Asia have the lowest work disability benefit prevalence rates among the foreign-born; persons from Southern Europe, Western Europe, the former Soviet Union, and the Caribbean have the highest rates.     

The Use of the Talmudic Format for the Presentation of Qualitative Research

In this article, I propose to adapt the Talmud, a Jewish religious text, for the written representation of qualitative research. The form and the style of argumentation in and engendered by the Talmud can be adapted to present qualitative methods in a way that transcends the limitations of conventional formats. In addition, this format requires even greater participation in the act of reading. Because the Talmudic format uniquely addresses the difficulties involved in representing everyday life, I argue that adapting the format of the Talmud is ideal for giving voice, for presenting multiple and competing narratives alongside documents, and for further problematizing any simple notion of truth and authority.     

Money,Marriage, and Children: Testing the Financial Expectations and Family Formation Theory

Using data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Survey (N = 2,954), a birth cohort study, this work examines how gains in earnings and income are associated with marriage and subsequent childbearing for low‐income couples. Using change models, results indicate that positive changes in earnings, controlling for baseline levels of earnings, were associated with greater odds of marriage. Cohabiting couples who became poor were associated with a 37% decrease in marriage likelihood. Neither earnings nor income was affiliated with additional fertility. Results are consistent with the Financial Expectations and Family Formation theory, which posits that positive economic circumstances are necessary for marriage, but are not associated with subsequent childbearing.     

Physical and social barriers to social relationships: voices of rural disabled women in the USA

Through exploring the lived experiences of disabled women, this study investigates how physical and social barriers affect their social relationships. In‐depth tape‐recorded interviews investigating a variety of social and interpersonal issues were conducted with 24 women with physical or visual impairments who lived in a rural region of the midwestern USA. Using content analysis, the researchers examined interview data for common themes and patterns relating to social relationships. The findings indicate that physical barriers, related to the physical environment and personal physicality, along with social barriers, involving preconceptions of others about impairment and restrictions in personal networks, hamper the initiation and maintenance of social relationships. Further, the experiences of this group of disabled women corresponded most closely with the premises of a social relational understanding of disability.     

Likelihood estimation for stochastic compartmental models using Markov chain methods

This paper presents a method for estimating likelihood ratios for stochastic compartment models when only times of removals from a population are observed. The technique operates by embedding the models in a composite model parameterised by an integer k which identifies a switching time when dynamics change from one model to the other. Likelihood ratios can then be estimated from the posterior density of k using Markov chain methods. The techniques are illustrated by a simulation study involving an immigration-death model and validated using analytic results derived for this case. They are also applied to compare the fit of stochastic epidemic models to historical data on a smallpox epidemic. In addition to estimating likelihood ratios, the method can be used for direct estimation of likelihoods by selecting one of the models in the comparison to have a known likelihood for the observations. Some general properties of the likelihoods typically arising in this scenario, and their implications for inference, are illustrated and discussed.     

Residence and Income Inequality: Effects on Mortality Among U.S. Counties

Abstract Despite lower average incomes, greater percentages living in poverty, lower levels of health insurance, less preventive health care, and poorer health status, nonmetropolitan residents have been found to experience lower mortality than their metropolitan counterparts. Several pathways through which residence influences mortality have been proposed. The objective of this study is to examine the effects of income inequality on residential differentials in mortality. Using data from the Compressed Mortality File for counties in the coterminous United States for 1990, we estimate weighted least squares models of total mortality for 3,067 counties, and separately for metropolitan and nonmetropolitan counties. Mortality is lower in nonmetropolitan counties than in metropolitan counties, once rates are standardized for age, sex, and race. Moreover, income inequality exerts stronger effects in nonmetro counties, an effect that persists when per capita income, median household size, and racial composition are controlled. The percentage of the population that is black exerts an independent effect on mortality in both metro and non‐metro counties.