The Evaluation of the Performance of IPWGEE,a Simulation Study

This article compares two recently proposed test statistics for unobserved cluster effects (C, SSR _w ) with three statistics frequently mentioned in panel econometrics (BP, SLM, F). Simulations include data generating processes with a cluster-level explanatory variable, scenarios with unequally sized clusters, processes that have an incorrectly specified cluster structure, and processes that have no cluster structure but rather spatial correlation. All but the F test exhibit small-sample deviation from the asymptotic distribution. The SLM, F, and SSR _w tests show equivalent power when cluster sizes are balanced. SLM has greatest power when cluster sizes are unbalanced.     

Tailoring the Gaussian Law for Excess Kurtosis and Skewness by Hermite Polynomials

This article aims at reshaping the normal law to account for tail-thickness and asymmetry, of which there is plenty of evidence in financial data. The inspiration to address the issue was provided by the orthogonality of Hermite polynomials with the Gaussian density as a weight function, with the Gram–Charlier expansion as background. A solution is then devised accordingly, by embodying skewness and excess-kurtosis in a normal kernel, via third- and forth-degree polynomial tune-up. Features of the densities so obtained are established in the main theorem of this article. In addition, a glance is cast at the issue of embodying between-squares correlation, and a solution is outlined.     

Nonpolitical Versus Political Participation: Longitudinal Associations with Mental Health and Social Well-Being in Different Age Groups

Social Indicators Research - Drawing on public opinion and empirical research, one may advise people to participate in voluntary organizations because voluntary participation can improve their...     

Social Participation in Poland: Links to Emotional Well-Being and Risky Alcohol Consumption

Social participation has been hypothesised to have both positive and negative impact on health outcomes via a variety of pathways, but previous studies have found few significant effects of social participation, and there is a lack of research from post-communist societies, which are known to be low on social capital. Using cross-sectional data from Poland on 2,970 individuals surveyed in 2009, we investigated the individual-level relationships between formal and informal social participation, emotional well-being, and risky alcohol consumption while controlling for demographic variables, socioeconomic status, employment and partnership status, health, religiosity, and generalised trust. Frequent joint activities with friends and neighbours were related to higher positive affect but also to more risky alcohol consumption. Membership in voluntary organisations was associated with more risky alcohol consumption, especially among younger males and for certain types of organisations. In contrast, volunteer work was related to higher positive affect and fewer depressive symptoms in the whole sample and to less risky alcohol consumption among the younger participants. The findings illustrate that some types of social participation, even if they are not typical of a given context (e.g., volunteering in Poland), may be more beneficial than others.     

Violence to Probation Staff: Patterns and Managerial Responses

This article examines the impact of violence perpetrated against probation officers. It presents empirical evidence based upon work carried out under the ESRC Violence Research Programme. It is argued that the managerial response to violence has been largely defensive and piecemeal. Professional responses to violence are context‐bound, while risk assessment is largely confined to the potential harm to the general public posed by offenders. The article concludes by arguing that more attention needs to be given to the evaluation of management responses to violence including appropriate training, and the greater organizational support for safety at work.     

Social Protection in Greece: A Brief Glimpse of a Welfare State

This paper examines the delayed development of the welfare state in Greece and its restructuring since the early 1990s. The emphasis is on factors, such as the rapid shift from pre-Fordist to post-Fordist socio-economic structures, the weak development of contractual relationships and a solidaristic culture, and the extensive reproduction of a statist/clientelist form of social organization strongly linked to a high degree of social fragmentation and a particularistic appropriation of welfare benefits and services, which have hindered the full maturation of social citizenship in Greek society up to now. An expensive trend of social protection in conjunction with some major law reforms in the early 1980s contributed to the development of a “weak form” of universalism. These trends were soon overturned, however, well before Greek society could develop a welfare state, under the pressure of a serious fiscal crisis, low economic growth, increasing international competition, significant demographic changes and a fragile social consensus. Thus, the national health care system has hardly succeeded in establishing universal coverage, the social insurance system has remained highly fragmented and dualist, while policy measures for tackling increasing unemployment, hardship and poverty have been rudimentary. These have caused serious deadlocks and a deep institutional crisis. For this crisis to be overcome, it is essential that a new social balance promoting social solidarity is achieved in the country, while a reinvigorated Social Europe can help enormously in this direction.     

Trade and development in the world economy: Methodological features of Project DYNAMICO

The paper reports on the methodological features and early application of the model underlying the DYNAMICO Projects, which has been developed at the United Nations Secretariat to study the interaction between trade and development. In order to investigate alternative development strategies, scenarios are calculated year by year for the global economy and the ten regions covered in the model.Each year is represented by a block-angular linear programming problem, where the systemwide (or coupling) constraints represent the world market clearance conditions for nine tradable commodities. Each subblock of relations represents the economy of a given region. The Dantzig-Wolfe decomposition method is used to solve the system.Section 2 reviews the specifications of a typical regional subproblem. Each regional subproblem contains the following material balances; labor, land, and capital requirements; investment functions; the most important macroeconomic definitions; and several other restrictions to simulate policy constraints concerning both domestic and external economic activity.Decomposition methods may, in general, be viewed as resource-allocation procedures valuable to capture some of the essential features of decentralized decision-making. In the literature, two classes of such resource-allocation procedures have been proposed: primal (relying on quantity signals), and dual (relying on prices). Section 3 discusses some of the theory underlying the Dantzig-Wolfe method, which is a price-directive one.Section 4 describes in detail the particular solution method implemented in the model. At first, in a prelink phase, each regional subproblem is solved a number of times on the basis of     

A New Postnatal Home Care Worker: Challenges for Training,Implementation and Policy

The rise in paid care workers has not, until very recently, included carers specifically trained to provide domiciliary postnatal care. In 2002 a new occupation of domiciliary postnatal carers was introduced in the catchment area of a large metropolitan hospital in Adelaide, South Australia. The carers work with professional midwives to provide home based postnatal support to women discharged early from hospital following childbirth. Carers were trained in a short, six month program, and were recruited from long term unemployed young women from the same geographically disadvantaged catchment area as the hospital. In this paper, findings from the evaluation of the program are described and analysed. These include its implications for the postnatal care workers themselves and for the professionals involved in training and working with them. In addition, the implications for birthing women of a program using young, minimally trained carers are considered. Finally, the more general lessons for the training and ‘insertion’ of paid carers into domiciliary work with professionals are reflected on.