Child-custody reform and the division of labor in the household

We investigate whether the adoption of joint-custody laws affects the amount of time that married mothers and fathers devote to market and household work. Our findings suggest that custody reform induces a reallocation of time within marriage, with mothers working more in the market and fathers working more in the home. However, fathers lower their labor-force-participation rates in response to custody reform. The patterns in the data are most easily reconciled with models that emphasize shifts in bargaining power to one household member, which is likely the father in the case of joint-custody reform.     

A varying coefficient approach to estimating hedonic housing price functions and their quantiles

The varying coefficient (VC) model introduced by Hastie and Tibshirani [26 T. Hastie and R. Tibshirani, Varying-coefficient models, J. R. Statist. Soc. (Ser. B) 55 (1993), pp. 757–796.[Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]] is arguably one of the most remarkable recent developments in nonparametric regression theory. The VC model is an extension of the ordinary regression model where the coefficients are allowed to vary as smooth functions of an effect modifier possibly different from the regressors. The VC model reduces the modelling bias with its unique structure while also avoiding the ‘curse of dimensionality’ problem. While the VC model has been applied widely in a variety of disciplines, its application in economics has been minimal. The central goal of this paper is to apply VC modelling to the estimation of a hedonic house price function using data from Hong Kong, one of the world's most buoyant real estate markets. We demonstrate the advantages of the VC approach over traditional parametric and semi-parametric regressions in the face of a large number of regressors. We further combine VC modelling with quantile regression to examine the heterogeneity of the marginal effects of attributes across the distribution of housing prices.     

A weighted Harrell–Davis distance test with applications to censored data

Consider the standard treatment-control model with a time-to-event endpoint. We propose a novel interpretable test statistic from a quantile function point of view. The large sample consistency of our estimator is proven for fixed bandwidth values theoretically and validated empirically. A Monte Carlo simulation study also shows that given small sample sizes, utilization of a tuning parameter through the application of a smooth quantile function estimator shows an improvement in efficiency in terms of the MSE when compared to direct application of classic Kaplan–Meier survival function estimator. The procedure is finally illustrated via an application to epithelial ovarian cancer data.     

The Impact of the Physical Home Environment for Family Carers of People with Dementia: A Qualitative Study

Background: The majority of people with dementia are cared for by their families at home. This study aimed to elicit family carers' perceptions on home environmental aspects and strategies with the view to identify barriers and facilitators when caring for a person with dementia at home.

Design and methods: Thirteen co-resident family carers were engaged in semi-structured in-depth walking interviews. Interviews were recorded, transcribed and analysed using thematic analysis.

Results: Home environments can pose a number of challenges and opportunities. Aspects of the architectural and interior environment (e.g. size, condition, layout and accessibility, familiarity) are perceived as important (Theme 1) as well as a plethora of environmental strategies that encourage independence and comfort at home (Theme 2). Carers' scepticism, timing, costs, property characteristics and mistrust to services are some barriers to implementing environmental strategies (Theme 3).

Conclusions: Carers improvised solutions via trial and error and need further education on strategies to create an enabling and comfortable home environment.     

Being disabled,being a manager: ‘glass partitions’ and conditional identities in the contemporary workplace

This article critically explores the working lives and views of disabled senior staff working in UK organisations. The qualitative research at the core of the article establishes that some disabled people are confounding established notions of disabled people only working in peripheral employment roles by exploring the working lives and perceptions of disabled managers. The findings do, however, point to continued barriers to what disabled staff in senior positions can be seen to do and be organisationally. Here both practical and ontological risk inheres in organisationally induced change, openness about impairment and risky identities. Such ideas, it is argued, present limits to further promotion and workplace inclusion for some disabled managers.     

Effects of Group Practice of the Transcendental Meditation Program on Preventing Violent Crime in Washington,D.C.: Results of the National Demonstration Project,June--July 1993

This paper reports the results of a prospective experiment in which a group of approximately 4,000 participants in the Transcendental Meditation and TM-Sidhi programs of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi assembled in Washington, D.C., from June 7 to July 30, 1993. It was hypothesized that levels of violent crime in the District of Columbia would fall substantially during the Demonstration Project, as a result of the group's effect of increasing coherence and reducing stress in the collective consciousness of the District. A 27-member Project Review Board comprising independent scientists and leading citizens approved the research protocol and monitored the research process. Weekly crime data was derived from database records provided by the District of Columbia Metropolitan Police Department (DCMPD), which are used in the FBI Uniform Crime Reports. Statistical analysis considered the effect of weather variables, daylight, historical crime trends and annual patterns in the District of Columbia, as well as trends in neighboring cities. Consistent with previous research, levels of homicides, rapes and assaults (HRA crimes) correlated with average weekly temperature. Robberies approximately followed an annually recurring cycle. Time series analysis of 1993 data, controlling for temperature, showed that HRA crimes dropped significantly during the Demonstration Project, corresponding with increases in the size of the group; the maximum decrease was 23.3% (p < 2 × 10–9) [24.6% using a longer baseline, with 1988--1993 data (p < 3 × 10–5)], coincident with the peak number of participants in the group during the final week of the assembly. When the same period in each of the five previous years was examined, no significant decreases in HRA crimes were found. Robberies did not decrease significantly. However, a model that jointly estimated the effect of the Demonstration Project on both HRA crimes and robberies showed a significant reduction in violent crimes overall of 15.6% (p = 0.0008). Further analysis showed that the effect of the coherence-creating group on reducing HRA crimes could not be accounted for by additional police staffing. The time series analysis for HRA crimes gave results that are highly robust to alternative model specifications, and showed that the effect of the group size was cumulative and persisted after the Demonstration Project ended. Also, calculation of the steady state gain based on the time series model predicted that a permanent group of 4,000 coherence-creating experts in the District would have a long-term effect of reducing HRA crimes by 48%.     

THE DETAIL SCHEDULING OF A PART-TIME WORK FORCE: A CASE STUDY OF TELLER STAFFING

This paper presents a comparison of two heuristic methods for assigning a part-time work force to meet varying daily work loads. The authors use actual operating data from Purdue National Bank, Lafayette, Indiana, to make teller staffing decisions. The performance criteria for comparison of the two heuristics is the minimum number of workers employed, minimum number of interbranch transfers, and computer time necessary to attain a solution.     

Gibbs sampling for marginal posterior expectations

In earlier work (Gelfand and Smith, 1990 and Gelfand et al, 1990) a sampling based approach using the Gibbs sampler was offered as a means for developing marginal posterior densities for a wide range of Bayesian problems several of which were previously inaccessible. Our purpose here is two-fold. First we flesh out the implementation of this approach for calculation of arbitrary expectations of interest. Secondly we offer comparison with perhaps the most prominent approach for calculating posterior expectations, analytic approximation involving application of the LaPlace method. Several illustrative examples are discussed as well. Clear advantages for the sampling based approach emerge.