The Impact of Minimum-Wage Increases: Evidence from Fast-food Establishments in Illinois and Indiana

Fast-food establishments in Illinois and Indiana were surveyed during a period of state-mandated minimum-wage increases in Illinois. While entry-level wages of Illinois establishments rose substantially in response to the mandated increases, there is little evidence that Illinois establishments ameliorated wage increases by delaying scheduled raises or reducing fringe benefit offerings. There is little evidence of ‘labor-labor’ substitution in favor of women, better educated, or teenaged workers, or increased worker tenure at the new wage, but weak evidence of increased food prices. In contrast, there are large declines in part-time positions and workers’ hours in Illinois relative to Indiana. Aggregate figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics support relative declines in total fast-food employment in ‘downstate’ Illinois counties, as hypothesized. However, establishments’ responses do not appear proportionate to the strength of the minimum wage change.     

Family business in Russia: the path to middle class?

The paper seeks to explore via a series of interview-based case studies aspects of the emergence of an entrepreneurial middle-class in Russia. The paper notes the origins of those studied in the professional or highly skilled workers in the former Soviet Union. The paper reveals the complexity and fragility of the circumstances of these entrepreneurs and suggests that commentary in both Russia and the West that pins its hopes for social stability on the emergence of a new property owning middle class in Russia are, at best, premature.     

It's no picnic: personal and family safety for rural social workers

This paper reports the key research findings related to personal and family safety of rural welfare and social workers, from a study conducted in rural Victoria, Australia. Significant findings included concerns about personal and family safety, frequency of episodes of work related violence and harassment, and the resultant impact on personal and family activities. A range of useful strategies was identified to combat and cope with both the risk and experience of violence and harassment for the worker, and for their families. Workplaces, professional associations and educators need to recognise the impact of this occupational hazard and respond with sensitivity to these issues, which have particular relevance for rural practitioners where anonymity and privacy are frequently compromised.     

Toward Less Fixed Internal Transformations of Gender Commentary on: Melancholy Femininity and Obsessive—Compulsive Masculinity: Sex Differences in Melancholy Gender by Meg Jay,Ph.D.

While highly commending this cross-disciplinary exercise and agreeing with Jay and Butler that children may indeed mourn the loss of erotics with same-sex parents as they identify and develop in a gendered fashion, this author highlights, in both Butler and Jay's interesting further refinements of Butler's position in their use of Freud's 1917 paper on “Mourning and Melancholia,” a lack of attention to the significant aggression that Freud also included in this early formulation concerning the lost object. A consideration of such affects is well taken, but this author prefers a less sparse and monolithic linear clarity about how girls grow into sexed and gendered women. She feels the limitation here of the use of later analytic theory such as Loewald's rich account of internalization.     

How Does Divorce Affect Iranian Women's Sexual Well-Being?

Sexuality and divorce are two interwoven subjects with complex effects on women's sexual well-being in Iranian culture. Results of this exploratory study using focus group discussions and individual interviews revealed how the sexual well-being of women was influenced by the divorce experience through common patterns and recurring themes. A total of 26 women participated voluntarily in the study. They were approached through a selected social support group in a center in West Tehran in 2011, and all had been divorced for less than 10 years. For the majority, sexuality-related matters became complicated and jeopardized their overall well-being in postdivorce life. This finding, along with the fact that the majority were seeking financial and emotional support, implies that counseling women and providing economic support for postdivorce life might improve women's sexual well-being.     

GENDER,OCCUPATIONAL CLASS AND WORK–LIFE CONFLICT

Although people from different countries may report similar scores on measures of work–life conflict, the factors which give rise to conflict may in fact be very different. Full-time working respondents to the 2002 Family module International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) in both Portugal and Britain were assessed for country, gender and occupational class differences in work–life conflict, focusing on both work and domestic spheres. Two distinct groups emerged as having very high levels of work–life conflict: routine and manual women in Portugal and professional and managerial women in Britain. It is suggested that very long hours of domestic work, combined with worries over unsatisfactory childcare arrangements and a lack of support from partners and informal networks, contribute to the high levels of conflict experienced by women working in routine and manual occupations in Portugal. The pressures of very long working hours, combined with a perception of increasing work demands, as well as additional domestic work, contribute to the high levels of work–life conflict for women working in professional and managerial occupations in Britain.     

Feminist In(ter)ventions in Family Therapy†

Family therapy is often receptive to new ideas but so far it has only engaged with the second wave of feminisms in a restrained and conditional way. In this article we map the influence of feminisms on the life of family therapy and conclude that its dominant conceptual frameworks have so far resisted feminist revision. Ironically, while feminist post-modernist thought has helped to loosen the modernist grip on family therapy, family therapy's embrace of post-modernism synthesizes and displaces rather than centres feminist concerns. Since post-modernism is not post-patriarchal, the result may be exclusion of feminist perspectives that offer a principled and liberating way through current dilemmas in family therapy. Feminist perspectives are not mere voices among others; they hold promise for the development of a more inclusive theory and practice based on a valuing of inter-connectedness and an ethics of care and responsibilty.