The Possible Effects of Child Survival on Women's Ages at First Union and Childbirth in Sub-Saharan Africa

Improvements in childsurvival may lead to lower fertility throughseveral pathways. To date, most studies havefocused on the physiological and replacementeffects, whose impacts are known to be modestin size. Few have examined the potentially moreimportant insurance effect on fertility withinunion, and almost none have considered thepossible relationship between child mortalityand marriage, which could also grow out of aninsurance strategy. In this study, we use datafrom 21 sub-Saharan African countries to assessthe relationship between child mortality andyoung women's ages at first marriage andchildbirth. The results show that lower levelsof mortality are strongly associated with latermarriages and first births, even aftercontrolling for the effects of a large numberof other variables. The implications of thefindings are discussed and alternativeexplanations for this relationship arepresented.     

Critical Analysis of the Relationship between Local Ownership and Community Resiliency*

Abstract Collectively, current resource‐development literature has given little attention to organizational features of ownership as important variables in community resilience. By drawing from six local buyout cases in Canada's forest sector, we reveal the complexity and numerous constraints on local ownership and expose a more nuanced context than most sociologists tend to consider. Our findings suggest that the meaning of local ownership and community resilience varies depending upon the composition (e.g., private vs. public; mill vs. forest license vs. coupled mill & forest license), type (social, cooperative, trust and/or direct‐share ownership), extent of ownership (percentage of local versus extra‐local shares), and the level of control (e.g., proportion of locally held seats on the Board of Directors) associated with ownership. Future research on local ownership should more carefully differentiate between the nature of local ownership and its associated outcomes.     

Passing and Stigma Management: The Case of the Transsexual

The nature of the transsexual's stigma is such that she can pass as a natural female with little difficulty if she chooses to. At the same time, transsexuals do not once and for all become women after their conversion operation. Their ambiguous gender implies at least a double identity: some of the feminized transsexual's social circles remain associated with her former (male) gender, while some center around her new identity. Thus, it is more accurate to say that the transsexual is ongoingly passing than that she has passed. This led to the formulation of two hypotheses: (1) transsexuals compartmentalize their social circles to a greater extent than normals, and (2) transsexuals experience greater incompatibility of their social circles than normals. To operationalize social circles, the family and present friends were chosen. In terms of this operationalization, the findings support the first hypothesis but not the second. It is argued that transsexuals do not experience unusual incompatibility between family and friends because they either minimize contacts with the former, or do so with the latter, or segregate the two. In the final analysis, the transsexual's double identity is not simply a double gender identity, but also the product of participation in the radically different cultures and lifestyles of her rural background on the one hand and her present urban underworld environment on the other.     

Optimality of blue's in a general linear model with incorrect design matrix

We consider the Gauss-Markoff model (Y,X₀β,σ²V) and provide solutions to the following problem: What is the class of all models (Y,Xβ,σ²V) such that a specific linear representation/some linear representation/every linear representation of the BLUE of every estimable parametric functional p'β under (Y,X₀β,σ²V) is (a) an unbiased estimator, (b) a BLUE, (c) a linear minimum bias estimator and (d) best linear minimum bias estimator of p'β under (Y,Xβ,σ²V)? We also analyse the above problems, when attention is restricted to a subclass of estimable parametric functionals.     

A network simulation for budgeting

One problem with budgeting is the deterministic nature of the tool, even for flexible budgets, that is being used to provide forecasts of a stochastic process. Budget simulation provides not only expected values but anticipated dispersion of budget data as well. The network model may provide the best framework for such a simulation.     

An expectational view of consumer spending prospects

While the path of the economy clearly depends on a lot more than the behavior of consumers, the latter is surely one of the key influences on the former. After all, consumer spending counts for about two-thirds of the total (more if consumer investments in owner-occupied housing are included), and postwar business cycle movements in the U.S. have typically been foreshadowed by significant changes in consumer spending, particularly for automobiles and houses. Thus, whether the economy will be proceeding along at reasonably satisfactory growth rates, sliding into recession, or accelerating into renewed expansion will be heavily influenced by what consumers do.