Mortality differentials among immigrant populations in Canada

Mortality among different groups of migrants to Canada is compared with that of native-born Canadians and with trends in the migrants' countries of origin, using data for the period 1981-1985. Results show that life expectancy at birth among migrants in Canada is generally higher than that of the populations at place of origin and destination. (SUMMARY IN FRE AND SPA)     

An Expected Consequence Approach to Route Choice in the Maritime Transportation of Crude Oil

Maritime transportation is the major conduit of international trade, and the primary link for global crude oil movement. Given the volume of oil transported on international maritime links, it is not surprising that oil spills of both minor and major types result, although most of the risk‐related work has been confined to the local settings. We propose an expected consequence approach for assessing oil‐spill risk from intercontinental transportation of crude oil that not only adheres to the safety guidelines specified by the International Maritime Organization but also outlines a novel technique that makes use of coarse global data to estimate accident probabilities. The proposed estimation technique, together with four of the most popular cost‐of‐spill models from the literature, were applied to study and analyze a realistic size problem instance. Numerical analyses showed that: a shorter route may not necessarily be less risky; an understanding of the inherent oil‐spill risk of different routes could potentially facilitate tanker routing decisions; and the associated negotiations over insurance premium between the transport company and the not‐for‐profit prevention and indemnity clubs. Finally, we note that only the linear model should be used with one of the three nonlinear cost‐of‐spill models for evaluating tanker routes.     

Optimal location and capability of oil-spill response facilities for the south coast of Newfoundland

The south coast of Newfoundland (Canada) includes both open sea and semi-enclosed waterways which collectively account for over 20,000 vessel movements annually. Every such movement poses the risk of an oil spill which can endanger the fragile marine life and tourism locales in the region, and is a source of concern to the communities. In an effort to analyze the problem, we present a two-stage stochastic programming approach which tackles both the location and stockpile of equipment at the emergency response facilities. The proposed optimization program was tested on realistic data collected from publicly available reports and through personal communications with emergency response personnel. These data were then varied to solve a number of scenarios which account for the stochastic nature of the problem parameters. Although only two response facilities seem to be appropriate for almost all scenarios, the size of equipment stockpile is a function of both the societal disutility factor and the trade-off between environmental cost and facility and equipment acquisition cost.     

Surprise,Anticipation, and Sequence Effects in the Design of Experiential Services

The most salient or peak aspect of a service experience often defines customer perceptions of the service. Across two studies, using the same novel form of a scenario‐based experiment, we investigate the design of peak events in a service sequence by testing how anticipated and surprised peaks influence customer perceptions. Study 1 captures the immediate reactions of participants and Study 2 surveys participants a week later. In both studies, we find a main effect for the temporal peak placement, confirming the positive influence of a strong peak ending. When assessing the peak design strategies of surprise and anticipation, we find in Study 1 that surprise and anticipation moderate the temporal peak placement (e.g., early peak vs. late peak) on overall customer perceptions, with the surprise peak at the end of an experience yielding the strongest effect. In Study 2 we see that the remembered experience of a surprise peak positively affects customer perceptions compared to an anticipated peak regardless of the temporal placement of the peak. We also find that the infusion of a surprise peak ending has a lasting effect that amplifies the peak‐end effect of remembered experiences. Drawing on these findings, we discuss the role of surprise, anticipation, and sequence effects in experience design strategy.     

Token Presence or Substantive Participation? A Study of Labor Trustees on Pension boards

In contrast to their absence from corporate boards in North America, labor representatives do have a seat on many pension boards. Given the lack of research on the role of labor participation in these fora, this study reports findings from a survey of labor trustees. We find that labor trustees make greater contributions to procedure-oriented processes such as information sharing, rule-making and rule interpretation; and, fewer contributions to investment-oriented processes such as investment decisions, fund performance and manager selection. Gender does not seem to matter in explaining participation in board activities. Accountability in terms of a requirement to report back to their union did increase labor trustee contribution but only to procedural issues, not investment issues. Short board tenure, lack of multiple labor seats and lack of training appear to limit labor trustees’ contribution to investment-based issues. Prior exposure to pension issues, and longer tenure appear to increase contributions to procedure-based issues. Exclusionary board dynamics hinder both types of contributions by labor trustees. These findings suggest that labor trustees do take advantage of their position to make procedural contributions but they find it hard to expand into newer, non-traditional roles such as investment-related activities of the Board.     

A controlled case study of supervisor training to optimize response to injury in the food processing industry

The role of supervisors to aid injured workers, access health care, and provide reasonable accommodation may prevent prolonged disability among workers reporting musculoskeletal pain. Although supervisor training has been a common element of broad-based ergonomic interventions to prevent injuries, the impact of supervisor training alone to improve injury response has not been studied. In a controlled design, 11 supervisors in an intervention group and 12 supervisors in a delayed intervention control group from the same plant were provided a 4-hour training workshop. The workshop emphasized communication skills and ergonomic accommodation for workers reporting injuries or health concerns. Workers' compensation claims data in the 7 months before and after the workshop showed a 47% reduction in new claims and an 18% reduction in active lost-time claims versus 27% and 7%, respectively, in the control group. Improving the response of frontline supervisors to employees' work-related health and safety concerns may produce sustainable reductions in injury claims and disability costs.     

SIMULTANEOUS BATCHING AND SCHEDULING FOR CHEMICAL PROCESSING WITH EARLINESS AND TARDINESS PENALTIES

We consider the problem of determining the allocation of demand from different customer orders to production batches and the schedule of resulting batches to minimize the total weighted earliness and tardiness penalties in context of batch chemical processing. The problem is formulated as a mixed-integer nonlinear programming model. An iterative heuristic procedure that makes use of the network nature of the problem formulation is presented to approximate an optimal solution. An algorithm polynomial in the number of batches to produce is also presented that optimally solves the problem under special cost structures.     

一篇引人入胜的论文

国际统计学会第45届会议《社会经济统计报告》的特邀论文会议于1985年8月15日下午在阿姆斯特丹举行。荷兰中央统计局国民核算司司长H.K.van图伊宁(H.K.van Tuinen)担任主席。会上宣读了李成瑞同志的论文《关于中国近几年的经济政策对居民收入和消费影响的统计报告》,国际统计学会研究中心(ISI Reasearch Centre)主任V.弗马(V.Verma)博士被邀请对李成瑞同志的论文进行评论,现将其中有关的部分译出,供读者参考。标题是译者根据弗马博士的评语加上的。