Informal Care Intensity and Caregiver Drug Utilization

Providing informal care has negative health consequences for informal caregivers. If these health consequences increase drug utilization among caregivers, estimates of health care savings from informal care—mainly realized through reductions in utilization among care recipients—should consider the increased drug costs incurred by informal caregivers. This paper evaluates whether more intensive informal caregivers have higher drug utilization than less intensive caregivers, controlling for initial health status and other factors. We find that informal care intensity is associated with higher drug consumption. An increase of 10% of total informal care per day is associated with a 0.7% increase in drugs. The small magnitudes indicate that, in this application, it is not important to consider caregiver drug utilization when quantifying the net savings to the health care system of informal care. For individual caregivers, such as those who take multiple drugs per month and/or have no drug coverage, the increase in drug utilization associated with intensive caregiving is likely to be costly.     

The impact of schools self-administering substance abuse surveys: an evaluation

The literature suggests that administering drug surveys to public school students is best done by persons outside of the school system (or at least unfamiliar to the students). This is the approach used by the long-time Monitoring the Future project. Because of the increased costs that administration by outside research associates requires (both time and transportation), we decided to design an experiment that would compare it to administration by school personnel. Six school systems were split, and 3756 surveys were administered, about half by outside research associates and half by school personnel. The results indicate that there were minimal and non-significant differences between the two groups. On the basis of these results, we draw the conclusion that school personnel are able to administer survey instruments without affecting the quality of the results and, thus, that school districts may safely use such data in the evaluation of their drug education and drug prevention programs.     

Equal division of estates and the exchange motive

Although the bequest motive is one of the most important theoretical extensions of the life-cycle hypothesis, few empirical studies have measured determinants of unequal estate division. We estimated whether several proxies that are consistent with exchange and altruism lead to unequal estate division using data from a longitudinal survey of deceased elderly persons linked to probate court records. Equal division was the rule-between 70 and 83% of estates were divided equally, depending on the strictness of the definition of equal division. Several measures of exchange were not significant predictors of unequal division. Two factors that are consistent with both exchange and altruism- writing the last will and testament within five years of death and having more children-predict unequal estate division. The models control for selection, because many decedents do not file a record in probate court.     

Some finite-sample-size properties of rosenblatt density estimates

The results of a Monte Carlo study of the sensitivity of Rosenblatt density estimates to the scale factor are presented.     

The Social Networks of Leaders in More or Less Viable Communities Six Years Later: A Research Note1

Abstract Using 1995 data, this study re-examines the social networks of leaders in five more and less viable rural communities in Missouri which were originally studied in 1989 (O'Brien et al. 1991; O'Brien and Hassinger 1992). In the six year period between the 1989 and 1995 surveys, four of the five communities were impacted by major events, including the introduction of corporate hog production in two places and flooding in two others. However, despite these events, there is a high degree of continuity in the relative viability scores of the five places in the two surveys. Leaders in more viable places continue to work with a larger number of fellow leaders and to be more involved in community development organizations than their counterparts in less viable places. These findings show the importance of social capital for rural community viability.     

Revisiting sociology's first classic:The division of labor in society and its actuality

Durkheim's doctoral dissertation can justifiably be called sociology's first classic. Rereading it 100 years later enables us to see major domains of the contemporary world where its analysis remains, of actuality, heuristic or yet to be fully appreciated: for example, its themes of anomieas economic deregulation and corporatism as an institutional arrangement to deal with anomie.At the same time, Durkheim's discourse reflects its historical embeddedness, such as his discussion of the sexual division of labor, which needs to be reworked. A second feature of emergent contemporary social solidarity unforeseen by Durkheim (and the great majority of theorists of change) is what may be termed the return of mechanical solidarity.     

Family Size and Parental Wealth: The Role of Family Transfers in Europe

European Journal of Population - As baby boomers enter retirement, an increasing portion of the population in Europe will rely on wealth as a source of financial security. We address two research...