Good Job,Good Life? Working Conditions and Quality of Life in Europe

Cross-national comparisons generally show large differences in life satisfaction of individuals within and between European countries. This paper addresses the question of whether and how job quality and working conditions contribute to the quality of life of employed populations in nine strategically selected EU countries: Finland, Sweden, the UK, the Netherlands, Germany, Portugal, Spain, Hungary, and Bulgaria. Using data from the European Quality of Life Survey 2003, we examine relationships between working conditions and satisfaction with life, as well as whether spillover or segmentation mechanisms better explain the link between work domain and overall life satisfaction. Results show that the level of life satisfaction varies significantly across countries, with higher quality of life in more affluent societies. However, the impact of working conditions on life satisfaction is stronger in Southern and Eastern European countries. Our study suggests that the issue of security, such as security of employment and pay which provides economic security, is the key element that in a straightforward manner affects people’s quality of life. Other working conditions, such as autonomy at work, good career prospects and an interesting job seem to translate into high job satisfaction, which in turn increases life satisfaction indirectly. In general, bad-quality jobs tend to be more ‘effective’ in worsening workers’ perception of their life conditions than good jobs are in improving their quality of life. We discuss the differences in job-related determinants of life satisfaction between the countries and consider theoretical and practical implications of these findings.     

Women’s economic capacity and children’s human capital accumulation

Programs that increase the economic capacity of poor women can have cascading effects on children’s participation in school and work that are theoretically undetermined. We present a simple model to describe the possible channels through which these programs may affect children’s activities. Based on a cluster-randomized trial, we examine how a program providing capital and training to women in poor rural communities in Nicaragua affected children. Children in beneficiary households are more likely to attend school 1 year after the end of the intervention. An increase in women’s influence on household decisions appears to contribute to the program’s beneficial effect on school attendance.     

Tedious: feminized labor in machine-readable cataloging

This essay examines previously unexplored IBM reports and manuals that document the development of Machine-Readable Cataloging (MARC) in the 1960s to understand gendered assumptions manufacturers made about the labor of information retrieval and to ultimately discuss the ways in which MARC transformed the feminized labor of information, making it more diffuse and shifting expectations about productivity. In the process, this essay will show that cataloging, like other forms of women’s labor transformed by technology in the latter part of the twentieth century, has a complicated relationship to the market labor and industrialization. Finally, this essay ends by connecting MARC and feminized labor to the contemporary discussion of BIBFRAME.     

Impulsivity as a Risk Factor for HIV Transmission in Men Who Have Sex with Men: A Delay Discounting Approach

Delay discounting (DD) is a measure of impulsivity that describes the subjective decline in value of a consequence as the delay to that consequence increases. We sought to assess whether the results of a monetary DD task would be predictive of sexual risk-taking in a group of Internet-using men who have sex with men (MSM). 1402 participants completed an online survey that included questions about the participant’s demographics, sexual history and behavior, drug use, sexual compulsivity, and a monetary DD task. High DD was associated with increased odds of reporting >2 UAI partners in the past 12 months [aOR = 1.5 (1.1–2.1)]. Future studies should examine the utility of DD as a predictor of risky sexual behavior, as well as explore the possibility of HIV prevention interventions targeting DD.     

A value of information framework for assessing the trade-offs associated with uncertainty,duration, and cost of chemical toxicity testing

A number of investigators have explored the use of value of information (VOI) analysis to evaluate alternative information collection procedures in diverse decision-making contexts. This paper presents an analytic framework for determining the value of toxicity information used in risk-based decision making. The framework is specifically designed to explore the trade-offs between cost, timeliness, and uncertainty reduction associated with different toxicity-testing methodologies. The use of the proposed framework is demonstrated by two illustrative applications which, although based on simplified assumptions, show the insights that can be obtained through the use of VOI analysis. Specifically, these results suggest that timeliness of information collection has a significant impact on estimates of the VOI of chemical toxicity tests, even in the presence of smaller reductions in uncertainty. The framework introduces the concept of the expected value of delayed sample information, as an extension to the usual expected value of sample information, to accommodate the reductions in value resulting from delayed decision making. Our analysis also suggests that lower cost and higher throughput testing also may be beneficial in terms of public health benefits by increasing the number of substances that can be evaluated within a given budget. When the relative value is expressed in terms of return-on-investment per testing strategy, the differences can be substantial.     

Critical approaches to private education in the Global South

This article highlights the key themes that animate the critical discourse on private education initiatives targeting poor children in the Global South. Scholars in the field remain skeptical that public-private partnerships, low-fee private schools, and various subsidy and voucher programs are best suited to addressing the underlying issues of equity and quality that plague public education systems in low- and middle-income countries. Most, however, tend to adopt one of two different, though complementary, lines of analysis in drawing attention to the issue. Some scholars, for instance, use empirical evidence to show how low-fee private schools fall short of delivering on promises to address the needs of all children and enhancing basic literacy and numeracy scores in comparison to public schools. Other scholars, however, map networks of people and money to reveal how private education in the Global South is guided by power and profit. The paper outlines the moral and analytic interests that guide these two approaches to the challenge private education presents, while also making the case for an additional mode of analysis that would test the democratic and social justice claims that feature in mission statements of larger foundations and institutions set in vulnerable societies.