Quality of Post-1965 Asian Immigrants

The reliance on an overall average approach to the labor market quality of immigrants could generate misleading information and biased policy recommendations. Focusing on Asian immigrants, this article demonstrates that much insight into immigrant quality can be gained via a diversity approach. Using the 5% PUMS data of the 1990 U.S. census, this paper shows that a common perception that the quality of post-1965 immigrants is lower than natives and earlier immigrants is invalid for post-1965 Asian immigrants. Unlike their Latin American counterparts, post-1965 Asian immigrants are generally more educated and skilled than natives. The educational level of post-1965 Asian immigrants surpasses that of their pre-1965 counterparts, despite their disadvantage in occupational attainment due to their shorter time of adaptation. Diversity also characterizes educational and occupational attainment across major post-1965 Asian immigrant groups and within each Asian immigrant group before and after 1965. Gender does not alter the advantage of post-1965 Asian immigrants over natives and their pre-1965 parallels in education, but it does complicate their occupational status. Policy implications of the findings are considered.     

Leadership,information, and risk attitude: A game theoretic approach

This paper experimentally investigates how risk attitudes mitigate leadership effectiveness in a collective setting with projects that exhibit both free riding and coordination problems. We take two novel approaches: 1) the introduction of economic game theory to psychological studies of leadership, and 2) the application of the leadership ontology of Drath et al. (2008) as a cross-disciplinary integrative framework. Leadership here is focused on the presence or absence of direction, alignment, and commitment as well as antecedent beliefs and practices that are held within a collective (for us, our experimental participants). Our leadership context is stripped down to very minimal conditions: three group members, an investment decision, and the introduction of information regarding group members' attitudes toward risk. We find that the mere mention of risk attitude (whether risky or risk averse) undermines leadership effectiveness in mitigating free riding for our 420 experimental participants. Our study's primary implications lie in the application of game theory methodology to the psychological study of leadership, the introduction of relevant individual difference constructs to economic studies of leadership, and the advocation of the Drath et al. (2008) framework as a helpful integrative mechanism for interdisciplinary leadership research.     

Social Sources of Community Solidarity in U.S. Congregations

Community solidarity, or a collective sense of belonging, plays a vital role in the health and survival of many organizations. Consequently, identifying the elements that contribute to a strong sense of solidarity within communities has long been a topic of inquiry for scholars. In this study, we draw upon prior theorizing to develop and test four hypotheses regarding the organizational characteristics associated with community solidarity in religious congregations. Multivariate models are estimated using national data on religious congregations from the 2001 U.S. Congregational Life Survey (n?=?357). Organizations with greater community solidarity tend to feature higher levels of social capital (operationalized with measures of friendship networks and participation in organizational activities), higher levels of official membership within the organization, and inspiring congregational leadership. Higher levels of commitment are associated with greater community solidarity, but the effect is wholly mediated by social capital. Congregations that engender higher levels of community solidarity share certain organizational features, including higher levels of social capital, higher rates of membership, and inspiring leaders.     

Immigrants and Employer-provided Training

Much has been written about the labour market outcomes for immigrants in their host countries, particularly with regard to earnings, employment and occupational attainment. However, much less attention has been paid to the question of whether immigrants are as likely to receive employer-provided training relative to comparable natives. As such training should be crucial in determining the labour market success of immigrants in the long run it is a critically important question. Using data from a large-scale survey of employees in Ireland, we find that immigrants are less likely to receive training from employers, with immigrants from the New Member States of the EU experiencing a particular disadvantage. The immigrant training disadvantage arises in part from a failure on the part of immigrants to get employed by training-oriented firms. However, they also experience a training disadvantage relative to natives within firms where less training is provided.     

China's Below‐Replacement Fertility: Recent Trends and Future Prospects

Between 1970 and 1990, China experiencoed a rapid and sharp fertility decline—from total fertility rates of approximately six births to two. The degree to which Chinese fertility has continued to fall after 1990 is controversial. We use survey data from the 1997 National Population and Reproductive Health Survey and from the 2001 Reproductive Health and Family Planning Survey to document recent trends in Chinese fertility. Our estimates provide further evidence that China's fertility is well below‐replacement level at the turn of the twenty‐first century—with TFR levels of approximately 1.5 children per woman. Trends in parity‐specific cohort fertility by age also suggest below replacement completed fertility for cohorts still in the childbearing years. In the article's second section, we identify key components of low period fertility in order to frame our discussion of two questions: 1) in what ways is Chinese low fertility different from/similar to that in other low‐fertility countries? And 2) what are the likely future trends in Chinese fertility?     

Intergroup bigotry and late nineteenth and early twentieth century immigrant competition,exploitation and succession in the United States

Using a variety of primary and secondary sources, this study attempts to emphasize the rivalry and tensions between the various ethnic groups in one of the major phases of immigration into the United States. Not only were these immigrants exploited by employers but the divisions between groups, often exaggerated and manipulated by those employers, also helped to build significant barriers to a strong unionism within the workforce. The overall conclusion of the article is an essentially negative evaluation of the economic and social forces immigrants experienced in these years.