Interpreting Null Findings of Evaluative Studies

When an evaluator comes to interpret negative or null findings of a service program, he sometimes acts like a politician instead of a scientist. Far from dwelling in an ivory tower, an evaluator is surrounded by the hurly-burly of everyday life. Unless strucrural mechanisms are introduced to protect him, his judgment can be unduly swayed by nonscientific considerations. Six suggestions are offered that may grant him some needed protection.     

Field Placement and the Impact of Financial Stress on Social Work and Human Service Students

While significant research has been undertaken exploring the pedagogical benefits of undertaking lengthy social work and human services field placements, there has been very little consideration given to the potential financial stress involved for students. This study sought to address this knowledge gap. Research was conducted in 2014 using quantitative and qualitative methods with students and academic and professional staff from six Queensland universities. The findings show a significant relationship between unpaid placements and financial hardship, creating considerable stress for students and at times a compromised placement learning experience. The limited flexibility in requirements from professional bodies and universities for how placements are undertaken has been identified as a key contributor to financial hardship. Addressing the complexities inherent in this issue requires a collaborative effort from multiple stakeholders and should not be regarded as a problem for students to endure and manage.     

Regime-specific impact of financial reforms on economic growth in Pakistan

This study uses and proposes a new methodological approach to construct a financial liberalization index on the basis of the dynamic factor model technique. The resulting index is used to investigate the impact of the financial sector reforms in Pakistan on economic growth. Using the Markov regime-switching model over the period 1972–2015, the empirical results showed that the examined relationship is nonlinear, nonmonotonic, state-dependent, and better described by the two-state Markov switching model characterized by the high growth regime and low growth regime. Despite the positive impact of financial liberalization on economic growth in both the high and low growth regimes, financial liberalization relatively strongly affects real GDP growth in the high growth regime. The results further demonstrate that transition probabilities establish an inordinate episode of the low growth regime. Furthermore, the high growth regime is relatively short-lived than the low growth regime. Among the other variables, trade openness and physical capital stock have a positive impact on economic growth, while labor force and government expenditure exert a negative effect on economic growth. Several economic policies are proposed and discussed for better functioning of financial sector development in Pakistan.     

Determinants of financial worry and rumination

Significant parts of populations in developed countries frequently worry and ruminate about their finances. Financial worry and rumination can have serious psychological consequences, resulting in lower psychological well-being, mental-health problems, and impaired cognitive functioning. The literature lacks studies investigating the socio-demographic antecedents of and the financial processes underlying financial worry and rumination.The purpose of our study was to investigate the socio-demographic and financial antecedents of financial worry and rumination (FWR) and the financial factors mediating these relationships. We collected online self-administered survey data from a sample of the Dutch population (N = 1040). Using confirmatory factor analysis, we found that a bifactor model, including a strong and reliable general factor, provided the best explanation of the structure underlying FWR.We developed a parallel mediation model and investigated its structural relationships using structural equation modeling. After controlling for multiple hypotheses testing, our results show that income, past positive changes in one’s finances, and age are negatively related to FWR. We found no support for education level and only weak support for expected changes in one’s finances as antecedents. Furthermore, the explained variance in FWR substantially improved after adding the mediators of making ends meet, financial buffer, and perceived debts. Among these mediators, making ends meet played a key role explaining respectively half and two-thirds of the total effects of income and past changes in one’s finances on FWR. These results were robust under several specifications and were generalizable to the Dutch population. We discuss the implications of our results for future research and government policy.     

Worries of the poor: The impact of financial burden on the risk attitudes of micro-entrepreneurs

We randomly expose the owners of small retail businesses in Vietnam to scenarios that trigger financial worries and study the effect of this intervention on risk attitudes using an incentive-compatible elicitation method. We find that entrepreneurs exposed to financial worries behave less risk-averse than those assigned to a placebo treatment. This effect is stronger for owners of shops which are smaller and those less exposed to large income shocks in their everyday business. We further show that the effect of financial worries on risk attitudes is not explained by changes in the cognitive functioning of the treated. The findings are consistent with previous results from laboratory experiments with students in developed countries. As such, the paper provides evidence for the external validity of these findings in the context of micro-entrepreneurship in a developing country and points to financial worries as one understudied psychological channel for the effect of material deprivation on decision-making.     

The Lichtenberg Financial Decision Screening Scale (LFDSS): A new tool for assessing financial decision making and preventing financial exploitation

ABSTRACT

One of the challenges in preventing the financial exploitation of older adults is that neither criminal justice nor noncriminal justice professionals are equipped to detect capacity deficits. Because decision-making capacity is a cornerstone assessment in cases of financial exploitation, effective instruments for measuring this capacity are essential. We introduce a new screening scale for financial decision making that can be administered to older adults. To explore the scale’s implementation and assess construct validity, we conducted a pilot study of 29 older adults seen by APS (Adult Protective Services) workers and 79 seen by other professionals. Case examples are included.     

Are European social safety nets tight enough? Coverage and adequacy of Minimum Income schemes in 14 EU countries

Figari F, Matsaganis M, Sutherland H. Are European social safety nets tight enough? Coverage and adequacy of Minimum Income schemes in 14 EU countries This study explored and compared the effectiveness of Minimum Income (MI) schemes for persons of working age in the European Union (EU). Using the European microsimulation model EUROMOD, we estimated indicators of coverage and adequacy of MI schemes in 14 EU countries. In terms of coverage, we found that in several countries, some individuals are ineligible for MI even when they fall below a poverty line set at 40 per cent of median income. With respect to adequacy, we show that in certain countries, a large fraction of those entitled to MI remain at very low levels of income even when MI benefit is added. Overall, our findings suggest that MI schemes in Europe remain divergent, and that their clustering may be more complex than has hitherto been allowed for. Key Practitioner Message: ?The ability of European welfare states to fight poverty is a key policy question, especially at times of crisis;?Adequacy and coverage of Minimum Income schemes are crucial aspects of the answer;?Microsimulation allows us to separate the effectiveness of MI schemes ‘by design’, from issues of benefit administration, targeting errors and so forth.     

全球金融风险及中国的对策

当前,全球金融危机深层次影响正逐步显现,全球经济和金融体系的风险还在积聚,经济复苏的基础仍很脆弱,危机远远没有结束。在全球金融危机持续发酵的过程中,按照G20峰会确定的改革方向,金融稳定理事会、巴塞尔委员会等国际组织正共同努力推动金融监管改革,但金融体系长期积累的问题短期内难以消化,还需要全球政策制定者和监管当局加强政策协调,凝聚共识,在刺激经济增长和实施长期结构化改革之间寻求平衡。针对金融领域存在的风险隐患,中国为坚守不发生系统性和区域性金融风险的底线,必须完善相关配套政策,全面构建中国银行业的审慎监管体系。     

Connections with banking institutions and diverse asset portfolios in young adulthood: Children as potential future investors

A central hypothesis of Child Development Accounts (CDA) suggests that savings accounts in childhood lay a foundation for connecting to mainstream banking institutions and diversifying asset portfolios in young adulthood and beyond. While children may have limited savings to invest initially, they are financial actors who may increasingly invest money into different types of savings products over time. This paper uses propensity score weighted, longitudinal data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics and its supplements to examine the types of financial and nonfinancial assets owned by young adults and whether or not they are more likely to own these assets when they have savings accounts as children. The most commonly owned assets in young adulthood included savings accounts (89%), vehicles (54%) and credit cards (51%). Smaller percentages owned stocks (9%), bonds (6%), and homes (8%). On average, young adults owned two to three different assets. Having savings accounts in childhood was associated with being two times more likely to own savings accounts, two times more likely to own credit cards, and four times more likely to own stocks in young adulthood, compared to not having savings accounts in childhood. Young adults' ownership of more total financial assets was also associated with having savings accounts in childhood. Findings provide some supporting evidence of demand for children's savings accounts. Policy endeavors that remove barriers to account ownership may be advantageous for children and mainstream banks.     

上海国际金融中心建设过程中的人民币跨境使用

随着跨境贸易人民币结算试点的开展以及向更广领域的拓展,人民币跨境使用逐步从边境贸易、跨境旅游等小范围走向国际贸易结算、贸易融资、跨境直接投资等更加广泛的领域,人民币提升国际地位迎来重大发展机遇。人民币跨境使用的扩大,有利于上海国际金融中心建设,上海国际金融中心建设也将推动人民币跨境使用的进一步发展。推动人民币的跨境使用、建设上海国际金融中心符合我国的核心战略利益。人民币资本项下的不完全可兑换,是影响人民币跨境使用的因素之一,也是制约上海国际金融中心建设的因素之一。应根据人民币可兑换进程的发展,研究探索人民币跨境使用的形式,推动人民币跨境使用规模的扩大。亚洲、拉美以及非洲是推动人民币跨境使用的境外重点区域。应鼓励我国在涉外经济中掌握主动权的行业和企业使用人民币进行跨境收付,同时推动官方涉外经济活动更加广泛地使用人民币。要根据人民币跨境使用的需要,不断取消人民币可兑换方面的限制,通过推动境内金融市场对外开放、支持中资金融机构拓展跨境业务、完善人民币跨境支付清算体系等扩大人民币的跨境使用,并以此推动上海国际金融中心建设。