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In 2023, the existing Farm Bill expires. The policy underlying the current Farm Bill perpetuates a risky business model, imposes serious harms, and does little to feed the United States. It also costs American taxpayers tens of billions of dollars each year. This Article sets forth specific recommendations for the United States to implement to decrease its agriculture funding. These specific recommendations are based on New Zealand's overwhelming success--due largely to the temporary assistance measures New Zealand implemented to aid agriculture's successful transformation away from reliance on government funds. Unlike the failed 1996 attempt to eliminate agricultural subsidies in the United States, which did not utilize significant temporary assistance measures, the recommendations featured in this Article emphasize the importance of these measures. U.S. agriculture's water pollution is one of the leading sources of environmental degradation. Its pollution has deleterious and pervasive effects on society including harming human health and diminishing the profitability of industries reliant on clean water--such as tourism and fishing. The federal government's lavish support of agriculture distorts free market signals, reduces agriculture's incentives to satisfy consumer demands, and tethers industry "success" to government funding. This Article is the first to recommend that the United States use New Zealand's successful temporary assistance measures as a template. Although New Zealand is often pointed to as an example of a country that successfully reduced its financial support of the agriculture industry, the temporary assistance measures New Zealand used to reform its agriculture industry have yet to be given the credit they deserve. After closely analyzing New Zealand's successful reform, this Article concludes that the United States should reduce its funding of the industry's destructive behavior by implementing gradual reform that aids the industry's adjustment to a freer market by providing beneficial temporary assistance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses U.S. Southern women's efforts to gain amnesty and presidential pardons following the close of the U.S. Civil War. The author examines the loss of property rights according to U.S. President Andrew Johnson's Amnesty Proclamation among these women. The author believes that women sought amnesty not to gain increased rights, but to instead preserve the Southern antebellum social order by regaining ownership of their land and personal property. Women's use of gender stereotypes in applying for pardons is also analyzed by the author. The eventual restoration of political rights to former Confederates during Reconstruction is explained.

Using unique data provided by the CEOs of 80 large U.S. firms, the authors examined relationships among the stakeholder attributes of power, legitimacy, urgency, and salience; CEO values; and corporate performance. They found strong support for the attribute-salience relationship and some significant relationships among CEO values, salience, and corporate social performance but found no support for a salience-financial performance link. Their findings suggest a need for continued emphasis on the development of normative stakeholder theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study replicated, with modifications, previous research of dyad reading using texts at various levels of difficulty (Morgan, 1997). The current project measured the effects of using above-grade-level texts on reading achievement and sought to determine the influences of dyad reading on both lead and assisted readers. Results indicate that weaker readers, using texts at two, three, and four grade levels above their instructional levels with the assistance of lead readers, outscored both proficient and less proficient students in the control group across multiple measures of reading achievement. However, the gains made by assisted readers were not significantly different relative to the various text levels. When all assessments were considered, assisted readers reading texts two grade levels above their instructional levels showed the most robust gains in oral reading fluency and comprehension. Lead readers also benefited from dyad reading and continued their respective reading developmental trajectories across measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

OBJECTIVES: Firearms are a leading cause of injury and death for children and adolescents in the United States. We examined how hospitalization rates for firearm injuries differ for rural and urban populations. METHODS: The Kids' Inpatient Database was used to identify hospitalizations for firearm injuries in patients <20 years of age by using International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision external-cause-of-injury codes. Data from 2006, 2009, and 2012 were analyzed to compare demographics and intent (assault, self-inflicted, unintentional, and undetermined). Urban-rural classification was based on patients' county of residence. Rates were calculated by using weighted cases and US Census data. RESULTS: There were 21 581 hospitalizations for firearm injuries. The overall hospitalization rate was higher in urban versus rural areas (risk ratio [RR] = 1.95; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.81-2.10). Rates were highest for assaults in urban 15- to 19-year-olds (RR = 7.82; 95% CI: 6.48-9.44). Unintentional injuries were the leading cause of hospitalizations in younger age groups in all urban and rural locations. Rates for unintentional injuries were lower among urban versus rural 5- to 9-year-olds (RR = 0.47; 95% CI: 0.36-0.63) and 10- to 14-year-olds (RR = 0.44; 95% CI: 0.37-0.52). CONCLUSIONS: Hospitalizations for firearm assaults among urban 15- to 19-year-olds represent the highest injury rate. Notably, hospitalizations are lower for urban versus rural 5- to 9-year-olds and 10- to 14-year-olds, and unintentional firearm injuries are most common among these groups. Preventative public health approaches should address these differences in injury epidemiology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Neoadjuvant chemoradiation reduces local recurrence in locally advanced rectal cancer, and adherence to national and societal recommendations remains unknown.Objective: To determine variability in guideline adherence in rectal cancer treatment and investigate whether hospital volume correlated with variability seen.Design: We performed a retrospective analysis using the National Cancer Database rectal cancer participant user files from 2005 to 2010. Stage-specific predictors of neoadjuvant chemotherapy and radiation use were determined, and variation in use across hospitals analyzed. Hospitals were ranked based on likelihood of preoperative therapy use by stage, and observed-to-expected ratios for neoadjuvant therapy use calculated. Hospital outliers were identified, and their center characteristics compared.Results: A total of 23,488 patients were identified at 1183 hospitals. There was substantial variability in the use of neoadjuvant chemoradiation across hospitals. Patients managed outside clinical guidelines for both stage 1 and stage 3 disease tended to receive treatment at lower-volume, community cancer centers.Conclusions: There is substantial variability in adherence to national guidelines in the use of neoadjuvant chemoradiation for rectal cancer across all stages. Both hospital volume and center type are associated with over-treatment of early-stage tumors and under-treatment of more invasive tumors. These findings identify a clear need for national quality improvement efforts in the treatment of rectal cancer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

People with higher levels of self-control experience fewer stressful life events, but little is known about the reciprocal relationships between self-control and stressful life experiences. This study aimed to test linkages between daily stressors and self-control depletion. We collected web-based survey data twice daily for 14 days from 1,442 participants across the United States and used multilevel modeling to examine relations between daily stressors and self-control depletion. Daily stressors predicted subsequent self-control depletion and self-control depletion predicted daily stressors. Further, the overnight effects remained for self-control depletion on stressors but diminished for the effects of stressors on self-control depletion. Depletion had its weakest impact on participants who reported high mean levels of stressors. These results suggest that stressful events and self-control depletion may create negative spirals, but that these negative spirals can be mitigated by sleep. Further research is needed to better understand more about the reciprocal associations between self-control depletion and daily stressors and potential interruptions of these associations, such as sleep or self-control-enhancing events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reports the results of a nationwide audit study testing how Christian churches welcome potential newcomers to their churches as a function of newcomers' race and ethnicity. We sent email inquiries to 3,120 churches across the United States. The emails were ostensibly from someone moving to the area and looking for a new church to attend. That person's name was randomly varied to convey different racial and ethnic associations. In response to these inquiries, representatives from mainline Protestant churches-who generally embrace liberal, egalitarian attitudes toward race relations-actually demonstrated the most discriminatory behavior. They responded most frequently to emails with white-sounding names, somewhat less frequently to black- or Hispanic-sounding names, and much less to Asian-sounding names. They also sent shorter, less welcoming responses to nonwhite names. In contrast, evangelical Protestant and Catholic churches showed little variation across treatment groups in their responses. These findings underscore the role of homophily, organizational homogeneity, and the costs of racial integration in perpetuating the racial segregation of American religious life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the potential use of clawback provisions in sports contracts for professional athletes in America, and it mentions morals clauses in contracts and college coaching contracts, as well as the economic aspects of endorsement deals for athletes. According to the article, clawback provisions generally provide "stipulated damages when executives profit off of trades that they made by virtue of illegal or unethical trading practices." Athletes such as Tiger Woods are examined.

Ethical labeling campaigns have become a central means for diffusing and negotiating conflicts between social movements and market actors. Fair Trade was a pioneering ethical label and, by many accounts, a success. For nearly a decade, United Students for Fair Trade (USFT) activists worked to build the reputation of the Fair Trade Certified (FTC) label, but in Fall 2011 they withdrew their support and urged ethical consumers to do the same. This paper is an urgent reflection on USFT's trajectory from guerrilla marketing to boycotting FTC products. While their actions may appear shortsighted and contradictory, their decision to withdraw support from the FTC label has roots in a long struggle for control of Fair Trade. We argue that their actions signal a new stage in consumer action, as activists lose faith in the legitimacy of ethical labels and instead target the agencies that own the ethical brandscape. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The analgesic response and safety of intravenous morphine versus fentanyl for adult trauma patients who presented to the emergency department (ED) were evaluated. Median pain reduction on the numeric rating scale (0-10; 0 = no pain and 10 = worst possible pain) after opioid administration was similar between the groups (2 vs 2; P = .67). The lowest postdose pain score was recorded sooner in the fentanyl group than in the morphine group (22 vs 47 minutes, respectively; P < .001). There were no significant differences in drug-induced adverse effects between groups. Fentanyl produced a similar but more rapid analgesic response compared with morphine in trauma patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - In this chapter, we introduce the Internet-based field experiment (IBFE) that offers numerous advantages for bringing stratification processes "back into" the study of religion. We present preliminary results from a study of class and race discrimination using this approach. Design/Methodology/Approach - Using names offictitious characters, we sent e-mails to a nationally representative sample of 4,680 U.S. Christian churches asking about possible membership. The e-mails varied only in the perceived race and class of the senders. We utilize a mixed methods approach to analyze variation in the content of the church responses. Findings - Our early findings suggest significant variation by race/class manipulation, religious denomination, and region of the country in churches' responses as well as the length of time they took to reply, the length of the response, the warmth, religious tone, and several other dimensions. Research limitations/Implications - This study raises new opportunities for Internet-based research on religion in a variety of social settings, but there is not yet a well-established set of "do's" and "don'ts" for how to proceed. We advocate the development of a protocol of best practices as this research method develops. Originality/Value - This study demonstrates the opportunities and pitfalls of the IBFE and the advantages it provides for studies of stratification and religion. Ours is the first study to apply this emerging method to the study of religion and stratification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The Internal Medicine In-Training Exam (IM-ITE) assesses the content knowledge of internal medicine trainees. Many programs use the IM-ITE to counsel residents, to create individual remediation plans, and to make fundamental programmatic and curricular modifications.Objective: To assess the association between a multiple-choice testing program administered during 12 consecutive months of ambulatory and inpatient elective experience and IM-ITE percentile scores in third post-graduate year (PGY-3) categorical residents.Design: Retrospective cohort study.Participants: One hundred and four categorical internal medicine residents. Forty-five residents in the 2008 and 2009 classes participated in the study group, and the 59 residents in the three classes that preceded the use of the testing program, 2005-2007, served as controls.Intervention: A comprehensive, elective rotation specific, multiple-choice testing program and a separate board review program, both administered during a continuous long-block elective experience during the twelve months between the second post-graduate year (PGY-2) and PGY-3 in-training examinations.Measures: We analyzed the change in median individual percent correct and percentile scores between the PGY-1 and PGY-2 IM-ITE and between the PGY-2 and PGY-3 IM-ITE in both control and study cohorts. For our main outcome measure, we compared the change in median individual percentile rank between the control and study cohorts between the PGY-2 and the PGY-3 IM-ITE testing opportunities.Results: After experiencing the educational intervention, the study group demonstrated a significant increase in median individual IM-ITE percentile score between PGY-2 and PGY-3 examinations of 8.5 percentile points (p < 0.01). This is significantly better than the increase of 1.0 percentile point seen in the control group between its PGY-2 and PGY-3 examination (p < 0.01).Conclusion: A comprehensive multiple-choice testing program aimed at PGY-2 residents during a 12-month continuous long-block elective experience is associated with improved PGY-3 IM-ITE performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on privacy with reference to the social networking site Facebook. It discusses the imprisonment of a college junior Joshua Lipton due to his outfit as a prisoner in the Halloween Party and his pictures posted on the networking site. It further discusses the protection of the fourth amendment with respect to the confidentiality of Facebook information in a criminal investigation. Information on the analysis of the amendment by the U.S. Supreme Court is also presented.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the use of cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) in postgraduate orthodontic residency programs. An anonymous electronic survey was sent to the program director/chair of each of the sixty-nine United States and Canadian postgraduate orthodontic programs, with thirty-six (52.2 percent) of these programs responding. Overall, 83.3 percent of programs reported having access to a CBCT scanner, while 73.3 percent reported regular usage. The vast majority (81.8 percent) used CBCT mainly for specific diagnostic purposes, while 18.2 percent (n=4) used CBCT as a diagnostic tool for every patient. Orthodontic residents received both didactic and practical (hands-on) training or solely didactic training in 59.1 percent and 31.8 percent of programs, respectively. Operation of the CBCT scanner was the responsibility of radiology technicians (54.4 percent), both radiology technicians and orthodontic residents (31.8 percent), and orthodontic residents alone (13.6 percent). Interpretation of CBCT results was the responsibility of a radiologist in 59.1 percent of programs, while residents were responsible for reading and referring abnormal findings in 31.8 percent of programs. Overall, postgraduate orthodontic program CBCT accessibility, usage, training, and interpretation were consistent in Eastern and Western regions, and most CBCT use was for specific diagnostic purposes of impacted/supemumerary teeth, craniofacial anomalies, and temporomandibular joint (TMJ) disorders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on two sections of the U.S. Internal Revenue Code (IRC) and how they work for individual taxpayers. It discusses the difference between the 25A credits and the 222 deduction and the potential effect of each on the overall liability of education expense-paying taxpayers. It also explores the correlation between each statute's built-in scheme of keeping itself and the intent of the U.S. Congress. It proposes correctional measures and an assessment of legislation that if passed would alter the way the tax incentives function.

The article discusses class warfare in the U.S. and examines the role that class plays in American politics. The roles taken by U.S. Democrats and Republicans in the class struggle are explored and tax cuts proposed by both parties are detailed. Details about the fluid U.S. class system and the ability to move from one class to another are also provided.

The article presents the results of a study on the effects of 6-month calorie restriction and exercise on serum and liver lipids and markers of liver function in overweight men and women in the U.S. The liver-to-speen ratio was linked with body mass and visceral abdominal fat adjusted for total abdominal fat. Intrahepatic lipid (IHL) was correlated with serum triglyceride and HDL-cholesterol concentrations. IHL also influenced alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and alkaline phosphatase (ALK) but not with any markers of whole-body inflammation.

Background: CTLA4-blocking antibodies induce tumor regression in a subset of patients with melanoma. Analysis of immune parameters in peripheral blood may help define how responses are mediated. Methods: Peripheral blood from HLA-A*0201-positive patients with advanced melanoma receiving tremelimumab (formerly CP-675,206) at 10 mg/kg monthly was repeatedly sampled during the first 4 cycles. Samples were analyzed by 1) tetramer and ELISPOT assays for reactivity to CMV, EBV, MART1, gp100, and tyrosinase; 2) activation HLA-DR and memory CD45RO markers on CD4+/CD8+ cells; and 3) real-time quantitative PCR of mRNA for FoxP3 transcription factor, preferentially expressed by T regulatory cells. The primary endpoint was difference in MART1-specific T cells by tetramer assay. Immunological data were explored for significant trends using clustering analysis. Results: Three of 12 patients eligible for immune monitoring had tumor regression lasting > 2 years without relapse. There was no significant change in percent of MART1-specific T cells by tetramer assay. Additionally, there was no generalized trend toward postdosing changes in other antigen-specific CD8+ cell populations, FoxP3 transcripts, or overall changes in surface expression of T-cell activation or memory markers. Unsupervised hierarchical clustering based on immune monitoring data segregated patients randomly. However, clustering according to T-cell activation or memory markers separated patients with clinical response and most patients with inflammatory toxicity into a common subgroup. Conclusion: Administration of CTLA4-blocking antibody tremelimumab to patients with advanced melanoma results in a subset of patients with long-lived tumor responses. T-cell activation and memory markers served as the only readout of the pharmacodynamic effects of this antibody in peripheral blood. Clinical trial registration number: NCT00086489 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Children from the People's Republic of China and from the United States were asked to judge younger and older adults. Children's impression and memory for these adults was examined, along with their ability to use information presented about the adults to judge them. How stable children thought traits were about an adult as that adult ages, and how well children recalled information that was consistent or inconsistent with age stereotypes, was also examined. Additionally, the relationship between children's experiences with older adults, and their views of older adults, was assessed. Although 10-year-old American children were more negative about older adults than other children, 6-and 10-year-old children in both the People's Republic of China and the United States expressed negative views of older adults. However, these negative views, or age stereotypes, were more readily found when the task required a comparison between younger and older adults, even when that comparison was for the same person as a younger and older person. Although children were more positive in their views of the adults following the presentation of positive information, children did not necessarily see these characteristics as being stable, especially if they ran counter to stereotype. This was particularly true for the 6-year-old children. These results are discussed in terms of the formation and counter-formation of age stereotypes in children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The goal of this study was to design and evaluate a rapid screen to identify metagenomic clones that produce biologically active small molecules. We built metagenomic libraries with DNA from soil on the floodplain of the Tanana River in Alaska. We extracted DNA directly from the soil and cloned it into fosmid and bacterial artificial chromosome vectors, constructing eight metagenomic libraries that contain 53,000 clones with inserts ranging from 1 to 190 kb. To identify clones of interest, we designed a high throughput "intracellular" screen, designated METREX, in which metagenomic DNA is in a host cell containing a biosensor for compounds that induce bacterial quorum sensing. If the metagenomic clone produces a quorum-sensing inducer, the cell produces green fluorescent protein (GFP) and can be identified by fluorescence microscopy or captured by fluorescence-activated cell sorting. Our initial screen identified 11 clones that induce and two that inhibit expression of GFP. The intracellular screen detected quorum-sensing inducers among metagenomic clones that a traditional overlay screen would not. One inducing clone carries a LuxI homologue that directs the synthesis of an N-acyl homoserine lactone quorum-sensing signal molecule. The LuxI homologue has 62% amino acid sequence identity to its closest match in GenBank, AmfI from Pseudomonas fluorescens, and is on a 78-kb insert that contains 67 open reading frames. Another inducing clone carries a gene with homology to homocitrate synthase. Our results demonstrate the power of an intracellular screen to identify functionally active clones and biologically active small molecules in metagenomic libraries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This Article revisits the issues explored in Delaware's Going-Private Dilemma: Fostering Protections for Minority Shareholders in the Wake of Siliconix and Unocal Exploration ("Delaware's Going-Private Dilemma"), an article published in the February 2003 edition of The Business Lawyer. Specifically, it reexamines Delaware's Going-Private Dilemma in light of the Court of Chancery's decision in In re Pure Resources Shareholders Litigation ("Pure Resources") and the critique offered in Going-Private "Dilemma"?--Not in Delaware (the "Response"), an article published in the August 2003 edition of The Business Lawyer. The Article argues that the Response misconstrues Delaware's Going-Private Dilemma by, among other things, treating the two steps of going-private transactions as analytically unrelated. It moreover charges that the Response overstates the supposed effectiveness of the existing safeguards available to minority shareholders in such transactions and concludes that, notwithstanding the additional and laudable protections proffered by the Court of Chancery in Pure Resources, the need for the proposed reforms advocated in Delaware's Going-Private Dilemma continues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examines the emerging directions in the property tax valuation of commercial outdoor advertising structures in the United States. Assessment of outdoor advertising in several states in the country; Discussion of the most urgent issues faced by outdoor advertising businesses; Analysis of the ad valorem assessment approaches employed in leading states.

A critical issue to homeland security and defense is the development of broad range collectors and detectors of weapons of mass destruction. Nanoscience and nanotechnology are increasingly important in the area of such separation and detection. This article presents an overview of the research at the Forensic Science Center at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory to develop nanostructured materials for applications to forensics and homeland security. Among the many types of nanomaterials reviewed are silica-based materials, molecular imprinted polymers, and silicon platforms. The main aim of the article is to optimize these new classes of materials for the collection concentration and detection of chemical weapons or other related compounds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examines the foundations of the rulings of courts in Delaware on two cases related to the acquisition of the shares of minority shareholders by majority shareholders. Facts of the cases involving Siliconix and Unocal Exploration; Information on the acquisition alternatives by which majority shareholders can eliminate a minority position in a controlled company; Implications of the court rulings on the protection of minority shareholders.

Although measures of the home environment have gained wide acceptance in the child development literature, what constitutes the "average" or 'typical" home environment in the United States, and how this differs across ethnic groups and poverty status is not known. Item-level data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth on four age-related versions of the Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment-Short Form (HOME-SF) from five biennial assessments (1986-1994) were analyzed for the total sample and for four major ethnic groups: European Americans, Asian Americans, African Americans, and Hispanic Americans. The percentages of homes receiving credit on each item of all four versions of the HOME-SF are described. For the majority of items at all four age levels differences between poor and nonpoor families were noted. Differences were also obtained among African American, European American, and Hispanic American families, but the magnitude of the effect for poverty status was greater than for ethnicity, and usually absorbed most of the ethnic group effects on HOME-SF items. For every item at every age, the effects of poverty were proportional across European American, African American, and Hispanic American groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examined the frequency with which children were exposed to various parental actions, materials, events, and conditions as part of their home environments, and how those exposures related to their well-being. Part 1 focused on variations by age, ethnicity, and poverty status. In Part 2 of the study, relations between major aspects of the home environment (including maternal responsiveness, learning stimulation, and spanking) and developmental outcomes for children from birth through age 13 were investigated. The outcomes examined were early motor and social development, vocabulary development, achievement, and behavior problems. These relations were examined in both poor and nonpoor European American, African American, and Hispanic American families using hierarchical linear modeling. The most consistent relations found were those between learning stimulation and children's developmental status, with relations for parental responsiveness and spanking varying as a function of outcome, age, ethnicity, and poverty status. The evidence indicated slightly stronger relations for younger as compared with older children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this study was to extend our knowledge of the geographic distribution and genetic diversity of the arenavirus(es) associated with Neotoma species (woodrats) in the southwestern United States. Infectious arenavirus was recovered from 14 (3.3%) of 425 woodrats. The virus-positive species included N. albigula in New Mexico and Oklahoma, N. cinerea in Utah, N. mexicana in New Mexico and Utah, and N. micropus in Texas. Analyses of viral nucleocapsid protein gene sequence data indicated that all the isolates were strains of the Whitewater Arroyo virus, an arenavirus previously known only from northwestern New Mexico. Analyses of the sequence data also indicated that there can be substantial genetic diversity among strains of Whitewater Arroyo virus from conspecific woodrats collected from different localities and substantial genetic diversity among strains from different woodrat species collected from the same locality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Severe downslope windstorms are a mesoscale, primarily wintertime, phenomenon that affect regions in the lee of large mountain ranges. The resolution of current weather prediction models is too coarse to explicitly predict downslope windstorms. Hence, additional operational tools are needed for making downslope windstorm forecasts. Current windstorm forecast techniques commonly utilize a tool referred to as a 'decision tree.' Although decision trees provide valuable guidance, operational forecasters have not found this type of tool to be highly reliable. With recent advances in computer technology, a new type of operational tool is available for forecasting downslope windstorms: two-dimensional, nonlinear, mesoscale numerical models. This study inves-tigates whether this type of model, initialized with upstream profiles taken from operational Eta Model forecasts, can produce accurate downslope windstorm forecasts. Numerical simulations for high-wind events that affected seven regions in the United States between January 1993 and April 1997 indicate this tool is able to produce lee-slope wind speeds that meet the local peak gust threshold for a High Wind Warning for a majority of those cases where observed winds met this threshold. These simulations were initialized with upstream soundings taken from the 12- and 18-h Eta forecasts valid at the time of each high-wind event. A comparison for one region between the number of events for which High Wind Watches were posted and the number of events for which the two-dimensional model prediction met the peak gust threshold suggests this new tool would be a definite improvement over the current forecast technique. On the other hand, a preliminary test of the model's ability to differentiate between windstorm and nonwindstorm events suggests the false warning rate for this tool may be high. Further testing of this tool is ongoing and will continue through the winter months of 2000/01. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focuses on sexual violence and sex offenders in the U.S. Characterization of sex offenders; Approach for the assessment and treatment of sex offenders; importance of gathering collateral information and detailed sexual history.

Focuses on the assessment of risk for violence in the U.S. Roles of psychiatrists in predicting violence; Importance of risk assessment for violence; Factors related to the development of violent tendencies. d

ABSTRACT: Increasing pressure to improve low-performing schools--particularly those in central cities serving disadvantaged and minority students--has led to a host of reform efforts. This article focuses on a strategy that involves takeovers of troubled schools or entire systems by mayors, state legislatures, or control boards. Following the takeover of the Jersey City, New Jersey, schools in 1989, at least partial control of schools has been taken from elected boards in Chicago, Baltimore, Cleveland, Washington, D.C., and Detroit. Discussed in this article are some of the major issues involved with takeovers, including arguments for and against the practice, the policy questions it raises, and the all-important role race has played in the debate. The authors close with thoughts for evaluating the effectiveness of this increasingly popular, yet unproven, attempt at reforming low-achieving schools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The twentieth century has been characterized by four important social trends that have fundamentally changed the social cultural context in which children develop: women's increased labor force participation, increased absence of nonresidential fathers in the lives of their children, increased involvement of fathers in intact families, and increased cultural diversity in the U.S.. In this essay, we discuss how these trends are changing the nature of father involvement and family life, and in turn affecting children's and fathers' developmental trajectories. We end with an eye toward the twenty-first century by examining how the children of today will construct their expectations about the roles of fathers and mothers as they become the parents of tomorrow. This life-span approach to fatherhood considers the broader sociohistorical context in which fatherhood develops, and emphasizes the urgent need to consider mothers, fathers, and family structure in future research as we seek to understand and model the effects of parenting on children's development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

People live together for a variety of reasons, and it is meaningful to distinguish between voluntary and involuntary doubled-up housing. When doubled-up housing is voluntary, people cohabit for various social, romantic, or economic reasons of convenience and pleasure, and each person usually considers that lodging to be his or her home. In contrast, involuntary doubled-up housing occurs when people take in others, usually temporarily, because they have no place to stay. The person being taken in typically has experienced financial or social difficulties and does not consider the doubled-up situation to be home. Authors concentrate here on involuntary doubled-up housing, which for convenience the authors will refer to simply as "doubled-up housing." It is unclear how many people live in doubled-up housing, but wide-ranging numbers from several studies suggest that there are as many, if not substantially more, doubled-up people as there are homeless people in the United States. In a national telephone survey, Bruce Link and colleagues found that 11 percent of respondents had been doubled-up compared with 7 percent ever having been homeless. A similar finding estimated that there are roughly equal numbers of people in rural Ohio doubled-up with family members or friends as there are homeless. About 2 million single-parent families currently live in other peoples' homes, and an estimated 186,000 children are doubled-up with relatives or friends. The doubled-up families in New York City public housing possibly outnumber the "officially" homeless by 20 to 1.

Abstract Denominational and attendance differences in attitudes toward a broad range of family issues are examined using NORC data for whites (N of about 11,000) for 11 polls conducted between 1972 and 1984. Findings are presented with and without controls for sex, age, income, education, and region. Protestant fundamentalists along with Baptists and Catholics were most conservative; Lutherans, Methodists, and Presbyterians were moderates; and Episcopalians, Jews, and nones were most liberal. Approximate rank orders of the nine groups were consistent across family issues; however, no group was found to be consistently conservative, as the level of conservatism varied with the content of the issues. Attendance was found to be positively related to conservatism for all eight religious bodies (and unrelated for nones) with the degree of relationship varying directly with the degree of relative conservatism of the denominations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents a synthesis of the tectonic evolution of the Paleoproterozoic rocks of the Upper Granite Gorge of Grand Canyon in Arizona. Division of Paleoproterozoic supercrustal rocks; Variation of metamorphic assemblages; Five principal stages of Proterozoic evolution.

Determines who pursues self-employment in their youth in United States and then who succeeds by using the data from the National Longitudinal Surveys of Youth. Basic issues about youth self-employment; Central hypotheses of the study; Results of the incidence of entrepreneurial activity, performance measures, subsample characteristics and influences on entrepreneurial supply; Conclusions regarding the high incidence of youth entrepreneurship.

Between 1981 and 1987 twenty-eight states in the United States experimented with workfare programs. By requiring mandatory community service from welfare recipients, the states hoped to reduce welfare caseloads as well as increase community service. Based in part on those program experiences, the Congress included the first national workfare requirement in the 1988 welfare reform package, popularly known as the Family Support Act. This study is the first to attempt to evaluate the implementation and impact of workfare on a national basis. A pooled, cross-section, longitudinal model is used to estimate the effect of workfare on AFDC caseloads. Despite the low level of state-level implementation, the evidence suggests that workfare may have contributed to welfare caseload reductions in the 1980's.

Discusses the importance of reviewing the written reports of real estate appraisers prior to testifying in court. Scope of appraisal; Description of improvements; Income approach; Sales comparison approach; Cost approach.

In recent years some scholars of religion have observed that religious belief in the United States is so declining rapidly that a post-Christian era seems both inevitable and imminent. Survey data for national samples of Americans suggest, however, that there has been no appreciable decline in levels of religious belief in recent years and that the generational factor does not play as crucial a role as has been thought. Analysis of Gallup data shows that between 1957 and 1968 levels of belief in two basic Christian tenets (belief in an afterlife and belief in the devil) remained about the same. At the same time, however, there was a marked decline in the proportion of Americans expressing uncertainty regarding these beliefs, and an increase in the proportions openly espousing disbelief. It is our contention that past researchers have failed to distinguish between decline in belief and increase in disbelief. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dislocated workers have captured the spotlight of employment and training programs. In the 1960's and 1970's the focus of public employment programs was of youth and disadvantaged workers. The situation in the 1980's is different. The postwar baby boom has matured, depleting the ranks of teenagers, already, schools have closed and college enrollments have declined across the country. Public employment and training programs are only now beginning adjust. The complacency about mainstream workers has also been shattered. Rapid changes in technology, trade patterns, and consumer demand have undermined the competitive position of many industries. On top of this, deep and recurrent recessions have forced companies to retrench. In the process, millions of mainstream workers have lost their jobs.

Small businesses are subsidizing the training and development of the U.S. labor force. They have not taken on this role willingly. Rather, small businesses with their weak market position, have been. unable either to retain the workers they train or to recapture the training costs they incur. Moreover, they are unable to avoid continuing training losses, at least so long as they want to stay in business. The beneficiaries of small-business training have been the trained workers and the: large corporations that subsequently hire them. The former have commanded higher wages after training; the latter have gotten improved labor productivity without the attendant investment costs. The implication is clear small businesses end up subsidizing human capital development for large corporations. Given the risks and expense of hiring labor-market entrants, it is worth noting that small business is by far the most common source of first jobs for young men. Small firms employ more than half of all male workers, again mainly in the smallest enterprises, but their share of young men's initial attachments, at 64 percent, is greater than their 58 percent share of the total male work force.

Analyzes the political environment conducive to municipal charter reforms in the U.S. to understand the issues of progressivism. Theories of progressivism; Introduction of welfare programs and social reform; Model for reform prediction.

Gallup data for a random sample of adult Americans interviewed in 1968 are examined to learn the religious, social class, and other characteristics of persons who believe in both heaven and afterlife, in neither, and in one but not the other. Particular attention is paid to people who believe in heaven but not afterlife, an apparent contradiction in a Christian context. Multiple discriminant function analysis and cross-tabular analysis are used to learn which characteristics distinguish each group from the others. The overall conclusion is that social scientists will come to fully comprehend the meaning of religious beliefs-including those that appear to be inconsistent-only if they ask people to describe their beliefs in their own words. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The longitudinal earnings data reviewed in this paper unambiguously demonstrate that individuals are highly mobile across relative positions in the earnings distribution: 70 percent of the male workers in our sample are mobile and move on average a distance of one-fifth across the earnings distribution of their age cohort. Moreover, high mobility is a phenomenon that continues throughout one's working life. It was also noted that an element of directional stability exists in this mobility, implying that these observations reflect something more than purely random fluctuations. Models of labor market behavior that imply high rates of individual mobility will naturally find the greatest support in our observations. Of the models reviewed, the OJT variant of human capital models stands out in this regard, explaining more than half of the observed mobility. However, because other models (particularly those that distribute relative positions on the basis on some stochastic process) could generate equally good predictions, this support must be severely qualified. Essentially, what we have demonstrated is that those labor market models implying high rates of relative earnings mobility have more ex post plausability than various models of stratification. The OJT model is not uniquely verified by such observations; rather it stands out as one of the few models that formally accounts for mobility. Our conclusions must be further qualified by the pockets of immobility observed. Although, for example, it is clear that models of pervasive stratification (on whatever basis) are not likely candidates for general descriptions of the labor market, they may still play important roles. The lower mobility of black workers, for example, is obviously consistent with such models, as is the tendency toward lower mobility in the highest and lowest ventiles. The evidence on blacks is particularly disturbing as it not only suggests differential constraints on mobility but also that black workers already assimilated into the labor market by 1957 failed to receive any relative benefits over the subsequent fourteen years, a period which encompassed extensive civil rights and equal opportunity activity. The concept of relative earnings mobility provides a new perspective for assessing labor market models and behavior, as well as for interpreting the microeconomic substance of the (static) distribution of income. It cannot yet answer all the questions one might like to ask, however. To distinguish still more reliably among alternative earnings models, one must answer additional research questions. In particular, the relationship between earnings mobility and job experience must be examined. A most compelling implication of these findings is that more attention should be focused on the process of mobility, that is, on the mechanisms that facilitate or obstruct status improvement. The OJT model is but one example of such a focus, and has come to dominate this perspective, largely by default. Alternative explanations could easily be formulated, either on the basis of other supply characteristics, demand-side variables, or institutional factors which alter the character of both supply and demand. Presumably, the failure to recognize the pervasiveness of relative earnings mobility has inhibited the development of such alternatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This longitudinal study employs bivariate probit regression analysis to examine factors associated with returns home from, and reentry to, out-of-home care for 21,484 children placed by child welfare authorities in California. A central focus of the study is to determine the degree to which phenomena unaccounted for in analyses of the returns home from care are correlated with factors unaccounted for in analyses of the process of reentry to care. Although a previous analysis implies direct effects of race and age on foster care reentry, current results suggest that these effects are mediated by other factors. A second concern of the study led to the finding that Aid to Families with Dependent Children eligibility is associated with delays in the return home of children initially placed in kinship foster care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information on the absolute and relative income gains by whites and non-whites in the U.S. The study makes the point that a disadvantaged body of group can increase its income absolutely and can improve its position in the overall income distribution and even then can fall further behind dominant groups. In the present study, relative mobility of nonwhites will be measured in part by considering changes in that group's median family income percentile score. The author has chosen this measure partly because of its ease of calculation. And more importantly, percentile scores contain a kind d built-in control for change in the relative size of various section of the work force and alter such structural changes in the economy. For example, the present study, shifts in the ratio of whites to non-Whites or in the shape of the income distribution for the total population will affect the income percentile score of each aggregate. However, the utility of this measure remains unaffected by such shifts, equality continues to obtain only if all racial (or other) groups obtain a percentile score of 50 on income (or any other good).

Examines benefit cost changes in private industry in the U.S. during the 1980-1987 period. Changes in benefit costs which is published as part of the Employment Cost Index program; Use of fixed weights to ensure that changes measured are unaffected by employment shifts among industries and occupations; Trends within benefit categories.