State Highlights 5/11/1955

This is the student newspaper from Western State High School, the high school that was on the campus of Western Michigan University, then called State Highlights, in 1955

University High Highlights 5/11/1960

This is the student newspaper from University High School, the high school that was on the campus of Western Michigan University, then called University High School, in 1960

Unemployment, Human Capital Depreciation and Pension Benefits: An Empirical Evaluation of German Data

This paper investigates empirically how unemployment-induced employment-breaks at different career stages influence pension benefits. The analysis is based on German data. I distinguish four different career phases and investigate to what extent the prevailing social security policy compensated for earning losses. The results suggest that (1) losses in pension benefits were the greatest if unemployment occurred in the middle of a career (between 31 50); (2) social security policies have had a mitigating effect on losses in pension benefits. These findings indicate that institutions have a decided influence on how career patterns translate into pension benefits.employment histories, career interruptions, pension benefits, social security policy, human capital depreciation, institutions

5/11/2009

https://surface.syr.edu/scis_news/1048/thumbnail.jp

"Doing with space": towards a pragmatics of space

International audienc

The quality of God\u27s mercy: cause for celebration

1 Corinthians 3:5-11

Grandparental effects on reproductive strategizing

This paper analyzes data from the household registers for two villages in the Nôbi region of central Japan in the late Edo period (1717-1869) to assess how grandparents may have affected reproductive strategizing in stem families. The particulars of the family system fostered a culturally favored set of reproductive goals, in particular, a daughter as eldest child, followed by a son (and heir), coupled with gender alternation in subsequent reproduction and overall gender balance. This reproductive strategy was generally followed during the stem phase of the domestic cycle, when one or both grandparents were present, especially when the family head was in the senior generation. By contrast, a son-first strategy was favored when childbearing began in the conjugal phase of the cycle. This suggests grandparental influence on the junior couple’s reproductive decisions in favor of the cultural ideal. I find that the senior couple’s decision to marry the heir early or late strongly affects the reproductive strategies followed by him after marriage. I show that when a grandmother is present at the onset of childbearing, especially if she is relatively young, the junior couple ends up with more offspring on average. A controlled analysis of infanticiding behavior is interpreted in terms of conjugal power and coalition formation. It appears that a grandmother gets her way only when she and her son gang up on the daughter-in-law, but such a coalition is likely only when her son dominates the conjugal relationship (which in turn reflects the grandmother’s success in binding the son tightly to her emotionally and in delaying his marriage). Otherwise, the grandmother may be shut out from reproductive decision-making by the solidary conjugal coalition.family, historical household studies, infanticide, Japan, reproductive strategies

The Financial Crisis from a Forecaster’s Perspective

This paper analyses the recession in 2008/2009 in Germany, which is very different from previous recessions, in particular regarding its cause and magnitude. We show to what extent forecasters and forecasts based on leading indicators fail to detect the timing and the magnitude of the recession. This study shows that large forecast errors for both expert forecasts and forecasts based on leading indicators resulted during this recession which implies that the recession was very difficult to forecast. However, some leading indicators (survey data, risk spreads, stock prices) have indicated an economic downturn and hence, beat univariate time series models. Although the combination of individual forecasts provides an improvement compared to the benchmark model, the combined forecasts are worse than several individual models. A comparison of expert forecasts with the best forecasts based on leading indicators shows only minor deviations. Overall, the range for an improvement of expert forecasts during the crisis compared to indicator forecasts is relatively small.leading indicators, recession, consensus forecast, non-linearities

Conquest and Form: Narrativity in Joshua 5-11 and Historical Discourse in Ancient Judah

One goal of this essay is to offer an exploratory, historiographical analysis of the conquest account in the book of Joshua, an analysis that focuses upon the sociocultural milieu of ancient Judah. I propose to show how this narrative of conquest might have contributed to discourse(s) among the literate Judean community that perpetuated the text, and I will offer a few thoughts on the potential relationship between the narrative and the supposed cultic reforms of the late seventh century b.c.e. A number of biblical scholars have argued that the late monarchic period gave rise to the conquest story as recounted in Joshua. In this essay, I would like to pay special attention to precisely how this narrative might have functioned within the milieu of the late monarchic period, thus refining our understanding of the narrative’s contribution to the discourses of this era and our knowledge of its relationship to other narratives that were probably extant at the same time. In other words, what particular features of the narrative might have had special import in this period? Specifically, I will argue that the narrative reveals certain discursive statements about Yahweh’s cultic supremacy and about important cultic sites in late monarchic Judah, and that this is evident in particular narratival features that are present in the text