What Does America Think About Childhood Obesity?

Presents findings from a survey of 1,108 adults that examines current attitudes about childhood obesity and measures support for various childhood obesity prevention initiatives

Overdraft America: Confusion and Concerns About Bank Practices

Based on a survey, examines the prevalence of overdraft penalty and transfer fees by age and income, as well as consumer satisfaction with overdraft fee options. Makes policy recommendations

The Truth About Privatization in Latin America

Privatization is under attack. Criticisms run from corrupt deals to abuse of market power and social welfare losses. We evaluate the empirical record on privatization relying on recent comprehensive studies from Latin America. There are four main results. First, the increased profitability of privatized firms is not explained by sample selection biases. Second, in the quest to identify the sources of increased profitability after privatization, we find little evidence that validates concerns of generalized market power abuses, exploitation of workers and lack of fiscal benefits. Third, the manner in which privatization is carried out matters. Transparency and homogeneity in procedures, speed, and limited restructuring prior to privatization lead to better outcomes and less room for corruption and discretion. Finally, privatization’s success is enhanced by two complementary policies: re-regulation or deregulation of industries previously shielded from competitive forces; and an effective corporate governance framework that facilitates privatized firms’ access to capital at lower costs. Overall, the empirical record shows that privatization leads to increased profitability and productivity, firm restructuring, fiscal benefits, output growth and even quality improvements. Most cases of privatization failure can be linked to poor contract design, opaque processes with heavy state involvement, lack of re-regulation and a poor corporate governance framework.

What Does America Think About Addiction Prevention and Treatment?

Summarizes survey results on how Americans view alcohol and drug addiction, including whether it is a personal weakness or an illness; their experiences with addiction; common treatments; and support for state tax increases to improve treatment programs

What America Needs to Know About Higher Education Redesign

Finding ways to help more Americans develop and connect their knowledge, skills, and talent with a good job may be the most important economic and human development challenge in this country. To contribute to the dialogue surrounding the importance of post-secondary education in preparing and connecting people with a good job, for the past three years, Lumina and Gallup have been gauging the American public's opinion on the most pressing issues facing higher education today, including cost, access, quality, and workforce readiness. This year, in addition to the annual public opinion poll conducted of the U.S. general population, a second survey was conducted of business leaders in the U.S. to understand their perceptions of post-secondary education and how higher educational institutions are doing in preparing employees for the world of work. Together these studies can help inform what thought leaders and ALL Americans need to know about the value and opportunity that quality higher education affords

The Singing Insects of Michigan

Excerpt: The so-called singing insects are all those that make loud, rhythmical noises. They include members of three groups of Orthoptera (Gryllidae, Tettigoniidae, and Acridoidea) and one family of Homoptera (Cicadidae). There are about 300 noisy species in these four groups in eastern North America, perhaps a thousand in all of North America, and 25-30 thousand in the entire world. Only about 1000 of the world species have been studied in any detail, mostly in North America, Europe, Japan, and Australia

Information about petroleum in America prior to the nineteenth Century

The petroleum substances have been used a lot of centuries ago: bitumen has been used in Neolithic Period to fix head's hammer of stone and to set beads. The authors of this paper want to show the knowledge of bitumen and asphalt in South America until the 19t h century through documents of Spaniards conquerors. Besides, we have done a comparative study between different words to design these petroleum product

The History, Present Condition, and Future of the Molluscan Fisheries of North and Central American and Europe: Volume 1, Atlantic and Gulf Coasts

This three-volume monograph represents the first major attempt in over a century to provide, on regional bases, broad surveys of the history, present condition, and future of the important shellfisheries of North and Central America and Europe. It was about 100 years ago that Ernest Ingersoll wrote extensively about several molluscan fisheries of North America (1881, 1887) and about 100 years ago that Bashford Dean wrote comprehensively about methods of oyster culture in Europe (1893). Since those were published, several reports, books, and pamphlets have been written about the biology and management of individual species or groups ofclosely related mollusk species (Galtsoff, 1964; Korringa, 1976 a, b, c; Lutz, 1980; Manzi and Castagna, 1989; Shumway, 1991). However, nothing has been written during the past century that is comparable to the approach used by Ingersoll in describing the molluscan fisheries as they existed in his day in North America or, for that matter, in Europe. (PDF file contains 224 pages.

[Review of] Elwyn T. Ashton. The Welsh in the United States

Ashton\u27s mid-sized volume about the Welsh in America joins the first, and very short account by David Williams, Wales and America (published in Wales in 1946 as part of a bilingual pamphlet series), and Edward George Hartmann\u27s Americans from Wales (nearly three hundred pages, published in 1967 and reprinted in America in 1978)