Spotlight: Texas service sector outlook survey completing the regional economic picture

The service sector drives the Texas economy, accounting for 59 percent of private-sector output and employing close to 7 million workers. Despite the service sector’s prominence, there are no timely state-level gauges of its activity. To fill this regional data gap, the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas began assembling the Texas Service Sector Outlook Survey (TSSOS) in 2007. After a four-year collection period, the data have been seasonally adjusted, with public release June 1.Service industries ; Business cycles - Texas

Texas economy to ride higher in the saddle in 2011

The Texas economy grew moderately in 2010, outperforming most other states. Jobs increased by 209,000, a growth rate of about 2 percent—near the state’s average pace since 1980. Strength in the high-tech and energy sectors was an important source of Texas’ economic might relative to other parts of the country. The state also suffered less from housing price declines. ; Leading indicators, generally positive at the end of 2010, suggest an improving outlook in 2011 as consumers and businesses regain confidence in the economy. The Dallas Fed forecasting model projects Texas job growth of 2.5 percent to 3.5 percent this year.>Economic conditions - Texas ; Economic indicators

Spotlight: Farm real estate values: Texas holds steady in 2008, bucking U.S. trend

The value of Texas agricultural land has followed national trends since the early 1990s. Last year, however, the state's average price per acre remained unchanged, a sharp contrast to the nation's first decline in 17 years. Texas was one of only eight states that didn't see falling farm values in 2008.Farms - Valuation ; Agriculture - Economic aspects

Texas' Latino pay gaps: taking a closer look

Latino workers in Texas are on the short end of two pay gaps. They earn substantially lower wages than the state's non-Hispanic white workers. They also earn less than Latinos working in other parts of the U.S. ; In the fourth quarter 2009 issue of Southwest Economy, we identified lower educational attainment and such characteristics as immigrant status and country of origin as key factors in explaining Texas Latinos' relatively low wages. We now want to dig deeper into the Latino pay gaps. Two key questions remain unexplored. First, can we quantify the educational and demographic factors' relative contributions to the Latino wage gaps? Second, what role does occupational choice play in Texas Latinos' lower earnings? ; We find that education explains more than half of the Latino pay gap vis-a-vis non-Hispanic whites in the state and 20 percent of the gap vis-a-vis Latinos outside Texas. English fluency and state-level characteristics--such as cost of living, geography, history and institutions--likely account for much of the remaining wage deficit of Latinos in Texas. We also find that occupational choice explains some of the wage gap within Texas but little to none of the disparities across states.Wages ; Hispanic Americans ; Education - Economic aspects ; Texas

Slipping Through the Cracks: Addressing Mental Health Needs of Students in the K-12 Classroom

Mental health illnesses have become more prevalent over the past 20 years. With this increase in mental health disorders, schools have failed to provide students with the necessary support and resources needed for them to be successful in the classroom. The objective of this study is to highlight the prevalence of mental health illnesses and give insight to strategies that can be implemented by the school system in order to give every child the opportunity to be successful. This study focuses on adolescents with anxiety and/or depression. Research has been conducted to identify the increase in cases of mental health disorders since the year 2000. This research revealed possible causes of mental health illnesses, identified symptoms of such illnesses, and proposed possible strategies for helping students be successful in spite of their challenges. There is much discussion in the education field as to how much responsibility teachers have for the mental needs of their students. The findings of this study argue that teachers must address the mental needs of their students if they want to ever teach them academic content. This idea expands upon Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs where he suggested that a person’s physical needs must be met before a person can ever reach his/her full potential. This study explores Maslow’s theory and concludes that mental health needs belong inside his model for human necessities. The findings conclude that there needs to be reform inside the education system in order to properly address mental health needs of students

The sensitivity of saccharomyces mutants to palmitoleic acid may provide a means to study the controls of membrane fluidity in eukaryotes

The mechanisms which control the fluidity of eukaryotic membranes are unknown. We have identified S. cerevisiae deletion strains whose growth is impaired by palmitoleic (PO; C16:1) but not oleic (C18:1) acid. PO-sensitivity is suppressed by oleate thus perhaps identifying a signaling pathway that controls the ratio of these fatty acids in membrane phospholipid. Growth of these mutants is also inhibited by a known fluidizer, benzyl alcohol, thus indicating that PO has a fluidizing effect. Removal of Pkc1, known to play a key role in cell wall integrity control, leads to acute PO-sensitivity. Removal of Bck1, Mkk1, Mkk2, Slt2, or Swi6 downstream components of the cell wall integrity pathway, cause modest POsensitivity. Suppression by 1M sorbitol of the PO-sensitivity of these four mutants implies that PO/oleate ratio influences the cell wall. Acute PO-sensitivity of the pkc1Δ strain, even in the presence of 1M sorbitol, suggests the cell wall to be more severely compromised by PO addition to this strain. Alternatively, the failure to control the PO/oleate ratio could have an additional effect on the pkc1 strain, perhaps by disabling a 2nd pathway downstream of Pkc1 thus allowing PO addition to cause excess membrane fluidity. We are attempting to distinguish these two models by a variety of genetic, biochemical, and physical methods. Most notably, the effect of PO on the fluidity of the plasma membrane is being examined by measuring the depolarization of laurdan fluorescence

Chinese immigrants in the US labor market: Effects of post-tiananmen immigration policy

The Tiananmen Square protests in 1989 and ensuing government crackdown affected Chinese nationals not only at home but around the world. The U.S. government responded to the events in China by enacting multiple measures to protect Chinese nationals present in the U.S. It first suspended all forced departures among Chinese nationals present in the country as of June 1989 and later gave them authorization to work legally. The Chinese Student Protection Act, passed in October 1992, made those Chinese nationals eligible for lawful permanent resident status. These actions applied to about 80,000 Chinese nationals residing in the U.S. on student or other temporary visas or illegally. Receiving permission to work legally and then a green card is likely to have affected recipients' labor market outcomes. This study uses 1990 and 2000 census data to examine employment and earnings among Chinese immigrants who were likely beneficiaries of the U.S. government's actions. Relative to immigrants from Hong Kong, Taiwan, and South Korea - countries not covered by the post-Tiananmen immigration policy measures - highly-educated immigrants from mainland China experienced significant employment and earnings gains during the 1990s. Chinese immigrants who arrived in the U.S in time to benefit from the measures also had higher relative earnings in 2000 than Chinese immigrants who arrived too late to benefit. The results suggest that getting legal work status and then a green card has a significant positive effect on skilled migrants' labor market outcomes

Health and Well-Being Measures of Collegiate Athlete and Non-Athlete Graduates

American collegiate sport participation has been linked with psychosocial and career-related benefits as well as with mental and physical health risks, with extant research on this topic revealing mixed results. The study purpose was, informed by the Health through Sport Conceptual Model, to describe and compare associations among health related quality of life and psychosocial measures of former U.S. collegiate athletes and non-athletes from four university graduation cohorts. Results suggest on aggregate former collegiate athletes report more positive measures than their non-athlete peers. Study findings were, in some instances, mitigated/reversed when participants endorsed concussion, career ending injury or revenue sport participation histories or were female. Though limited by a cross-sectional design and a potential health worker effect, results provide some support for protective associations of collegiate athletics participation. This study also provides a theoretical bridge from intercollegiate athletics participation to broader sport promotion literatures

Electrochemical and luminescence studies of ruthenium and iridium metal chelates

My thesis focuses on the evaluation of various chemical labels which each emit a specific colour of light, when triggered by an electrical stimulus. These labels can be employed in diagnostic analyses and luminescent displays.<br /