How Will Declining Rates of Marriage Reshape Eligibility for Social Security?

For most older people in the United States, Social Security is the major source of income: nine out of ten people age 65 or older receive benefits, which represent an average of 41 percent of their income. Largely as a result of Social Security, poverty rates for the elderly are at an all-time low, just 10 percent. But pockets of poverty persist: older unmarried persons, blacks, and Hispanics experience poverty rates in excess of 20 percent, and over 40 percent of all older single black women live in poverty. People quality for Social Security based either on their work record or their marital status. Most older women receive noncontributory Social Security spouse of widow benefits on the basis of their marital history. For these women, marital status is more important than employment status in shaping old-age financial security. However, the trend to marry and stay married has declined over time in the United States, particularly among black women. This, we hypothesize, means that fewer women will qualify for spouse and widow benefits in coming decades. As a result, Social Security benefits will shrink among the very population that currently reports higher poverty rates, older single women, particularly black women. In this policy brief, we ask: Compared to earlier cohorts, what proportion of white, black, and Hispanic women born in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s will enter old age without a marriage that qualifies them for Social Security spouse and widow benefits? We find that the proportion who will reach age 62 without a qualifying marriage, and thus be ineligible for Social Security spouse and widow benefits, is increasing modestly for whites and Hispanics but dramatically for African Americans. Most of these women will be eligible for retired worker benefits under Social Security, but those benefits are not likely to be as large as the benefits they would have received as spouses and widows, had they been eligible. We then discuss a range of policy alternatives, including the possibility of a minimum benefit.Social Security, spousal benefits, widow benefits, poverty, elderly, social welfare, income security.

Cryo-TEM simulations of amorphous radiation-sensitive samples using multislice wave propagation [preprint]

Image simulation plays a central role in the development and practice of high-resolution electron microscopy, including transmission electron microscopy of frozen-hydrated specimens (cryo-EM). Simulating images with contrast that matches the contrast observed in experimental images remains challenging, especially for amorphous samples. Current state-of-the-art simulators apply post hoc scaling to approximate empirical solvent contrast, attenuated image intensity due to specimen thickness, and amplitude contrast. This practice fails for images that require spatially variable scaling, e.g., simulations of a crowded or cellular environment. Modeling both the signal and the noise accurately is necessary to simulate images of biological specimens with contrast that is correct on an absolute scale. To do so, we introduce the “Frozen-Plasmon” method which explicitly models spatially variable inelastic scattering processes in cryo-EM specimens. This approach produces amplitude contrast that depends on the atomic composition of the specimen, reproduces the total inelastic mean free path as observed experimentally and allows for the incorporation of radiation damage in the simulation. Taken in combination with a new mathematical formulation for accurately sampling the tabulated atomic scattering potentials onto a Cartesian grid, we also demonstrate how the matched-filter concept can be used to quantitatively compare model and experiment. The simulator is available as a standalone program, implemented in C++ with multi-threaded parallelism using the computational imaging system for Transmission Electron Microscopy (cisTEM.

Vol. 15, No. 3

Contents: Information Disclosure in Illinois Public Sector Labor Relations, by A. Lynn Himes and Sarah E. Joyce Recent Developments, by the Student Editorial Board Further References, compiled by Margaret A. Chaplanhttps://scholarship.kentlaw.iit.edu/iperr/1057/thumbnail.jp

Sovereign Defaults Before International Courts and Tribunals

This book review probes Michael Waibel’s new book, Sovereign Defaults Before International Courts and Tribunals. Waibel\u27s project is ambitious, exploring international attempts to address sovereign defaults over the past century and a half. Through painstaking and comprehensive historical analysis, Waibel shows how we\u27ve been here before -- a sober reminder for those thinking Argentina is simply part of a new fad in financial default. With the UN now turning its attention to sovereign debt issues, this study is especially timely. Although somewhat disappointing in the lightness of its normative content, the book should nevertheless prove helpful to those considering the role adjudicative tribunals (especially arbitral ones) might play in this current round of reform recommendations

Sovereign Defaults Before International Courts and Tribunals

This book review probes Michael Waibel’s new book, Sovereign Defaults Before International Courts and Tribunals. Waibel\u27s project is ambitious, exploring international attempts to address sovereign defaults over the past century and a half. Through painstaking and comprehensive historical analysis, Waibel shows how we\u27ve been here before -- a sober reminder for those thinking Argentina is simply part of a new fad in financial default. With the UN now turning its attention to sovereign debt issues, this study is especially timely. Although somewhat disappointing in the lightness of its normative content, the book should nevertheless prove helpful to those considering the role adjudicative tribunals (especially arbitral ones) might play in this current round of reform recommendations

Structure and dynamics of the E. coli chemotaxis core signaling complex by cryo-electron tomography and molecular simulations

To enable the processing of chemical gradients, chemotactic bacteria possess large arrays of transmembrane chemoreceptors, the histidine kinase CheA, and the adaptor protein CheW, organized as coupled core-signaling units (CSU). Despite decades of study, important questions surrounding the molecular mechanisms of sensory signal transduction remain unresolved, owing especially to the lack of a high-resolution CSU structure. Here, we use cryo-electron tomography and sub-tomogram averaging to determine a structure of the Escherichia coli CSU at sub-nanometer resolution. Based on our experimental data, we use molecular simulations to construct an atomistic model of the CSU, enabling a detailed characterization of CheA conformational dynamics in its native structural context. We identify multiple, distinct conformations of the critical P4 domain as well as asymmetries in the localization of the P3 bundle, offering several novel insights into the CheA signaling mechanism

Deconstructing 2 Bit Architectures with SoutDuo

Recent advances in psychoacoustic models and symbiotic information are based entirely on the assumption that I/O automata and 802.11 mesh networks are not in conflict with Scheme. In this work, authors demonstrate the appropriate unification of red-black trees and digital- to-analog converters, demonstrates the compelling importance of networking. SoutDuo, our new methodology for the synthesis of scatter/gather I/O, is the solution to all of these problems