Problems on the road to high skill: a sectoral lesson from the transfer of the dual system of vocational training to eastern Germany

The central challenge of transferring the dual system of education and training to eastern Germany is to convince companies to bear the in-firm costs of apprenticeship training. Two prominent explanatory variables in the social scientificliterature - national institutions and social capital - offer certain predictions aboutwhich factors will be most important in facilitating the transfer of the dual system toeastern Germany. Data from interviews with thirty-four firms in the metal andelectronics industry suggest that institutionalist theory mis-specifies the role ofemployers in coordinated market economies. Employers' associations in both eastern and western Germany have neither the access to inside information nor theinformal sanctioning capacity attributed to them in this literature, nor do they play anyrole in the regular diffusion of strategies of best practice. Ownership by westernGerman companies, however, appears to be of particular significance in the decisionof eastern German companies to train, a link which may support the institutional emphasis on access to long-term finance. Social capital is unable to explainsignificant variance in the ability of companies to cooperate in order to create additional apprenticeship places. The role of policy design in the new federal statesappears to have an important effect in explaining the ability of firms in some states tocooperate in training apprentices. The ability to craft effective policies depends oncoordination among state governments and employers' organizations, but the distributive conflicts inherent in these subsidies can hamper cooperation among employers. -- Die zentrale Herausforderung bei der Übertragung des dualen Berufsausbildungssystems nach Ostdeutschland ist es, die Unternehmen davon zuüberzeugen, die internen Kosten der Ausbildung zu tragen. Besonders zwe iVariablen in der sozialwissenschaftlichen Literatur - das nationale Institutionengefüge und das Sozialkapital - weisen auf vorab benennbare Faktoren hin, die wichtig sind, um den Transfer des dualen Systems nach Ostdeutschland zuerleichtern.Informationen und Daten aus Interviews in 34 Unternehmen der Metall- und Elektronikindustrie führen zu der Annahme, daß die Institutionen-Theorie die Rolle von Unternehmern in koordinierten Marktwirtschaften mißinterpretiert.Unternehmensverbände in Ost- und Westdeutschland haben weder Zugang zu Insider-Informationen noch eine wie auch immer geartete Sanktionsmöglichkeit - wieihnen in der Literatur zugeschrieben wird -, und sie spielen auch keine Rolle in derüblichen Verbreitung von best-practice-Erfahrungen. Wenn ein Unternehmen in Ostdeutschland einem westdeutschen Unternehmen gehört, so scheint dies allerdings eine wichtige Rolle bei der Entscheidung für eine berufliche Erstausbildung in dem ostdeutschen Unternehmen zu spielen. Dies könnte in einemZusammenhang mit der Diskussion um die Bedeutung von Institutionen und dabei um den Zugang zu langfristigem Kapital gesehen werden.Die These vom Sozialen Kapital kann die erheblichen Unterschiede in der Fähigkeitder Unternehmen, durch Kooperation zusätzliche Ausbildungsplätze zu schaffen, nicht erklären. Die je spezifische Art, wie politische Prozesse in den neuen Bundesländern gestaltet werden, scheint dagegen ein wichtiger Indikator zu sein, umdie in einigen Bundesländern vorhandene Kooperationsfähigkeit von Unternehmenbei der Lehrlingsausbildung zu erklären.Die Fähigkeit, wirksame politische Lösungen zu entwickeln, hängt von der Art der Zusammenarbeit zwischen Länderregierungen und Unternehmensverbänden ab, doch können Verteilungskonflikte, die immanent zu Subventionen gehören, dieKooperation zwischen Unternehmern behindern

Use of high L.E.T. radiation to improve adhesion of metals to polytetrafluoroethylene

MgK alpha X-rays (1254 eV) and 2 keV electrons irradiate the surface of polytetrafluoro ethylene (PTFE). The damage is confined to a few tenths of a micron below the surface, and the doses exceed 10 to the eight power rad. X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS) of the irradiated surfaces and mass spectroscopy of the gaseous products of irradiation indicate that the damaged layer is crosslinked or branched PTFE. After either type of irradiation, the surface has enhanced affinity for metals and a lower contact angle with hexadecane. Tape pull tests show that evaporated Ni and Au films adhere better to the irradiated surface. XPS shows the Ni interacts chemically with PTFE forming NiF2 and possibly NiC. However, the gold adhesion and contact angle results indicate that the interaction is, at least in part, chemically nonspecific. Decreased contact angles on FEP Teflon crystallized against gold were attributed to either the presence of a polar oxygen layer or increased physical forces due to greater density. In the case of irradiated PTFE, no oxygen on the surface was observed. The crosslinked structure might, however, have a greater density, thus accounting for the observed increase in adhesion and wettability

Thermal desorption study of physical forces at the PTFE surface

Thermal desorption spectroscopy (TDS) of the polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) surface was successfully employed to study the possibile role of physical forces in the enhancement of metal-PTFE adhesion by radiation. The thermal desorption spectra were analyzed without assumptions to yield the activation energy for desorption over a range of xenon coverage from less than 0.1 monolayer to more than 100 monolayers. For multilayer coverage, the desorption is zero-order with an activation energy equal to the sublimation energy of xenon. For submonolayer coverages, the order for desorption from the unirradiated PTFE surface is 0.73 and the activation energy for desorption is between 3.32 and 3.36 kcal/mol; less than the xenon sublimation energy. The effect of irradiation is to increase the activation energy for desorption to as high as 4 kcal/mol at low coverage

Alumina fiber strength improvement

The effective fiber strength of alumina fibers in an aluminum composite was increased to 173,000 psi. A high temperature heat treatment, combined with a glassy carbon surface coating, was used to prevent degradation and improve fiber tensile strength. Attempts to achieve chemical strengthening of the alumina fiber by chromium oxide and boron oxide coatings proved unsuccessful. A major problem encountered on the program was the low and inconsistent strength of the Dupont Fiber FP used for the investigation

The Context of Sexual Risk among African-American Female College Students

Objective: To assess the sexually transmitted infection (STI) awareness, sexual risk behaviors, and related contextual factors of African-American female college students. Participants: Eighty-nine African-American first year female students attending a majority public four-year college in the southern U.S. participated in the study in Spring, 2006. Methods: Participants completed an anonymous self-administered paper-and-pencil survey and received a $15 cash incentive. Results: Participants were highly knowledgeable and aware about STIs and their consequences. While this awareness translated into low levels of risk for many, still others engaged in behaviors and maintained beliefs that could potentially put them at high risk for contracting STIs. Conclusions: Given the disproportionate rates of STIs among young African-American females, researchers must not ignore the non-behavioral factors (i.e. beliefs and perceptions) that may influence sexual risk behaviors to help in determining optimal methods for intervention and prevention among young African-American females

A theoretical and experimental investigation of the modes of optical resonators with phase-conjugate mirrors

We present an analysis of resonator properties for a cavity bounded by a phase conjugate mirror, which is generated by a degenerate four-wave nonlinear optical interaction. Using a ray matrix formalism to describe the conjugate mirror, resonator stability conditions are derived. Longitudinal and transverse mode characteristics are discussed. Results are compared with an experiment where laser oscillation was observed at 6943 Å using carbon disulfide as the nonlinear interacting medium comprising the phase conjugate mirror

The economic footprint of its banks helped the U.S. to have a better bank bailout than the UK

In 2008 politicians in the UK and the U.S. put in place massive bailout programs worth billions of dollars to save their ailing financial institutions. Six years on, U.S. taxpayers have made nearly $10 billion on their bailout investment, while those in the UK have lost around$14 billion. Pepper D. Culpepper writes that this difference is down to a combination of regulatory power and policy design. Regulators in the U.S. were able to require even those banks that were financially fit to accept money in exchange for stock because those banks earned the majority of their revenue locally. UK regulators on the other hand, were constrained by the vast market power of HSBC, which has only 20 percent of its business in the country, meaning that the bank was able to reject proposals that it take public money