Various Supports for Low-Income Families Reduce Poverty and Have Long-Term Positive Effects On Families and Children

Since the Great Depression, the United States has developed a set of supports to help low-income families, seniors, children, and people with disabilities make ends meet and obtain health care. Extensive research indicates that these supports lift millions of Americans out of poverty, help "make work pay" by supplementing low wages, and enable millions of Americans to receive health care who otherwise could not afford it. To be sure, the United States still has a higher poverty rate than many other advanced countries, and many Americans reach adulthood without the tools they need to succeed in the workforce. Various programs and policies, especially in areas such as job training and education, could be reformed and strengthened. But the claim that advocates of shrinking government sometimes make that public efforts to reduce poverty and hardship have failed is belied by the evidence

The demand for M2, opportunity cost, and financial change

An analysis of the recent weakness in M2 growth that attempts to measure the opportunity cost of the aggregate more accurately and that explores the potential effects of the thrift industry restructuring on the adjustment of money demand to its long-run equilibrium level.Money supply ; Savings and loan associations

Understanding the recent behavior of M2

A discussion of the unanticipated weakness in the M2 monetary aggregate in recent years, suggesting that the shortfall may be largely attributable to the restructuring of the thrift industry, and an explanation of why economic models predicting M2 growth have had difficulty tracking this weakness.Money supply ; Savings and loan associations

The effect of war expenditures on U.S. output

A study of how war-related temporary increases in government expenditures affect real interest rates and output, with particular emphasis on the probable fiscal effects of the Persian Gulf War.Persian Gulf War, 1991 ; War - Economic aspects

Evaluating the effectiveness of e-cigarettes compared with usual care for smoking cessation when offered to smokers at homeless centres: Protocol for a multi-centre cluster-randomized controlled trial in Great Britain

Background and aims Smoking is extremely common among adults experiencing homelessness, but there is lack of evidence for treatment efficacy. E-cigarettes are an effective quitting aid, but they have not been widely tested in smokers with complex health and social needs. Here we build upon our cluster feasibility trial and evaluate the offer of an e-cigarette or usual care to smokers accessing a homeless centre. Design, Setting and Participants Multi-centre two-arm cluster-randomized controlled trial with mixed-method embedded process and economic evaluation in homeless centres in England, Scotland and Wales. Adult smokers (18+ years; n = 480) accessing homeless centres and who are known to centre staff and willing to consent. Intervention and Comparator Clusters (n = 32) will be randomized to either an e-cigarette starter pack with weekly allocations of nicotine containing e-liquid for 4 weeks [choice of flavours (menthol, fruit and tobacco) and strengths 12 mg/ml and 18 mg/ml] or the usual care intervention, which comprises very brief advice and a leaflet signposting to the local stop smoking service. Measurements The primary outcome is 24-week sustained carbon monoxide-validated smoking cessation (Russell Standard defined, intention-to-treat analysis). Secondary outcomes: (i) 50% smoking reduction (cigarettes per day) from baseline to 24 weeks; (ii) 7-day point prevalence quit rates at 4-, 12- and 24-week follow-up; (iii) changes in risky smoking practices (e.g. sharing cigarettes, smoking discarded cigarettes) from baseline to 4, 12 and 24 weeks; (iv) cost-effectiveness of the intervention; and (v) fidelity of intervention implementation; mechanisms of change; contextual influences and sustainability. Conclusions This is the first study, to our knowledge, to randomly assign smokers experiencing homelessness to an e-cigarette and usual care intervention to measure smoking abstinence with embedded process and economic evaluations. If effective, its results will be used to inform the larger-scale implementation of offering e-cigarettes throughout homeless centres to aid smoking cessation

Validation Of A Numerical Method For Determining Liner Impedance

This paper reports the initial results of a test series to evaluate a method for determining the normal incidence impedance of a locally reacting acoustically absorbing liner, located on the lower wall of a duct in a grazing incidence, multi-modal, nonprogressive acoustic wave environment without flow. This initial evaluation is accomplished by testing the methods' ability to converge to the known normal incidence impedance of a solid steel plate, and to the normal incidence impedance of an absorbing test specimen whose impedance was measured in a conventional normal incidence tube. The method is shown to converge to the normal incident impedance values and thus to be an adequate tool for determining the impedance of specimens in a grazing incidence, multi-modal, nonprogressive acoustic wave environment for a broad range of source frequencies. Nomenclature [A(i)]; [A I ]; [B I ] =complex block tridiagonal matrices [A [I;J] ] =local element matrix a; b =length and height, respectiv..