Married Women's Employment in Rapidly Industrializing Societies: Examples from East Asia

A variety of explaantions have addressed the phenomenon of scular change in married women's employment in rapidly industrializing countries. These include theoretical frameworks that emphasize female labor supply, the conditions of labor demand, patriarchal values, the international division of labor, and the effects of export-led industrialization. This article examines two societies (South Korea and Taiwan) that showed considerable similarity in female labor supply conditions, female labor force participation, and cultural values 20 years ago but have since diverged in dramatic and puzzling ways. Using aggregate and microlevel data, this article shows that the emergent differences in married women's employment are best explained by the intersection of labor supply (similar in the two cases) and demand (markedly different). The article highlights the impact of government policy and foreign loan investment in shaping the nature of labor demand during rapid export-led industrialization in both countriesSociolog

An experimental analysis of the effects of noise on Wi-Fi video streaming

Wireless networks such as WiFi suffer communication performance issues in addition to those seen on wired networks due to the characteristics of the radio communication channel used by their Physical Layers (PHY). Understanding these issues is a complex but necessary task given the importance of wireless networks for the transfer of wide ranging packet steams including video as well as traditional data. Simulators are not accurate enough to allow all the intricacies of such communication to be accurately understood, especially when complex interactions between the protocols of different layers occurs. The paper suggests cross layer measurement as a solution to the problem of understanding and analysis of such complex communication issues and proposes a framework in which appropriate performance measurements can be made from a WiFi network supporting a video streaming application. The framework has been used to collect these measurements at the PHY, MAC, Transport and Application layers. Analysis of the collected measurements has allowed the effects of noise interference at the PHY to be related to the perceived performance at the Application Layer for a video streaming application. This has allowed the effect of the SNR on the download time of a video sequence to be studied

Experimental assessment of the effects of cross-traffic on Wi-Fi video streaming

Wi-Fi networks are the first and sometimes only choice for the video streaming in homes, airports, malls, public areas and museums. However, Wi-Fi networks are vulnerable to interference, noise and have bandwidth limitations. Due to the intrinsic vulnerability of the communication channel, and the large number of variables involved, simulation alone is not enough in the evaluation of the performance of wireless networks. Actually, there is a tendency to give experimental tests a central role in the assessment of Wi-Fi networks performance. The paper presents an experimental analysis of the effects of cross traffic on the performance of video streaming over Wi-Fi, based on cross-layer measurements. Experiments are carried out in a semi-anechoic chamber, to prevent the results from being influenced by external factors. The experimental results permit to analyze the influence of cross traffic characteristics on cross layer measures and objective video quality metrics evaluated through a standardized approach

Population-Based Sexual Behavior Surveys in China: Liuzhou Compared with Other Prefectural Cities

Sexual behaviors in China are rapidly changing; simultaneously, STI/HIV prevalence is increasing in the general population. To investigate these major shifts, we examined sexual behaviors and self-reported sexually transmitted infections (STI) in one prefectural city in southern China, Liuzhou, and compared it to other prefectural cities throughout China. We used adults age 18-39 from two sets of population-based surveys that paralleled each other in both content and method. The first set was the Liuzhou survey conducted in 2008 (n=398). The second set consisted of two national surveys collected in 2006 and 2010 (n=2186). Liuzhou respondents reported more active social and sexual behaviors than their national counterparts, including more socializing, dancing, drinking excessively, sexual activity among never married men and women, purchasing commercial sex among men, one-night stands among men, multiple sexual partnerships and self-reported STI among both men and women. Women in Liuzhou reported greater sexual risk behavior than their national counterparts, although overall they reported less than their male counterparts; they were also more likely to have had an abortion than women in other prefectural cities. Our findings provide a comprehensive overview of the sexual context of Liuzhou among the general population, which may help explain the greater STI/HIV prevalence in Liuzhou

Estimation of Breast Cancer Incident Cases and Medical Care Costs Attributable to Alcohol Consumption Among Insured Women Aged <45 Years in the U.S.

This study estimated the percentage of breast cancer cases, total number of incident cases, and total annual medical care costs attributable to alcohol consumption among insured younger women (aged 18–44 years) by type of insurance and stage at diagnosis

Embracing the Market: Entry into Self-Employment in Transitional China, 1978-1996

This paper introduces labor market transition as an intervening process by which the macro institutional transition to a market economy alters social stratification outcome. Rather than directly addressing income distribution, it examines the pattern of workers’ entry into self-employment in reform-era China (1978-1996), focusing on rural-urban differences and the temporal trend. Analyses of data from a national representative survey in China show that education, party membership and cadre status all deter urban workers’ entry into self-employment, while education promotes rural workers’ entry into self-employment. As marketization proceeds, the rate of entry into self-employment increases in both rural and urban China, but urban workers are increasingly more likely to take advantages of the new market opportunities. In urban China, college graduates and cadres are still less likely to be involved in self-employment, but they are becoming more likely to do so in the later phase of reform. The diversity of transition scenarios is attributed to rural-urban differences in labor market structures.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/39897/3/wp512.pd

The generality of the GUGA MRCI approach in COLUMBUS for treating complex quantum chemistry

The core part of the program system COLUMBUS allows highly efficient calculations using variational multireference (MR) methods in the framework of configuration interaction with single and double excitations (MR-CISD) and averaged quadratic coupled-cluster calculations (MR-AQCC), based on uncontracted sets of configurations and the graphical unitary group approach (GUGA). The availability of analytic MR-CISD and MR-AQCC energy gradients and analytic nonadiabatic couplings for MR-CISD enables exciting applications including, e.g., investigations of π-conjugated biradicaloid compounds, calculations of multitudes of excited states, development of diabatization procedures, and furnishing the electronic structure information for on-the-fly surface nonadiabatic dynamics. With fully variational uncontracted spin-orbit MRCI, COLUMBUS provides a unique possibility of performing high-level calculations on compounds containing heavy atoms up to lanthanides and actinides. Crucial for carrying out all of these calculations effectively is the availability of an efficient parallel code for the CI step. Configuration spaces of several billion in size now can be treated quite routinely on standard parallel computer clusters. Emerging developments in COLUMBUS, including the all configuration mean energy multiconfiguration self-consistent field method and the graphically contracted function method, promise to allow practically unlimited configuration space dimensions. Spin density based on the GUGA approach, analytic spin-orbit energy gradients, possibilities for local electron correlation MR calculations, development of general interfaces for nonadiabatic dynamics, and MRCI linear vibronic coupling models conclude this overview

Resource Utilization and Cost-Effectiveness of Counselor- vs. Provider-Based Rapid Point-of-Care HIV Screening in the Emergency Department

Routine HIV screening in emergency department (ED) settings may require dedicated personnel. We evaluated the outcomes, costs and cost-effectiveness of HIV screening when offered by either a member of the ED staff or by an HIV counselor.We employed a mathematical model to extend data obtained from a randomized clinical trial of provider- vs. counselor-based HIV screening in the ED. We compared the downstream survival, costs, and cost-effectiveness of three HIV screening modalities: 1) no screening program; 2) an ED provider-based program; and 3) an HIV counselor-based program. Trial arm-specific data were used for test offer and acceptance rates (provider offer 36%, acceptance 75%; counselor offer 80%, acceptance 71%). Undiagnosed HIV prevalence (0.4%) and linkage to care rates (80%) were assumed to be equal between the screening modalities. Personnel costs were derived from trial-based resource utilization data. We examined the generalizability of results by conducting sensitivity analyses on offer and acceptance rates, undetected HIV prevalence, and costs.Estimated HIV screening costs in the provider and counselor arms averaged $8.10 and$31.00 per result received. The Provider strategy (compared to no screening) had an incremental cost-effectiveness ratio of $58,700/quality-adjusted life year (QALY) and the Counselor strategy (compared to the Provider strategy) had an incremental cost-effectiveness ratio of$64,500/QALY. Results were sensitive to the relative offer and acceptance rates by strategy and the capacity of providers to target-screen, but were robust to changes in undiagnosed HIV prevalence and programmatic costs.The cost-effectiveness of provider-based HIV screening in an emergency department setting compares favorably to other US screening programs. Despite its additional cost, counselor-based screening delivers just as much return on investment as provider based-screening. Investment in dedicated HIV screening personnel is justified in situations where ED staff resources may be insufficient to provide comprehensive, sustainable screening services

Priming with a Recombinant Pantothenate Auxotroph of Mycobacterium bovis BCG and Boosting with MVA Elicits HIV-1 Gag Specific CD8+ T Cells

A safe and effective HIV vaccine is required to significantly reduce the number of people becoming infected with HIV each year. In this study wild type Mycobacterium bovis BCG Pasteur and an attenuated pantothenate auxotroph strain (BCGΔpanCD) that is safe in SCID mice, have been compared as vaccine vectors for HIV-1 subtype C Gag. Genetically stable vaccines BCG[pHS400] (BCG-Gag) and BCGΔpanCD[pHS400] (BCGpan-Gag) were generated using the Pasteur strain of BCG, and a panothenate auxotroph of Pasteur respectively. Stability was achieved by the use of a codon optimised gag gene and deletion of the hsp60-lysA promoter-gene cassette from the episomal vector pCB119. In this vector expression of gag is driven by the mtrA promoter and the Gag protein is fused to the Mycobacterium tuberculosis 19 kDa signal sequence. Both BCG-Gag and BCGpan-Gag primed the immune system of BALB/c mice for a boost with a recombinant modified vaccinia virus Ankara expressing Gag (MVA-Gag). After the boost high frequencies of predominantly Gag-specific CD8+ T cells were detected when BCGpan-Gag was the prime in contrast to induction of predominantly Gag-specific CD4+ T cells when priming with BCG-Gag. The differing Gag-specific T-cell phenotype elicited by the prime-boost regimens may be related to the reduced inflammation observed with the pantothenate auxotroph strain compared to the parent strain. These features make BCGpan-Gag a more desirable HIV vaccine candidate than BCG-Gag. Although no Gag-specific cells could be detected after vaccination of BALB/c mice with either recombinant BCG vaccine alone, BCGpan-Gag protected mice against a surrogate vaccinia virus challenge