Homelessness on Los Angeles\u27 Skid Row: A Theory of [Responsibility]

The pervasion of personal choice and personal responsibility language in research on homelessness is incorrect and damaging because it causes us to look at homelessness as the result of the personal flaws and failings of those who experience it, instead of as a societal structure that leads some people to be precariously housed and others to be better able to overcome obstacles such as mental illness and losing a job. This assumption of personal responsibility falsely portrays homelessness as something that everyone is equally at risk of experiencing and ignores alternate accounts of responsibility that would call into question our current policies. I take up the experience of homelessness from the point of view of those who experience it directly in order to retheorize responsibility and examine root causes of poverty and homelessness on Los Angeles’ “Skid Row.” Based on interviews with people who reside or have resided within Skid Row, I take up how respondents—as themselves theorists of their own experience—understand responsibility both in the abstract and in terms of their own situation. I turn to them to identify institutional improvements and changes in societal norms that could alleviate the problem, and offer new conceptions of responsibility that can be used to rethink policy directives and how we do research on homelessness. I develop an account of responsibility that allows us to rethink conditions that perpetuate cycles of chronic homelessness and critique institutions and systems that fail to take responsibility for their role in preventing individuals from rising out of Skid Row. By incorporating theories of homelessness and responsibility from homeless individuals themselves, I lay out a new way of looking at who or what is responsible for homelessness in order for society to address the problem differently

The Impact of Financial Renewable Energy Policy Incentives vs. Government Renewable Energy Regulatory Policies on CO2 Emissions and Employment in US States

With a clear political influence spearheading the fight against climate change, this paper investigates renewable energy policies in U.S. states from 2000 to 2018 by utilizing panel data and OLS regression analysis to pinpoint the most effective renewable energy policies. Policy data in each state comes from DSIRE, a database of state incentives for renewables & efficiency. Specific policies examined in this paper include Sales Tax Incentives, Grant Programs, Loan Programs, Renewable Portfolio Standards, Energy Standards for Public Buildings, Building Energy Codes, and Solar/Wind Access Policies. Controls for CO2 emission analysis include total state GDP, transportation GDP, manufacturing GDP, utilities GDP, number of registered vehicles, and population. All GDP controls are lagged to avoid endogeneity with CO2 emissions. Employment analysis includes sex and race as controls. Both dependent variables are run with state and year fixed effects. Contrary to existing literature, results vary depending upon the high-level subsamples in the analysis: High Emission Group, Low Emission Group, High Population Group, Low Population Group, Red States, and Blue States. Most policies examined have opposite effects in their subsample counterparts. For example, an RPS Policy increased emissions in Red States by 2.1% but decreased emissions by 3.4% in Blue States. However, a Grant or Loan Policy has positive impacts on employment across all subsamples. Overall, the results discussed in this paper give insight into how popular policies can be effective when implemented in the right situation. These findings indicate that policy-makers should make decisions on a case-by-case basis to reach their desired goals

Class Size and Class Heterogeneity

We study how class size and composition affect the academic and labor market performances of college students, two crucial policy questions given the secular increase in college enrollment. We rely on the random assignment of students to teaching classes. Our results suggest that a one standard deviation increase in the class-size would result in a 0.1 standard deviation deterioration of the average grade. Further, the effect is heterogenous as female and higher income students seem almost immune to the size of the class. Also, the effects on performance of class composition in terms of gender and ability appears to be inverse U-shaped. Finally, a reduction of 20 students (one standard deviation) in one's class size has a positive effect on monthly wages of about 80 Euros (115 USD) or 6% over the average.class size, heterogeneity, experimental evidence, academic performance, wages

H.B. 681: An Amendment to Ohio\u27s Consumer Sales Practices Act

The Ohio Consumer Sales Practices Act, passed in 1972, was designed to provide consumers with statewide protection against marketplace abuses. By declaring suppliers\u27 deceptive or unconscionable practices in connection with consumer transactions to be illegal, the 1972 Act was designed to promote fair bargaining in the marketplace. The passage of five years has demonstrated the inadequacy of this law in achieving its intended legislative purpose. In testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on March 15, 1978, William J. Brown, Ohio Attorney General, expressed his alarm over the deceptive-unconscionable \u27 clause description in the 1972 Act, as reflecting an inadequate enforcement standard for properly policing the unscrupulous supplier. … The Ohio Legislature responded to this call for consumer protection by enacting House Bill 6816 to cure the deficiencies in the 1972 Act. H.B. 681 widens the field of unlawful business methods to include a prohibition against unfair supplier acts or practices

How does Risk-selection Respond to Risk-adjustment? Evidence from the Medicare Advantage Program

Medicare administers a traditional public fee-for-service (FFS) plan while also allowing enrolles to join government-funded private Medicare Advantage (MA) plans.We model how selection and differential payments - the value of the capitation payments the firm receives to insure an individual minus the counterfactual cost of his coverage in FFS - change after the introduction of a comprehensive risk adjustment formula in 2004. Our model predicts that firm screening efforts along dimensions included in the model ("extensive-margin" selection) should fall, whereas screening efforts along dimensions excluded ("intensive-margin" selection) should increase. These endogenous responses to the risk-adjustment formula can in fact lead differential payments to increase. Using individual-level administrative data on Medicare enrollees from 1994 to 2006, we show that while MA enrollees are positively selected throughout the sample period, after risk adjustment extensive-margin selection decreases whereas intensive-margin selection increases. We find that differential payments actually rise after risk-adjustment, and estimate that they totaled $23 billion in 2006, or about six percent of total Medicare spending.Health Care Markets

“It Was Like Double Damage” : An Exploration of Clergy-Perpetrated Sexual Abuse, Institutional Response, and Posttraumatic Growth

This study examines the relationship between institutional responses to reports of clergy- perpetrated sexual abuse of adult women and the survivor’s level of posttraumatic growth, current spirituality, current religious commitment, well-being, and flourishing. The experience of adult women abused by clergy is not well-researched; this study seeks to highlight those experiences to the extent possible. This study utilized a mixed methods approach wherein surveys were collected from 108 participants, and follow up interviews were conducted with ten participants to further illustrate their experiences. All participants experienced some level of institutional betrayal which left lasting impacts on their ability to achieve posttraumatic growth, and their levels of spirituality, religious commitment, general well-being and flourishing. The findings suggest how a religious institution responds to reports of sexual abuse of adult women can make a difference in how that survivor experiences their life post-reporting of abuse. Interview participants shared recommendations for ways in which they felt institutions could better respond to reports of clergy-perpetrated sexual abuse. These findings support the need for additional research on institutional responses to reports of sexual abuse of adults by religious institutions

The development of empathy in childhood

Previous research has identified that children and adolescents, typically males, with behaviour problems have poorer empathic skills than their nonbehaviour disordered peers (e.g. De Wied, Goudena & 'Matthys, 2005). Since increased empathy is positively associated with prosocial behaviour and negatively associated with aggression (Strayer & Roberts, 2004) investigating what factors might affect child empathy might be of value in developing proactive and reactive interventions. Chapter 1 aims to review the current knowledge-base and to highlight the variety of parental factors which may affect empathy development in the typically developing child. Limitations of the research and suggestions for future research are discussed. Understanding how empathy develops in the typically developing child is important in order to understand where and why empathy development goes wrong. ! Chapter 2 presents an empirical study investigating empathy in boys with behavioural problems. This study aimed to investigate whether empathy scores were dependant on the relationship between the observer and the observed person. The findings offer some support for the prediction that empathy scores are enhanced when participants empathise with someone they have ~ positive relationship with. The thesis concludes with a reflective paper (Chapter 3) which considers the controversy between reductionism and holism in research and practice