Parental Substance Abuse and Foster Care: Evidence from Two Methamphetamine Supply Shocks

Foster care caseloads have almost doubled over the last two decades, but the cause of the growth is poorly understood. We study the role of parental methamphetamine (meth) use, which social workers have linked to recent growth in foster care admissions. To mitigate the impact of omitted variable bias, we take advantage of two significant, exogenous supply-side interventions in meth markets in 1995 and 1997, and find robust evidence that meth use has caused growth in foster care caseloads. Further, we identify the mechanisms by which increased meth use caused an increase in foster care caseloads. First, we find that treatment for meth abuse caused foster caseloads to fall in situations where a child was removed because of parental incarceration, suggesting that substance abuse treatment is a substitute for foster care services and more generally an effective demand-side intervention. Secondly, we find that parental meth use causes an increase in both child abuse and child neglect foster care cases. These results suggest that child welfare policies should be designed specifically for the children of meth-using parents.child welfare, illegal drugs, crime

Fakelore vs. Folklore - Again

Notes for Querie

A Platform for Proactive, Risk-Based Slope Asset Management, Phase II

INE/AUTC 15.0

Marriage Equality, Workplace Inequality: The Next Gay Rights Battle

Same-sex marriage is not the only civil rights issue impacting the gay community. Although the Supreme Court’s decision in Obergefell v. Hodges represented a momentous victory on same-sex marriage, workplace protections affect far more people and remain a high priority for many lesbians and gay men. Today, even though the Supreme Court has invalidated state marriage restrictions across the country, federal law still makes it perfectly permissible to fire a gay man for telling a coworker about his sexuality or to discharge a woman for displaying her wife’s picture at work. This Article critically evaluates the relationship between same-sex marriage and workplace rights. Focused narrowly on case-by-case tactics, proponents of same-sex marriage won in court by selectively choosing gay couples who appeared “safe” and “ordinary” to judges. The decision to prioritize marriage over other gay civil rights—while utilizing reductive depictions of gay relationships in the process—raises distinct challenges for lawyers attempting to extend victories on the marriage front to other important legal realms such as employment protections. Outlining a model for thinking about gay rights beyond marriage, this Article calls for renewed attention to the argument that sexual orientation discrimination constitutes a form of sex discrimination. The cultural imperative requiring individuals to desire only partners of the opposite sex constitutes American society’s most enduring gender stereotype. Employers and states that punish sexual minorities for violating this norm engage in both sexual orientation discrimination and sex discrimination. By combating discrimination in employment, housing, and other civil rights areas, this refocused approach to gay rights applies to numerous legal contexts outside of marriage, thereby addressing the legal needs of a much larger segment of the gay community

Redefining the Rights of Undocumented Workers

Should a nation extend legal rights to those who enter the country illegally? The Supreme Court recently addressed this question when it held that unauthorized immigrants who are fired illegally for unionizing cannot recover monetary remedies. This has led to a significant decline in employment protections for unauthorized immigrants beyond the unionized sector. For example, some courts now question whether unauthorized immigrants can receive full remedies for sexual harassment, workplace discrimination, or on-the-job injuries. Scholars have criticized these losses but have yet to formulate a coherent framework for evaluating the employment rights of unauthorized immigrants. This article does so by distilling and applying several core principles at issue when employment laws conflict with immigration laws. I begin by explaining how the text and purpose of selected immigration and employment statutes show that Congress never intended to restrict unauthorized immigrants’ employment rights. Remedial restrictions not only harm the workplace protections at issue, they fail to discourage illegal immigration. Thus, neither legislative intent nor national immigration goals justify limiting the workplace remedies available to unauthorized immigrants. Although the future rights of unauthorized workers will turn partly on the issues of statutory purpose and immigration policy discussed in the early sections of the article, equally important are the consequences of diminished rights. Accordingly, the article concludes by explaining why restricting workplace protections based on status harms citizens as well as immigrants. Cunningham-Parmeter contends that employment protections are “rights of partial inclusion” that reflect a distinctive sphere - the workplace - where unauthorized immigrants should be placed on par with citizens in pursuing collective interests. In contrast to arguments that favor limiting resources to lawful residents, partial inclusion explains how employment protections can effectively preserve national identity while simultaneously enhancing unauthorized immigrants’ incentives for social investment. In doing so, partial inclusion furthers the community’s self-definition, while providing unauthorized immigrants with a sense of belonging in a world increasingly focused on their exclusion

(Un)Equal Protection: Why Gender Equality Depends on Discrimination

Most accounts of the Supreme Court’s equal protection jurisprudence describe the Court’s firm opposition to sex discrimination. But while the Court famously invalidated several sex-based laws at the end of the twentieth century, it also issued many other, less-celebrated decisions that sanctioned sex-specific classifications in some circumstances. Examining these long-ignored cases that approved of sex discrimination, this Article explains how the Court’s rulings in this area have often rejected the principle of formal equality in favor of broader antisubordination concerns. Outlining a new model of equal protection that authorizes certain forms of sex discrimination, (Un)Equal Protection advocates for one particular discriminatory policy that could dramatically promote gender equality in the decades to come. Fatherhood bonuses— laws that give families additional parental leave when fathers stay at home with their newborns—have the potential to drastically reorder gendered divisions of labor and expand women’s workplace opportunities. Countries that have experimented with fatherhood bonuses have seen women with children spend more time in paid work, advance in their careers, and earn higher wages. Applying these international models to the American context, this Article explains why fatherhood bonuses would fit comfortably within our constitutional framework, which authorizes discriminatory policies when such policies support women’s public participation. (Un)Equal Protection concludes by proposing a model for fatherhood bonuses in the United States that would encourage more men to perform care work, thereby advancing the goal of gender equality for both sexes

(Un)Equal Protection: Why Gender Equality Depends on Discrimination

Most accounts of the Supreme Court’s equal protection jurisprudence describe the Court’s firm opposition to sex discrimination. But while the Court famously invalidated several sex-based laws at the end of the twentieth century, it also issued many other, less-celebrated decisions that sanctioned sex-specific classifications in some circumstances. Examining these long-ignored cases that approved of sex discrimination, this Article explains how the Court’s rulings in this area have often rejected the principle of formal equality in favor of broader antisubordination concerns. Outlining a new model of equal protection that authorizes certain forms of sex discrimination, (Un)Equal Protection advocates for one particular discriminatory policy that could dramatically promote gender equality in the decades to come. Fatherhood bonuses— laws that give families additional parental leave when fathers stay at home with their newborns—have the potential to drastically reorder gendered divisions of labor and expand women’s workplace opportunities. Countries that have experimented with fatherhood bonuses have seen women with children spend more time in paid work, advance in their careers, and earn higher wages. Applying these international models to the American context, this Article explains why fatherhood bonuses would fit comfortably within our constitutional framework, which authorizes discriminatory policies when such policies support women’s public participation. (Un)Equal Protection concludes by proposing a model for fatherhood bonuses in the United States that would encourage more men to perform care work, thereby advancing the goal of gender equality for both sexes