1,720 research outputs found
Barriers to the Employment of Welfare Recipients
Dramatic reductions in welfare caseloads since passage of the Personal Responsibility and WorkOpportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 have not allayed policy concerns about the employability of recipients remaining on the rolls. Analysis of potential barriers to employment can address whether current recipients have problems that either singly or in combination make it difficult for them to comply with the new requirements for getting and keeping jobs. In this paper, we explore the prevalence and work effects of 14 potential barriers in a new survey of a representative sample of 753 urban single-mother recipients. We report the prevalence of the barriers and how their number predicts employment rates, controlling for demographic characteristics. We also analyze which individual barriers are associated with employment and how a model inclusive of a comprehensive array of barriers improves upon a traditional human capital model of the work effects of education and work and welfare history. Single mothers who received welfare in 1997 had higher rates of personal health and mental health problems, domestic violence, and children’s health problems than do women in national samples, but they were no more likely than the general population to be drug or alcohol dependent. Only 15 percent of respondents had none of the barriers and almost two-thirds had two or more barriers. The numbers of multiple barriers were strongly and negatively associated with working, and among the individual barriers, low education, lack of access to transportation, poor health, having drug dependence or a major depressive disorder, and several experiences of workplace discrimination reduced employment. Welfare-to-work programs need to be more finely targeted with respect to exemptions and service provision, and states should consider providing longer-term and enhanced supports for those who face low prospects of leaving welfare for employment.
Assortativity and leadership emergence from anti-preferential attachment in heterogeneous networks
Many real-world networks exhibit degree-assortativity, with nodes of similar
degree more likely to link to one another. Particularly in social networks, the
contribution to the total assortativity varies with degree, featuring a
distinctive peak slightly past the average degree. The way traditional models
imprint assortativity on top of pre-defined topologies is via degree-preserving
link permutations, which however destroy the particular graph's hierarchical
traits of clustering. Here, we propose the first generative model which creates
heterogeneous networks with scale-free-like properties and tunable realistic
assortativity. In our approach, two distinct populations of nodes are added to
an initial network seed: one (the followers) that abides by usual preferential
rules, and one (the potential leaders) connecting via anti-preferential
attachments, i.e. selecting lower degree nodes for their initial links. The
latter nodes come to develop a higher average degree, and convert eventually
into the final hubs. Examining the evolution of links in Facebook, we present
empirical validation for the connection between the initial anti-preferential
attachment and long term high degree. Thus, our work sheds new light on the
structure and evolution of social networks
The Progenitor of SN 2005cs in the Whirlpool Galaxy
The progenitor of SN 2005cs, in the galaxy M51, is identified in
pre-explosion HST ACS WFC imaging. Differential astrometry, with post-explosion
ACS HRC F555W images, permitted the identification of the progenitor with an
accuracy of 0.006". The progenitor was detected in the F814W pre-explosion
image with I=23.3+/-0.2, but was below the detection thresholds of the F435W
and F555W images, with B<24.8 and V<25 at 5-sigma. Limits were also placed on
the U and R band fluxes of the progenitor from pre-explosion HST WFPC2 F336W
and F675W images. Deep images in the infra-red from NIRI on the Gemini-North
telescope were taken 2 months prior to explosion, but the progenitor is not
clearly detected on these. The upper limits for the JHK magnitudes of the
progenitor were J<21.9,H<21.1 and K<20.7. Despite having a detection in only
one band, a restrictive spectral energy distribution of the progenitor star can
be constructed and a robust case is made that the progenitor was a red
supergiant with spectral type between mid-K to late-M. The spectral energy
distribution allows a region in the theoretical HR diagram to be determined
which must contain the progenitor star. The initial mass of the star is
constrained to be M(ZAMS)=9+3/-2 M_solar, which is very similar to the
identified progenitor of the type II-P SN 2003gd, and also consistent with
upper mass limits placed on five other similar SNe. The upper limit in the deep
K-band image is significant in that it allows us to rule out the possibility
that the progenitor was a significantly higher mass object enshrouded in a dust
cocoon before core-collapse. This is further evidence that the trend for type
II-P SNe to arise in low to moderate mass red supergiants is real.Comment: Accepted (31/08/05) for publication in MNRAS Letter
Paraphysial Cysts of the Third Ventricle
The radiographic appearances of the third ventricle in 26 patients with colloid cysts, have been reviewed. The constant radiographic features and the invectigations in which the diagnostic yield is good are stressed
- …