Unemployment and Poverty in Western New York

It is a common understanding that a high unemployment rate means that more people are out of work and therefore more people have fallen into poverty. But the relationship between unemployment and poverty is complex, and the two may not always relate very directly. It is necessary to examine states, counties, and even cities separately to determine the extent of this relationship and the possibilities of other influential factors

Humor in Corporate Work Place Interactions: It\u27s Not What You Can Do for Humor, but What Humor Can Do for You

This review examines the role of humor in work place interactions through the social constructionist perspective (Hatch 1997). That is, this review explores the ways in which people construct their interactions through humor, and the effects that has on their performance in the work place. However, according to Robinson, “any attempt to analyze humor risks taking all the fun out of the subject,” but this review is going to do just that (2001:123). Humor is often defined as being in the eye of the beholder. However, there are a few theories as to what constitutes humor. Humor is generally known as a verbal or written incongruity, or inconsistency with a societal norm, and communicated with the intention of being amusing (O’Quin 1981). This review focuses on that humor which is intended to be humorous, regardless of the outcome. Humor is a diverse and complex creature that has been scrutinized by some of the most learned scholars over the years, as shown in this review, which has sources dating back to 1951. The wealth of knowledge gathered on humor over the years shows that humor can be used in just about any way imaginable. Humor can be used to alienate people (Emerson 1969; Fine and De Soucey 2005; Robinson and Smith-Lovin 2001; Stephenson 1951), to create conflict (Hatch 1997; Stephenson 1951), to ease conflict (Rose 2007; Romero and Cruthirds 2006; Stephenson 1951), to broach taboo topics (Emerson 1969; Sanford and Elder 1984; Stephenson 1951), or even to explore one’s own identity (Rose 2007; Sanford and Elder 1984). This review will briefly touch on all of these things, but the main focus of this review is the use of humor in the workplace, and how it is used to the benefit of the company and its employees. The review explores how and why humor builds group cohesion, facilitates communication, relieves stress, and (spark) sparks creativity (Romero and Cruthirds 2006; Romero and Pescosolido 2008). Managers and employees who use humor in a productive manner can create an atmosphere that stimulates many desirable aspects of the corporate workplace. However, humor is not entirely a bag full of chuckles, as there are some serious implications that are associated with humor (Emerson 1969). Humor can be used in a variety of unpleasant ways(;), both intentionally and unintentionally, such as to create boundaries between people, and can cause hurt feelings. This is important because it is entirely counterproductive to humor that enhances work place productivity. Productivity in the work place is essential, especially to managers, as this generation of employees increasingly expect work to be fun (Romero and Pescosolido 2008). This is highly relevant in this day and age, as employers must look for innovative ways to motivate their employees

Bringing Military Tribunals into Focus

How do you draw the line between national security and individual rights? A new movie, developed in collaboration with the law school, sheds fresh insights on the issues so fundamental to the secrecy-shrouded U.S. military tribunals at Guantanamo, Cuba

Book Review

Review of the following: Risk-Taking BEHAVIOR. (J. Frank Yates, ed., Wiley 1992) [244 pp.] Acknowledgements, author index, figures, preface, references, series preface, subject index, tables. LC 91-21229, ISBN 0-471-92250-1. [Cloth $64.95. 1 Wiley Drive, Somerset NJ 08875

Crimes Involving Intangible Property

[Excerpt] “A well-known cliché came to life when “[t]he pope’s butler was convicted . . . of stealing the pontiff’s private documents and leaking them to a journalist . . . .” His lawyer’s unsuccessful argument—that taking “only photocopies, not original documents” should not be criminal—prompted this paper. When tangible property is taken, owners retain nothing. When documents or equivalents are duplicated, however, even if owners retain originals, they suffer loss of control and may lose substantial present and potential advantages, not necessarily economic. Civil redress for such losses has therefore long been available through copyright and trade secret laws. Indeed, it has often been available when injuries occasioned by unauthorized reproduction seem unrelated to goals traditionally advanced by either body of law. Thus, the way information is expressed may be protected by copyright and, until published, if it otherwise qualifies, information as such may also enjoy trade secret protection. When civil remedies are inadequate to deter theft and vindicate interests of owners and the public, civil remedies can be augmented with criminal penalties. Differences between tangibles and intangibles, however, are often seen to warrant different prosecutorial requirements and penalties. The second part of this paper explains how federal courts, recognizing those differences, have come to find the National Stolen Property Act (“NSPA”) inapplicable to theft of at least some intangibles. Ones addressed there fall within the scope of the Federal Copyright Act (“FCA”) and the Economic Espionage Act of 1996 (“EEA”). … The paper concludes, first, by echoing a suggestion that lack of uniformity in state law justifies federal penalties and expanded jurisdiction. It also advocates more uniformity and better articulation of the subject matter contemplated by the term “intangibles” in, for example, the Model Penal Code. Finally, the paper argues that even when tangibles such as media are taken, courts should, for example, not base their value on the value of its intangible contents.

100 ways to make a Japanese house

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content: Scenes of children making dollhouses are something of a leitmotif in Rumer Godden’s celebrated doll stories. Her first children’s novel, The Dolls’ House (1947), has sisters Charlotte and Emily Dane refurbishing a Victorian dollhouse, while in 1956’s The Fairy Doll, the young protagonist Elizabeth fashions a more unassuming home for her doll. Of course, Charlotte, Emily, and Elizabeth are not alone in these pursuits, and Godden is not the only mid-twentieth-century children’s writer to detail them. One of Elinor Brent-Dyer’s Chalet School heroines, Tom Gay, creates many dollhouses in her time at the school, selling these at the end-of-school sales; the first appears in Tom Tackles the Chalet School (serialized in 1947 and 1948 before being released as a single volume in 1955). The Five Dolls series by Helen Clare is likewise full of improvised dollhouse objects and craft activities; in Five Dolls in a House (1953), for example, heroine Elizabeth converts her child-sized blue velvet ribbon into a dolls’ staircase carpet, blithely saying, “we’ll pin it on with drawing-pins as I haven’t any stair rods” (58). However, what is an ancillary, if significant, motif in Brent-Dyer, Clare, and even The Dolls’ House or The Fairy Doll becomes the defining narrative preoccupation in two of Godden’s lesser-known works, her 1961 children’s novel Miss Happiness and Miss Flower and its sequel Little Plum (1963)