The Future of Contractual Mandatory Retirement in South Korea

Although contractual mandatory retirement at a specified age has been eliminated, or limited, in many Western nations, the practice remains widespread in other parts of the world. In South Korea (henceforth, Korea) most workers are subject to contractual mandatory retirement, often while still relatively young; that is, in the 50s. Korean retirement policies are deeply rooted in the belief by policy makers, employers and unions that mandatory retirement creates jobs for young workers. In addition, because worker compensation is linked to age, employers argue that the seniority-based wages paid to older workers are excessive. Notwithstanding the opposition to reforming retirement policies, Korea faces a rapidly aging population that will require modifications to existing retirement arrangements. Moreover, greater emphasis on human rights, and efforts to reduce age-based discrimination in employment, will add to the pressures to increase the age of contractual mandatory retirement.Mandatory Retirement, South Korea, Age Discrimination, Population Aging

Strengthening Fairness and Funding in the Canada Pension Plan: Is Raising the Retirement Age an Option?

This paper seeks to contribute to a forward-looking debate on possible reform options for the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) and the Quebec Pension Plan (QPP). Even though it focuses on the CPP, most of its analysis applies to the QPP as well since the two programs are largely identical. This paper does not provide a broad survey of all possible reform options, but rather analyzes one vital option that has received insufficient attention in previous debates: raising the normal retirement age from 65 to 67 years. A discussion of this option is warranted not only because it could prevent future financing problems in Canada’s public pension insurance programs, but also because it could improve fairness across generations. The significant increase in life expectancy raises the question of whether the current retirement ages of 60 years, for earliest CPP and QPP benefits, and 65 years, for full benefits, are too low. Should future generations pay for the longevity increases of the current generation of workers, or should current workers share the costs by retiring at a later age? We conclude that raising the normal age from 65 to 67 years—and the earliest age from 60 to 62 years—is a financially effective, intergenerationally fair, and politically acceptable option for improving the CPP and for addressing the QPP’s problems. We suggest that the option of raising the retirement age needs to be discussed well before longevity increases or funding problems occur and that a broad consultation with stakeholders and citizens would be an essential part of a debate on raising the retirement age in Canada.pension systems, pensions, retirement, retirement age, life expectancy, Canada

Simulating the Formation of Massive Protostars: I. Radiative Feedback and Accretion Disks

We present radiation hydrodynamic simulations of collapsing protostellar cores with initial masses of 30, 100, and 200 M$_{\odot}$. We follow their gravitational collapse and the formation of a massive protostar and protostellar accretion disk. We employ a new hybrid radiative feedback method blending raytracing techniques with flux-limited diffusion for a more accurate treatment of the temperature and radiative force. In each case, the disk that forms becomes Toomre-unstable and develops spiral arms. This occurs between 0.35 and 0.55 freefall times and is accompanied by an increase in the accretion rate by a factor of 2-10. Although the disk becomes unstable, no other stars are formed. In the case of our 100 and 200 M$_{\odot}$ simulation, the star becomes highly super-Eddington and begins to drive bipolar outflow cavities that expand outwards. These radiatively-driven bubbles appear stable, and appear to be channeling gas back onto the protostellar accretion disk. Accretion proceeds strongly through the disk. After 81.4 kyr of evolution, our 30 M$_{\odot}$ simulation shows a star with a mass of 5.48 M$_{\odot}$ and a disk of mass 3.3 M$_{\odot}$, while our 100 M$_{\odot}$ simulation forms a 28.8 M$_{\odot}$ mass star with a 15.8 M$_{\odot}$ disk over the course of 41.6 kyr, and our 200 M$_{\odot}$ simulation forms a 43.7 M$_{\odot}$ star with an 18 M$_{\odot}$ disk in 21.9 kyr. In the absence of magnetic fields or other forms of feedback, the masses of the stars in our simulation do not appear limited by their own luminosities.Comment: 24 pages, 14 figures. Accepted to The Astrophysical Journa

Different Perceptions of Race in Education: Racial Minority and White Teachers

We analyze the perceptions of White and racial minority teachers concerning antiracist education in the Toronto Board of Education. The findings highlight five topics on which White and racial minority teachers have different perspectives: views of antiracist educa- tion; support for employment equity; racial minority teachers as role models; the role of principals in antiracist education; and the treatment of racial minority teachers. Racial minority teachers face greater barriers than White teachers in the education system, barriers that hamper the full recognition and importance of racial diversity in education. White teachers are generally less supportive than their racial minority colleagues of antiracist education that attempts to shape the institutional culture of schools. Les auteurs analysent les perceptions des enseignants de race blanche et des enseignants faisant partie des minorités raciales au sujet de l’éducation antiraciste du Conseil scolaire de Toronto. Les conclusions de cette étude mettent en relief cinq sujets sur lesquels les points de vue des enseignants de race blanche et de ceux des minorités raciales diffèrent: les perceptions de l’éducation antiraciste, le soutien accordé à l’équité en matière d’em- plois, les enseignants des minorités raciales comme modèles de comportement, le rôle des directeurs d’école dans l’éducation antiraciste, et la façon dont sont traités les enseignants des minorités raciales. Ces derniers font face à des obstacles plus grands que les ensei- gnants de race blanche, des obstacles qui retardent la reconnaissance complète de l’impor- tance de la diversité raciale dans l’éducation. En règle générale, les enseignants de race blanche sont, par rapport à leurs collègues faisant partie des minorités raciales, moins en faveur de l’éducation antiraciste qui essaie de façonner la culture institutionnelle du système d’éducation.

The Pressures of Rapid Population Aging Affect Retirement, Work, and Pension Policies in South Korea

South Korea’s rapidly ageing population is putting pressure on the state to come up with new social policies that accommodate this demographic shift and prevent an age crisis. This shift has played a major role in shaping workplace and income security policies for the elderly.York’s Knowledge Mobilization Unit provides services and funding for faculty, graduate students, and community organizations seeking to maximize the impact of academic research and expertise on public policy, social programming, and professional practice. It is supported by SSHRC and CIHR grants, and by the Office of the Vice-President Research & Innovation. This summary was prepared by Marianne Lau. [email protected] www.researchimpact.c

A general hybrid radiation transport scheme for star formation simulations on an adaptive grid

Radiation feedback plays a crucial role in the process of star formation. In order to simulate the thermodynamic evolution of disks, filaments, and the molecular gas surrounding clusters of young stars, we require an efficient and accurate method for solving the radiation transfer problem. We describe the implementation of a hybrid radiation transport scheme in the adaptive grid-based FLASH general magnetohydrodynamics code. The hybrid scheme splits the radiative transport problem into a raytracing step and a diffusion step. The raytracer captures the first absorption event, as stars irradiate their environments, while the evolution of the diffuse component of the radiation field is handled by a flux-limited diffusion (FLD) solver. We demonstrate the accuracy of our method through a variety of benchmark tests including the irradiation of a static disk, subcritical and supercritical radiative shocks, and thermal energy equilibration. We also demonstrate the capability of our method for casting shadows and calculating gas and dust temperatures in the presence of multiple stellar sources. Our method enables radiation-hydrodynamic studies of young stellar objects, protostellar disks, and clustered star formation in magnetized, filamentary environments.Comment: 16 pages, 15 figures, accepted to Ap

Simulating protostellar evolution and radiative feedback in the cluster environment

Radiative feedback is among the most important consequences of clustered star formation inside molecular clouds. At the onset of star formation, radiation from massive stars heats the surrounding gas, which suppresses the formation of many low‐mass stars. When simulating pre‐main‐sequence stars, their stellar properties must be defined by a pre‐stellar model. Different approaches to pre‐stellar modelling may yield quantitatively different results. In this paper, we compare two existing pre‐stellar models under identical initial conditions to gauge whether the choice of model has any significant effects on the final population of stars. The first model treats stellar radii and luminosities with a zero‐age main‐sequence (ZAMS) model, while separately estimating the accretion luminosity by interpolating to published pre‐stellar tracks. The second, more accurate pre‐stellar model self‐consistently evolves the radius and luminosity of each star under highly variable accretion conditions. Each is coupled to a raytracing‐based radiative feedback code that also treats ionization. The impact of the self‐consistent model is less ionizing radiation and less heating during the early stages of star formation. This may affect final mass distributions. We noted a peak stellar mass reduced by 8 per cent from 47.3 to 43.5 M⊙ in the evolutionary model, relative to the track‐fit model. Also, the difference in mass between the two largest stars in each case is reduced from 14 to 7.5 M⊙. The H ii regions produced by these massive stars were also seen to flicker on time‐scales down to the limit imposed by our time‐step (<560 yr), rapidly changing in size and shape, confirming previous cluster simulations using ZAMS‐based estimates for pre‐stellar ionizing flu