Medical–Legal Partnerships: How Legal Services can Dramatically Improve Health Outcomes,and the Missed Opportunity to Help Women Seeking Abortions

There are significant health disparities in the United States, with low‐income and minority Americans experiencing higher rates of chronic disease and autoimmune disorders. Research has firmly established that social factors ‐ such as malnutrition, limited access to healthcare, and safe housing ‐ play a critical role in these health disparities. Medical‐Legal Partnerships are a relatively new approach to improving the health of people living in poverty by addressing the root causes of these health‐harming social factors. This article discusses the benefits of Medical‐Legal Partnerships and argues for continued expansion of the model, particularly in pediatricians’ offices, because parents are more likely to seek medical care for their children than themselves. This article further discusses how legal constraints prevent federal funding for Medical‐Legal Partnerships in abortion clinics; this creates a missed opportunity to work with women who are seeking abortions, many of whom face considerable social and economic challenges that could be addressed through legal assistance. This article digs into the legal restrictions that create this missed opportunity and proposes potential solutions to better serve the vulnerable population of abortion‐seeking women.     

社会保障体系完善与社会经济可持续发展——基于城乡差异和区域差距视角的统计分析

社会经济的又好又快发展,是我国社会保障体系可持续发展的坚实依托。而消费需求不足则是长期制约我国经济持续健康发展的瓶颈之一,在当前国际金融市场动荡、外部需求下降的情形下,扩大内需就显得更加紧迫。本文从定量的角度开展我国社会保障支出水平与社会保障可持续发展影响因素的关联序分析,认为确保社会保障支出可持续发展是实现我国经济可持续发展的前提;从城乡差异和区域差异的视角,通过实证分析,探讨城乡社会保障水平与扩大内需之间的关系,考察了社会保障支出项目对居民消费作用的城乡差异和区域差距。在此基础上提出,改善社会保障水平区域不平衡现状、建立覆盖城乡的全国社会保障体系、实施全国统一的社会保险关系转续办法和建立多部门协同管理的社会保障统计体系,将是我国扩大内需、促进经济稳定增长的长期战略。     

Saved By the Bell: Reclaiming Home Court Advantage for At‐Risk Youth Funneled into the School‐to‐Prison Pipeline

Far too often, minority students are faced with punitive disciplinary actions and are consequently directed to the “school‐to‐prison” pipeline. From education to discipline, implementation of policies that criminalize minor delinquent behavior pushes these students out of school and into the juvenile justice system. Traditional disciplinary actions that would land students in the principal's office have gradually transformed to students being handcuffed and thrown in jail. This Note proposes a model statute requiring states with a high criminal delinquency rate to implement school‐based youth courts in public high schools.     

Capability Failure and Group Disparities : Some Evidence from India for the 1980s

This paper advances a particular measure of deprivation - called the Capability Failure Ratio (CFR) - on the dimensions of longevity, knowledge and income, and suggests how an (inequality-) 'adjusted' version of the CFR may be derived. These measurement concerns are explored in the context of relevant State-wise data for the Indian Union. The paper thus makes an attempt to enrich the analysis of human predicament by sensitising 'measures of central tendency' to distributional concerns.     

The median voter hypothesis: Regional disparities and redistribution in China

The paper is focused on regional redistribution of revenue of China and proposes to test two hypotheses. The first one is the positive relationship between inequality in the distribution of local fiscal situation and the central redistribution. The second one is a possible political channel of redistribution: the median voter hypothesis. Both hypotheses are confirmed empirically by the study. Therefore the median voter hypothesis is helpful for analyzing the redistribution to narrow the regional disparities of local expenditure among provinces, although there is no formal voting process on regional redistribution. In the process of decision-making in China, regional preference can be expressed sufficiently without voting actions. Thus Representative Democracy might not be a prerequisite for Median Voter Hypothesis in the case of China. The author wishes to thank Professors Emerson Niou and John P. Burn for their help in preparing this article, and the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.