Drug Reps Off Campus! Promoting Professional Purity by Suppressing Commercial Speech

In the name of restoring professionalism, an influential group of physician-educators have urged academic medical centers to take the lead in purging the house of medicine of the conflicts of interest created by industry's marketing. I argue that this revivalist movement is misguided, uses "conflict of interest" as an epithet, creates counter-productive incentives, and fails the duty to prepare physicians for ethical engagement with their commercial partners in patient care.     

Appropriations Politics in Congress: The House Appropriations Committee and the Executive Agencies

In the topsy-turvy world of congressional budgeting, last year's analysis is often out of date this year. How, then, could a work as old as most college sophomores have any relevance today? Richard Fenno's The Power of the Purse is a classic that passes the most challenging test of all time. Despite the very significant changes that have occurred in the congressional budget and appropriations processes, more than mere historical interest is to be found in Fenno's masterful study. While there are many relevant parts of the book, the following selection is from Fenno's exploration of the interplay between agency budget officials and the appropriations subcommittees. It was a pleasure to read these chapters again and I suspect that many other readers will be surprised at how insightful and fresh the study remains.     

Evaluation of an objective assessment technique for the detection of malingered memory deficits

Clinicians generally operate under the implicit assumption that their clients are being honest and putting forth their best effort on assessment procedures. However, clients may realize substantial secondary gains by appearing impaired. The present study evaluates an objective assessment procedure for the detection of malingered memory deficits. Results demonstrate that college students instructed to malinger memory impairment show different patterns of responding and can be clearly differentiated from students performing their best and from actual memory-impaired patients. Applying one of two scores derived from this test to a sample of 20 students instructed to malinger, 20 control subjects, and 20 memory impaired subjects performing their best resulted in a 100% hit rate for normal controls and memory-impaired subjects, and a 65% hit rate for experimental malingerers.This study was presented in a somewhat different form at the 10th Annual Conference of the National Academy of Neuropsychology; November, 1990; Reno. The test evaluated in this study is available to researchers upon request to the second author.     

Comment on Kirk Mcclure's “The low‐income housing tax credit program goes mainstream and moves to the suburbs”

Abstract

As McClure's article notes, the Low‐Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) program has indeed gone mainstream. Given the tarnished reputation of many other federal low‐income housing programs, this is good news. It is also surprising in some ways considering the many programmatic flaws inherent in the LIHTC program.

As a point of departure, I look at why McClure and others are able to describe the program in a positive light despite its many flaws. I attribute this to the unique political culture of the United States, for which the LIHTC program is well suited. In addition, it sidesteps one of the thorniest problems that have bedeviled low‐income housing programs—the spatial isolation of poor minorities. Until the LIHTC program explicitly addresses this issue, however, any praise must be tempered by a great deal of caution.     

The impact of source of income laws on voucher utilization

Vouchers are lauded both for being the most efficient way of delivering housing assistance to needy households and for the potential to allow poor households to access better neighborhoods. The success of vouchers is of course predicated on recipients being able to successfully use a voucher. For a number of reasons, including discrimination by landlords on the basis of source of income (i.e. a voucher), voucher recipients frequently cannot find apartments to lease. Using a difference-in-differences approach the research reported here examines how Source of Income anti-discrimination laws affect the utilization of housing vouchers.

The findings indicate that utilization rates are higher among Local Housing Authorities in jurisdictions with Source of Income anti-discrimination laws. These findings suggest such laws can be an effective tool for increasing the rate at which vouchers are successfully utilized. In a time of scarce resources for affordable housing this is an important policy tool that should not be over looked.