Invited Commentary: Seeking a Coherent Strategy in our Response to Homeless and Street-Involved Youth: A Historical Review and Suggested Future Directions

This invited commentary seeks to encourage a critical dialogue about youth homelessness that might assist in re-energizing a field that seems increasingly stagnant with a research body focused primarily on analyses of risk, hopelessly inadequate policy frameworks in most cities, diminishing funds for services, and decreasing media attention. Reviewing major trends in research and public responses to youth homelessness in the past century, I propose that there exist three major culturally-bound dimensions from which we construct our understanding of and responses to youth homelessness. These dimensions, which are considered in a transactional framework, are the scope of responsibility, the location of moral responsibility, and the amount of agency attributed to the youth. In this review I highlight the manner in which our historically binary and uncritical understanding of these dimensional characterizations of youth homelessness has led to major lapses in the effectiveness of our collective efforts to address this problem. I highlight gaps in the existing body of research literature and provide this framework, arguing that a strategic and cohesive response is vital if we are to move from reiterations of risk and hackneyed calls for prevention strategies to the generation of meaningful solutions.     

National Election Cycles and the Intermittent Political Safeguards of Federalism

Scholars have challenged the notion of "political safeguardsof federalism" in a large and well-developed body of work onthe use of coercive policy tools by the federal government.This study suggests, however, that there may be some utilityin re-examining the political factors that help to constrainthe growth of national power. Specifically, it argues that theneed to win votes from subnational constituencies makes nationallawmakers less supportive of mandates, preemptions, and taxsanctions during election cycles and, thus, provides an intermittentsafeguard of state authority. It tests and finds evidence forhypotheses related to that general argument in analyses of thepassage of coercive federalist policies over the last thirtyyears.     

A Chinese Medicine Convert

正I have a confession,and it’s one that I’m sure my Chinese colleagues will berate me for:When it came to Traditional Chinese Medicine(TCM),I was a bit of a doubter.I didn’t doubt that Chinese medicine could be effective.I just wasn’t sure that in this age of modern medicine,where pharmacies have come to resemble Hogwarts Potions Labs,     

Stratification by regulation: Are bootleggers and Baptists biased?

This paper investigates whether and to what extent regulation may be associated with wage inequality. Using regulation measures created by Al-Ubaydli and McLaughlin (Regul Govern 11:109–123, 2017), I find that regulation is associated with larger within-occupation wage inequality. Specifically, I show that a worker at the 90th wage percentile realizes a raise of $1.19 per hour relative to the 10th percentile earner for each standard deviation increase in regulation. That represents a 3.5% raise for a worker at the 90th percentile. Overall, increases in the regulatory burden are associated with 42–45% of the change in the 90th–10th percentile wage ratio from 2002 through 2014.

     

State Merit Amicus Participation and Federalism Outcomes in the U.S. Supreme Court

Research suggests that merit amicus curiae participation correlateswith Supreme Court decision making and that states make frequentand effective use of this tool. To date, however, no study hasadequately examined the relationship between state amicus participationand the federalism values reflected in the Court's decisions.This article dev"Lelops and finds evidence for the assertionthat, when they cooperate in the amicus process, state participationis associated with an increase in the likelihood of rulingsfavoring state rather than national government power.     

Manufacturing Trust: Community Currencies and the Creation of Social Capital

In this study I examine whether an innovative government program in Ichikawa, Japan has been successful in increasing the level of generalized interpersonal trust in the community by rewarding civic participation by local citizens. Japan has sponsored the development of a number of “community currency” programs at the local level that are designed to create social capital. A community currency is a local “money” that is only useable within a neighborhood or town. In a typical community currency program, a town rewards civic volunteers with credits to barter with other citizens, use at participating stores, or pay for town services. These programs are specifically designed to stimulate generalized trust by rewarding civic engagement and encouraging social interaction. I evaluate whether the new Tekona community currency program in Ichikawa, Japan has been successful in raising levels of trust among participants, as compared to a randomly selected control group of town residents. I find that community currency involvement increases general trust, which demonstrates that it is possible to institute government programs that create social capital.

Properties of novel and widely studied Y-STR loci in three South African populations

The objective of the present study was to examine the properties of a set of single-copy Y-STR loci to assess their suitability for forensic casework in three South African populations. Three criteria were used to select markers for assessment. Firstly, the single-copy markers of the minimal haplotype were selected based on their established use in forensic studies. Secondly, 8 markers were selected on the basis of high gene diversity values reported for several population studies, and thirdly 19 markers were chosen from a survey of Y-chromosome sequence with selections made primarily on the basis of the number of repeated elements present. Samples were typed from 101 English-speaking Caucasians, 88 Xhosa individuals and 77 Asian Indians. Gene diversity values, the number of alleles identified and the average stutter was determined for each locus.     

Capacity,Guidance, and the Implementation of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act

Programs administered by the U.S. Department of Energy under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009 were designed to spur investment in clean energy and jump‐start the economy. There was considerable variation, however, in the proportion of obligated funds that states spent during each year. A primary goal of the ARRA was to infuse as much money as possible into the struggling economy; however, there was significant variation in the success with which states implemented these programs. This article draws on and extends the literature on intergovernmental implementation to explain such variation. The authors argue that jurisdictional capacity and federal guidance were important determinants of the rate at which states spent ARRA funds and, more important, that these factors interacted with one another in the implementation process. This assertion is tested using a mixed‐methods approach that includes a regression analysis of state ARRA spending between 2009 and 2012, as well as an evaluation of interviews conducted with 46 state agency representatives responsible for spending ARRA energy funds.