Housing Voucher Take‐Up and Labor Market Impacts

Low participation rates in government assistance programs are a major policy concern in the United States. This paper studies take‐up of Section 8 housing vouchers, a program in which take‐up rates are quite low among interested and eligible households. We link 18,109 households in Chicago that were offered vouchers through a lottery to administrative data and study how baseline employment, earnings, public assistance, arrests, residential location, and children's academic performance predict take‐up. Our analysis finds mixed evidence of whether the most disadvantaged or distressed households face the largest barriers to program participation. We also study the causal impact of peer behavior on take‐up by exploiting idiosyncratic variation in the timing of voucher offers. We find that the probability of lease‐up increases with the number of neighbors who recently received voucher offers. Finally, we explore the policy implications of increasing housing voucher take‐up by applying reweighting methods to existing causal impact estimates of voucher receipt. This analysis suggests that greater utilization of vouchers may lead to larger reductions in labor market activity. Differences in take‐up rates across settings may be important to consider when assessing the external validity of studies identifying the effects of public assistance programs.     

Positive engagement and support for single‐parent families: Building bridges across sector boundaries

The high rate of joblessness among single‐parent families in Australia, relative to other organisation for OECD countries has resulted in the development of various government initiatives designed to support single parents to prepare for and gain employment. The ParentsNext pilot program that began in March 2016, in 10 socially and economically deprived areas throughout Australia, is the most recent Federal Government program aimed at connecting parents with young children into local activities that will build their confidence, skills, and networks and ultimately prepare for future employment. The ParentsNext pilot program is delivered through contracted providers in each of the 10 disadvantaged areas. WISE Employment, a national not‐for‐profit organization together with its local partner, Youth Family and Community Connections, delivers the pilot program in Burnie, Tasmania. This article discusses the findings of a study, which examined the implementation of ParentsNext in Burnie and provides insights to inform and improve practice outcomes.     

A Long‐term Study of the Association between the Relative Poverty Rate and Suicide Rate in Japan

The annual number of suicides in Japan totaled around 23,000 in 1997 and abruptly increased to around 31,000 in 1998. This figure has remained high since then. This abrupt increase in the number of suicides was primarily due to an increase in suicides occasioned by economic concerns. The association between various economic factors and suicide must be studied in detail and over the long term in order to ascertain the association between economic concerns and suicide. This study examined the relative poverty rate and the suicide rate in Japan over 30 years and discussed the association between those two rates. The results suggest that the relative poverty rate may be associated with the suicide rate for both sexes. This association is true for men in particular. The organizations and professionals involved in implementing suicide prevention measures should be cognizant of the current findings and consider formulating additional specific measures.     

National and Local Vulnerability to Climate‐Related Disasters in Latin America: The Role of Social Asset‐Based Adaptation

The Latin American region is particularly prone to climate‐related natural hazards. However, this article argues that natural hazards are only partly to blame for the region's vulnerability to natural disasters with quantitative evidence suggesting instead that income per capita and inequality are main determinants of natural disaster mortality in Latin America. Locally, the region's poor are particularly susceptible to climate‐related natural hazards. As a result of their limited access to capital, adaptation based on social assets constitutes an effective coping strategy. Evidence from Bolivia and Belize illustrates the importance of social assets in protecting the most vulnerable against natural disasters.     

重视解决高校贫困生的精神贫困问题

随着我国高校收费制度的改革和高等教育的迅猛发展，高校贫困生规模也在逐年增加。贫困生由于经济和生活等条件较差，容易产生自我意识相对迷失、个体心理容易失衡、人际交往面临困境等问题。高校应该对贫困生进行物质和精神双方面扶持，加强精神扶持力度。为此，要从政策关怀、心理关怀、人文关怀、自我关怀等四个方面努力构建贫困生精神关怀助困体系。     

论民事诉讼中“以人为本”理念的贯彻

民事诉讼中“以人为本”就是民事诉讼要以民事当事人为中心,从人性出发,考虑当事人的特点或实际需要,尊重当事人的民事权利和民事诉讼权利,把当事人作为实质的主体,尽量减少法院的干预和异化。简单的说就是以民事当事人为第一位,法官（法院）为第二位,弱化法官职权、增强当事人诉讼权利,切实使“纸面上的法”转化为“行动中的法”,保障公民的权利义务真正得以实现。     

构建独立多功能的庭前审查程序——以遵循司法规律为视角

本文以庭前审查程序在我国的确立、适用及修法缘由为切入点,重点对1996年《刑事诉讼法》关于庭前审查程序的修改及由此导致司法实践中出现的各种问题作出修法检讨,在此基础上对理论界与实务界提出的各种改革建议和措施进行了评述,认为这些改革措施未能从根本上解决问题的原因是未将庭前审查程序设置为独立的诉讼程序。提出我国应遵循司法规律要求,将庭前审查程序设置为独立的诉讼程序,并赋予其多种功能。     

Drug booms and busts: poverty and prosperity in a Nicaraguan narco-barrio

Abstract

The income generated by the drug economy can often be substantial for the different parties involved, even at the lowest rung of this illicit trade. Yet the drugs trade is also a notoriously volatile activity, meaning that drug-related prosperity is highly prone to boom-and-bust cycles. Drawing on ongoing longitudinal ethnographic research in urban Nicaragua, this article explores the consequences of the cyclical nature of the drugs trade, tracing its unequal patterns of capital accumulation, as well as what happened to those who benefited from the drug economy when it became more exclusive and then subsequently moved on elsewhere.     

Are the LDCs really the world’s least developed countries?

The term ‘the least developed countries’ (LDCs) is widely understood to designate, exactly as stated, the world’s least developed countries. In conjunction with the 2015 United Nations (UN) triennial review of the LDC category, this article attempts to critically evaluate the UN’s list of LDC countries in the light of various indicators – economic, social, political, military and security related, and psychological. It concludes that the official and actual lists of LDCs, despite important similarities, are not completely identical. The term ‘the LDCs’ as used by the UN is therefore not fully consistent with the reality it attempts to designate and describe.