In this article I present a critical reconstruction of the concept of postfordism, arguing for a regulation-theoretic approach that views Fordism and postfordism not in terms of production models based on a particular labour process but as institutional regimes of competition, within which there are one of four types of generic labour process: high-autonomy, semiautonomous, tightly constrained and unrationalized labour-intensive. I show that over one-third of US employment is in low-autonomy jobs and sketch an analytical framework for analysing job quality. Contrasting the four labour processes with various measures of job quality produces 18 job types that reduce to one of three job quality categories: good jobs, bad jobs and decent jobs. The typology provides a framework for analysing upgrading or downgrading of four aspects of employment quality within and across the four generic labour processes.

En las últimas décadas, el tema de la migración calificada, es decir, de personas con amplia experiencia laboral, habilida- des extraordinarias o con un alto nivel de educación formal, adquirió mayor resonancia. La atención en el tema se fundamenta en distintos aspectos: 1) Debido a que la migración calificada repre- senta un componente cada vez mayor de los flujos migratorios a nivel mundial; 2) Por los supuestos efectos positivos o negativos que esta migración tiene en el desarrollo de los países de origen y de des- tino; y 3) Dado que un porcentaje considerable de estos inmigrantes suele emplearse en las naciones de acogida en ocupaciones para las cuales no se requieren altos niveles de calificación, lo que implica una subutilización de capacidades de esta fuerza laboral.

Do women really sleep more than men? Biomedical and social scientific studies show longer sleep durations for women, a surprising finding given sociological research showing women have more unpaid work and less high-quality leisure time compared to men. We assess explanations for gender differences in time for sleep, including compositional differences in levels of engagement in paid and unpaid labor, gendered responses to work and family responsibilities, and differences in napping, bedtimes, and interrupted sleep for caregiving. We examine the overall gender gap in time for sleep as well as gaps within family life-course stages based on age, partnership, and parenthood statuses. We analyze minutes of sleep from a diary day collected from nationally representative samples of working-age adults in the American Time Use Surveys of 2003 to 2007. Overall and at most life course stages, women slept more than men. Much of the gap is explained by work and family responsibilities and gendered time tradeoffs; as such, gender differences vary across life course stages. The gender gap in sleep time favoring women is relatively small for most comparisons and should be considered in light of the gender gap in leisure time favoring men at all life course stages.

We exploit exogenous variation in college completion induced by draft-avoidance behavior during the Vietnam War to examine the impact of college completion on adult mortality. Our preferred estimates imply that increasing college completion rates from the level of the state with the lowest induced rate to the highest would decrease cumulative mortality by 28 percent relative to the mean. Most of the reduction in mortality is from deaths due to cancer and heart disease. We also explore potential mechanisms, including differential earnings, health insurance, and health behaviors, using data from the Census, ACS, and NHIS.

Information Systems of the Public Sector as a data source for micro-analysis in urban environment: Information systems of both central and local governments represent important data sources for micro- analysis enabling to monitor and model spatio-temporal situation and utilize them in new applications. They provide possibilities how to identify trends, better understand and explain processes running in a given territory, trigger early warnings and launch well-targeted measures which can help to i.e. eliminate societal threats. Real-time links to selected sources enable to develop new applications especially for the mobile platform providing highly updated and accurate services i.e. for transport optimisation. The exploitation of public sector information systems faces many issues including legislative and ethical requirements, data harmonisation, and consistency improvements. The paper identifies main plus and contras, opportunities, and describes selected examples of application especially in urban environment.

The flow of immigrants into the United States has steadily increased and now approaches levels unmatched since nearly a century ago. Similar to prior generations of immigrants, today’s foreign-born encounter numerous barriers that often lead to low-paying, dead-end jobs. This is despite public (mis)perceptions that hard work always leads to achieving the “American Dream.” Yet it remains unclear for whom and under what circumstances assimilation and labor market dynamics are most decisive. How do potential barriers intersect with individual efforts to integrate? Where and for whom is inequality reinforced or diminished? And, what are the consequences for immigrant and minority group earnings, mobility, and broader labor market and local experiences? Responding to recent calls for a more comprehensive approach to understanding racial/ethnic labor market inequality (e.g., see Portes and Rumbaut 2001; Kornrich 2009; Restifo, Roscigno, and Qian 2013), this dissertation examines how individual and structural processes simultaneously shape historical and contemporary racial/ethnic minority labor market experiences and outcomes. Drawing on quantitative and qualitative research techniques, I undertake three in-depth comparative analyses centering on Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles and New York City—four metropolitan areas encompassing diverse racial/ethnic populations, industrial makeup, and social-political dynamics. Utilizing U.S. Census microdata (1910 to 1930), my first analysis focuses on early twentieth century male labor force participants andexamines group-specific economic sector concentrations and earnings differentials for various immigrant and domestic minority groups. My second analysis introduces a novel dataset derived from content analysis of the Atlanta Constitution, Chicago Daily Tribune, Los Angeles Times, and New York Times (1905-1920), and explores processes frequently associated with labor market inequality—including racial/ethnic antagonisms, stereotyping, and assimilation. Finally, my third analysis draws on data from the 2010 American Community Survey, and examines present-day wage disparities for immigrant and domestic minority men and women in these same four cities. Findings clearly demonstrate, for both historical and contemporary periods and across distinct labor markets, the ways in which assimilative and human capital attributes are important for reducing labor market inequality. The analyses also demonstrate, however, important ways in which labor market opportunities and returns are embedded within, and disparately shaped by, dynamics of inter-group competition and racial/ethnic hierarchy. This was true for certain white ethnics at the turn of the last century as well as for Asian and Latino immigrant populations today. And in both eras, caste-like barriers are pronounced for African Americans. Taken together, this dissertation sheds important light on processes of racial/ethnic closure relative to historical and contemporary periods, and depending on the competitive mix of populations, within specific labor markets.

The Data Documentation Initiative (DDI) is an acknowledged international standard for the documentation and management of data from the social, behavioral, and economic sciences. Statistical domain experts, i.e. representatives of national statistical institutes and national data archives, and Linked Open Data community members have developed the DDI-RDF Discovery Vocabulary-based on a subset of the DDI-in order to support the discovery of statistical data as well as metadata. This vocabulary supports identifying programmatically the relevant data sets for a specific research purpose.

Diversas investigaciones señalan que las diferencias de género disminuyen a lo largo del proceso de desarrollo y que el estatus de las mujeres avanza con la modernización. Desde otro punto de vista se sostiene que la vulnerabilidad de las mujeres continúa o incluso puede aumentar a pesar del desarrollo. Entre estos dos puntos de vista opuestos otras investigaciones enfatizan en la importancia del tipo de desarrollo en el estatus de la mujer. La inequidad de género puede reducirse en determinadas áreas como la educación o la salud pero permanecer en niveles altos en el mercado de trabajo. Esta parece ser una de las características del desarrollo latinoamericano. El objetivo de esta ponencia es construir una historia global y comparada sobre la evolución de la brecha de género en indicadores básicos del desarrollo humano: educación, salud y participación en el mercado de trabajo en América Latina. Dada la dificultad para acceder ala información, nos planteamos abarcar una muestra que incluye países representativos del contexto latinoamericano (Chile, Brasil, Argentina, Colombia, México y Uruguay).

We assess the extent to which manufacturing decline and housing booms contributed to changes in U.S. non-employment during the 2000s. Using a local labor market design, we estimate that manufacturing decline significantly increased non-employment during 2000-2007, while local housing booms decreased non-employment by roughly the same magnitude. The effects of manufacturing decline persist through 2011, but we find no persistent non-employment effects of local housing booms, most plausibly because housing booms are associated with subsequent busts of similar magnitude. We also find that housing booms significantly reduce the likelihood that displaced manufacturing workers remain non-employed, suggesting that housing booms masknon-employment growth that would have otherwise occurred earlier in the absence of the booms. Applying our estimates to the national labor market, we find that hosing booms reduced non-employment growth by roughly 30 percent during 2000-2007 and that roughly 40 percent of the aggregate increase in non-employment during 2000-2011 can be attributed to manufacturing decline. Collectively, our results suggest that much of the non-employment growth during the 2000s can be attributed to manufacturing decline and these effects would have appeared in aggregate statistics earlier had it not been for the large, temporary increases in housing demand.

This dissertation assesses the environmental justice implications of New York State and New York City laws designed to encourage the cleanup and remediation of contaminated and vacant properties, also known as brownfields. To do so, the dissertation asks three questions. First, do brownfield policies promote the cleanup and redevelopment of contaminated sites in areas with predominantly poor and minority residents? Second, when brownfield development does occur in these neighborhoods, does it improve environmental conditions? And third, to what extent do brownfield policies offer residents, business owners, and others living, working, and playing near brownfield sites a voice in the remediation and development process? To answer these questions the dissertation uses a two-step, multi-scalar, and mixed-method approach. In the first step, the dissertation uses methods of randomization to describe the characteristics of populations and properties near sites enrolled in New York State’s brownfield program at the scale of the city. In the second step, the dissertation investigates the impact of brownfield development in three case study neighborhoods –the Gowanus and East New York neighborhoods in Brooklyn and Melrose Commons in the Bronx. Through these analyses, the dissertation concludes that the environmental justice implications of New York State’s and New York City’s brownfield policies are uneven. While state and city policies may encourage development in areas with higher property values and a higher proportion of white and wealthy residents, for the most part, they have little impact in areas with predominantly poor and non-white residents. When brownfield development does occur in these neighborhoods, it tends to exacerbate existing environmental injustices. Although the clean-up and development of contaminated sites may protect human and ecological health within the site’s boundaries, it often exacerbates environmental problems in the surrounding areas. City and state brownfield policies further exacerbates environmental injustices by providing few opportunities for nearby resident and business to influence remedial methods or future land uses. There are, however, exceptions to these findings. In neighborhoods with a history of community, comprehensive, and area-wide planning, brownfield policies are much closer to fulfilling the policies’ stated ambition.

The restaurant industry is one of the largest sectors in the United States economy and is projected to be among those with the largest growth by 2020.1 It currently employs over 10 million workers.2 Between 2000 and 2010, our economy as a whole shed jobs at a rate of -0.2 percent.3 However, food services and drinking places are projected to create over 860,000 new jobs between 2010 and 2020.4 Similarly, our economic output in the last ten years ambled along at a rate of 1 percent of growth, while restaurants grew one and a half times faster, adding $134.7 billion to our economy. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects the industry’s growth to continue apace over the next ten years.5 Despite the industry’s growth and potential for lifting the livelihoods of its workers, especially for women and mothers, working conditions have deteriorated and wages have not kept pace with growth. In fact, restaurant occupations employ the highest proportion of workers earning at or below the federal minimum wage.6 Food preparation and service-related occupations comprised . . .

This paper presents a novel quantitative analysis of the War on Povertys political economy through the lens of the legislation that came to define it: 1964 Economic Opportunity Act (EOA). Consistent with the eras lofty rhetoric, the Johnson administration systematically directed EOA funding toward poorer areas. Approximately 25 percent of the variation in county-level EOA funding outside of the South is explained by measures of poverty. In contrast, political considerations appear to have played a minor role. Choosing poverty over politics as usual may help explain why the War on Poverty, unlike the New Deal, is remembered as a failure.

This dissertation consists of two essays on the labor market impact of agglomeration economies and that of homeownership. The empirical analyses use different U.S. data and econometric techniques to examine the impact on different labor market outcomes such as volatility of hours worked and men’s employment. The first essay is motivated by the labor market pooling model from Krugman (1991). The paper adds to a small but important literature that provides evidence on the microeconomic foundation of agglomeration economies. Using various years of data from the American Community Survey and the County Business Patterns survey, I show that the agglomeration of economic activities reduces the volatility of hours worked. Drawing on Krugman’s model, I argue that this implies that labor pooling contributes to agglomeration economies, and helps to explain why cities are productive places. In the second essay, I consider the extent to which homeownership affects men’s labor supply. Research on the labor-supply consequences of homeownership is complicated by the endogeneity of housing tenure status. To address this endogeneity problem, I use a set of family size instruments (the presence of the third and additional children in a single family household) to estimate the effect of homeownership in a bivariate probit model. Based on a sample of married white male household heads from the American Community Survey, the IV result suggests that men who own their homes are 1.2% more likely to be employed relative to those who rent. I also show that the relationship between homeownership and family size is highly nonlinear and nonmonotonic. The first two children have positive influence on both homeownership and men’s employment. The third and additional children are negatively associated with homeownership but have no significant incremental effects on men’s labor supply.

We present a state-of-the-art of the literature on linkages between generations within families. We focus specifically on intergenerational coresidence, upward and downward intergenerational transfers in families and the relationship between norms of family obligation and intergenerational transfers. An overview of the academic literature on these topics is provided, as well as suggestions for future research.

Our fixed-effects panel data analysis of state spending on higher education fills a near void of studies examining capital expenditures on higher education. In our study, we found that political characteristics (e.g., interest group activity, organizational structure, and formal powers) largely account for differences between general fund and capital appropriations for higher education.

Background: Veterans of the U.S. armed forces tend to be older and have more chronic health problems than the general adult population, which may place them at greater risk of complications from influenza. Despite Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommendations, seasonal influenza vaccination rates for the general adult population remain well below the national goal of 80%. Achieving this goal would be facilitated by a clearer understanding of which factors influence vaccination. Methods: Using the 2010 U.S. National Health Interview Survey (NHIS), this study estimates models of two types of vaccinations (H1N1 and seasonal flu), assesses if the correlates differ for these vaccinations, and analyses the distribution of the correlates by veteran status. Results: Veterans, women, non-Hispanic whites, non-smokers, those at high risk, educated, with health insurance, and who use clinics as a usual source of care were more likely to receive both types of vaccinations. Those who were older, married, and with higher income were more likely to get vaccinated for seasonal flu, but not for H1N1. Age and number of children living in the household were found to have different effects for H1N1 compared to seasonal flu. Conclusion: Veterans are more likely to get vaccinated for seasonal influenza and H1N1 compared to the general population. This might be due to Veterans having better access to care or Veterans participating in better health care practices. Future studies should examine potential differences in flu vaccination use among Veterans using Veterans Affairs (VA) health care system vs. non-VA users. Keywords: H1N1, Seasonal flu shot, Veterans, non-Veterans, flu vaccination

We analyze the effect of rising Chinese import competition between 1990 and 2007 on US local labor markets, exploiting cross-market variation in import exposure stemming from initial differences in industry specialization and instrumenting for US imports using changes in Chinese imports by other high-income countries. Rising imports cause higher unemployment, lower labor force participation, and reduced wages in local labor markets that house importcompeting manufacturing industries. In our main specification, import competition explains one-quarter of the contemporaneous aggregate decline in US manufacturing employment. Transfer benefits payments for unemployment, disability, retirement, and healthcare also rise sharply in more trade-exposed labor markets.

When President Felipe Caldern took office he declared a war on drug lords, thus initiating a war of attrition which has claimed more than 40,000 lives in the last 5 years. In this chapter I document how this escalation of violence has led Mexicans living close to the northern border to migrate to the United States. Using data from the American Community Survey to estimate migration, and administrative death records to estimate murder rates, I present evidence that the United States southern states have seen the largest increases in Mexican migration from 2005 to 2010. I also show that these new migrants are college educated, which is in high contrast with the archetypal Mexican migrant in the United States. My analysis also shows that there is a correlation between business openings and murder rates in Mexico. I conclude that the war on drugs is making wealthy well-educated Mexicans leave the country, thus diminishing the available skilled labor force and investment needed for future economic development