William Rasdorf, Phil Lewis, Ingrid Arocho and Joseph Hummer
The purpose of this paper is to characterize the relationships between air pollutant emissions from heavy duty diesel equipment and highway construction project scope, schedule…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to characterize the relationships between air pollutant emissions from heavy duty diesel equipment and highway construction project scope, schedule, and budget. Objectives included estimating total project emissions; developing a daily emissions profile; and developing new emissions estimating metrics based on project scope, schedule, and budget.
Design/methodology/approach
The research approach involved collecting real-world data related to project scope, schedule, and budget from two highway case study projects. The data were used to establish an emissions inventory estimating methodology to calculate total emissions for each case study. The total emissions were normalized based on project size, duration, and cost in order to develop new emissions estimating metrics.
Findings
The results proved that it is possible to characterize total equipment emissions based on project size, duration, and cost. The new emissions estimating metrics were quantitatively similar for both case studies.
Research limitations/implications
The results were based on two case study projects. Additional data from more projects is needed to provide more highly refined numerical results.
Practical implications
This approach enables project planners and managers to assess the environmental impacts of highway projects along with the financial and time impacts.
Social implications
Construction equipment is a major contributor to the nation’s air pollution problem. Before pollutant emissions can be managed they must first be measured.
Originality/value
The new emissions estimating metrics are a novel approach to comparing environmental impacts of two or more projects, as well as estimating total emissions for future highway construction projects.
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Mahesh K. Nalla, Joseph D. Johnson and Gorazd Meško
The purpose of this paper is to examine the nature of police‐security relationships in three different continents that are unique in their economic, political, and social culture…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the nature of police‐security relationships in three different continents that are unique in their economic, political, and social culture. These countries include a developed economy (USA), an emerging economy (South Korea), and a transitional economy (Slovenia). More specifically, it compares the views that private and public police personnel in a diverse set of countries hold about one another on various issues relating to their working relationships and their efforts to improve them.
Design/methodology/approach
Data for the paper came from 1,158 police and security officers from the USA, South Korea, and Slovenia. All three studies employed survey methodology. The English language instruments are translated into the Korean and Slovenian languages and both instruments are back translated from the respective languages into English to check for validity.
Findings
While the findings for all the three countries vary in terms of the degree of personnels' positive attitudes toward one another, the overall levels of support from security professionals toward police officers appear positive in all the three countries. Among the police, personnel from the USA relative to other countries appear to have the most progressive and accepting attitude toward security personnel's role as partners. The varying degree of differences between South Korea and Slovenia may be a reflection of the centralized police structures, cultural and historical characteristics, and variations in the levels of economic liberalization policies. Findings suggest that in all the three countries security personnel are trying to reach out to the police to play their part in community policing compared to the police reaching out to the private sector.
Research limitations/implications
There is a time lag in data collection (seven‐year period) as the data for this paper were not collected at one point in time in these countries. Despite this limitation, the use of many identical questions in surveys in all the three countries offers an opportunity for this comparative research.
Originality/value
Most research on police officers' job satisfaction has been done in relation to individual factors while ignoring the role of organizational culture and environmental factors. Further, this setting offers an opportunity to test if democratization of police organizations influences job satisfaction.
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Caroline Wolski, Kathryn Freeman Anderson and Simone Rambotti
Since the development of the COVID-19 vaccinations, questions surrounding race have been prominent in the literature on vaccine uptake. Early in the vaccine rollout, public health…
Abstract
Purpose
Since the development of the COVID-19 vaccinations, questions surrounding race have been prominent in the literature on vaccine uptake. Early in the vaccine rollout, public health officials were concerned with the relatively lower rates of uptake among certain racial/ethnic minority groups. We suggest that this may also be patterned by racial/ethnic residential segregation, which previous work has demonstrated to be an important factor for both health and access to health care.
Methodology/Approach
In this study, we examine county-level vaccination rates, racial/ethnic composition, and residential segregation across the U.S. We compile data from several sources, including the American Community Survey (ACS) and Centers for Disease Control (CDC) measured at the county level.
Findings
We find that just looking at the associations between racial/ethnic composition and vaccination rates, both percent Black and percent White are significant and negative, meaning that higher percentages of these groups in a county are associated with lower vaccination rates, whereas the opposite is the case for percent Latino. When we factor in segregation, as measured by the index of dissimilarity, the patterns change somewhat. Dissimilarity itself was not significant in the models across all groups, but when interacted with race/ethnic composition, it moderates the association. For both percent Black and percent White, the interaction with the Black-White dissimilarity index is significant and negative, meaning that it deepens the negative association between composition and the vaccination rate.
Research limitations/implications
The analysis is only limited to county-level measures of racial/ethnic composition and vaccination rates, so we are unable to see at the individual-level who is getting vaccinated.
Originality/Value of Paper
We find that segregation moderates the association between racial/ethnic composition and vaccination rates, suggesting that local race relations in a county helps contextualize the compositional effects of race/ethnicity.
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Javier Portillo and Walter E. Block
The purpose of this paper is to criticize the current US tax system and explain in what ways taxation harms the economy. Taxes are coercive. Taxpayers are forced to pay individual…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to criticize the current US tax system and explain in what ways taxation harms the economy. Taxes are coercive. Taxpayers are forced to pay individual income taxes. If the taxpayer refuses, several adverse consequences will unfold against him even including jail‐time. Taxes diminish taxpayer's disposable income and leave consumer's wants unattended. The money they could have used to fulfil their wants goes instead to the government in the form of taxes.
Design/methodology/approach
Taxation is analyzed from an economic point of view.
Findings
Progressive taxation is harmful to the economy because it punishes successful individuals. The more they earn (a reflection of the productive value they bring to the market), the more they have to pay. Meanwhile less productive citizens paying little or no tax are receiving “benefits” derived from the investment of more successful taxpayers. These are inefficient since they reduce incentives. Taking money from Peter and giving it to Paul decreases the incentive, both have to earn an income and be productive. Finally, the paper exposes the influence government has over taxpayer's decisions.
Originality/value
We live at a time in the US when President Obama is calling for greater taxation for the rich, and the Republicans are rejecting this initiative on the ground that it is “class war.” A study of taxation at this point cannot help but shed light on this controversy.
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Joseph P.M. Kane and Francis A. O'Neill
Clozapine, whilst associated commonly with a transient and benign increase in liver enzymes, has also been associated with varying presentations of hepatitis in existing case…
Abstract
Clozapine, whilst associated commonly with a transient and benign increase in liver enzymes, has also been associated with varying presentations of hepatitis in existing case reports. This report describes what we believe to be the first documented case of acute liver injury and pleural effusion associated with clozapine, resolving after cessation of the agent. The case supports existing literature in advocating a high index of suspicion, particularly in the 4-5 weeks following clozapine initiation, when considering nonspecific clinical symptoms and signs.
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Martin Götz and Ernest H. O’Boyle
The overall goal of science is to build a valid and reliable body of knowledge about the functioning of the world and how applying that knowledge can change it. As personnel and…
Abstract
The overall goal of science is to build a valid and reliable body of knowledge about the functioning of the world and how applying that knowledge can change it. As personnel and human resources management researchers, we aim to contribute to the respective bodies of knowledge to provide both employers and employees with a workable foundation to help with those problems they are confronted with. However, what research on research has consistently demonstrated is that the scientific endeavor possesses existential issues including a substantial lack of (a) solid theory, (b) replicability, (c) reproducibility, (d) proper and generalizable samples, (e) sufficient quality control (i.e., peer review), (f) robust and trustworthy statistical results, (g) availability of research, and (h) sufficient practical implications. In this chapter, we first sing a song of sorrow regarding the current state of the social sciences in general and personnel and human resources management specifically. Then, we investigate potential grievances that might have led to it (i.e., questionable research practices, misplaced incentives), only to end with a verse of hope by outlining an avenue for betterment (i.e., open science and policy changes at multiple levels).
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HAVING outlined the scheme for monotyped catalogues, it only remains to consider it in its financial aspects. At Hampstead tenders were obtained for the same catalogue by…
Abstract
HAVING outlined the scheme for monotyped catalogues, it only remains to consider it in its financial aspects. At Hampstead tenders were obtained for the same catalogue by monotype, linotype, and by ordinary setting up. It may be mentioned that the catalogue is of royal‐octavo size, in double columns, each being fifteen ems wide and fifty deep. Main entries are in bourgeois; subject‐headings are set (by hand) in clarendon, and the entries under such headings are put in brevier. Notes and contents were specified for either minion or nonpareil, and many lines break into part‐italics. The monotype machine provided all these founts except the two already mentioned—italic numerals and clarendon. We had to do without the former type, but the latter not being numerous are easily carried in as wanted from an ordinary case. Naturally, I cannot give the exact figures of the accepted tender, but it may be stated that in our particular case the cheapest quotation was for linotype work, although there was not much difference between that and monotyping; whilst for both these methods worked out at appreciably less than the quotations for ordinary hand‐work.
Newspapers provide the context to how the public understands the role of race and gender in America. Both are portrayed commonly as having lost their power. Taking an…
Abstract
Newspapers provide the context to how the public understands the role of race and gender in America. Both are portrayed commonly as having lost their power. Taking an intersectional approach, here I examine the role race and gender play in black newspaper coverage of Michelle Obama from August 2008 through July 2009. Analyzing 31 papers, gathered from Ethnic NewsWatch, I examine 175 articles, notes, and editorials that addressed the first lady in some capacity. Most narratives highlighted traditional first lady duties, her “family” values and fashion. Female reporters were focused on Obama's values and duties before the election, but emphasized her duties and looks after. Although from December, their reporting was more diffuse, having no particular focus, male reporters also focused on her duties pre-election, but values and looks were relatively unimportant. Race remained an important element in many narratives, especially for male reporters. It was mostly invoked in ways that were ceremonial and abstract, with little attention to the specific plight of black communities. In contrast, female reporters made the intersection of race and gender important (both before and after the election), and Obama's looks (particularly after). Overall, these papers were supportive; and they almost appear in awe of a black family in the White House. As a result, little attention was given to exploring how “change you can count on” would affect black America particularly.
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The Americans are renowned as tough‐to‐please consumers. This is something that comes with the territory in the world’s richest and most powerful nation, where the most mundane…
Abstract
The Americans are renowned as tough‐to‐please consumers. This is something that comes with the territory in the world’s richest and most powerful nation, where the most mundane goods are available in a bewildering array of choices. A few years ago, a British television commercial for a 4×4 vehicle exploited this idea. Showing customers with the most complex orders for food and drink, it referred punningly to the vehicle’s suitability for “the most demanding country on Earth”.