Another Approach to Measuring Human Development: The Composite Dynamic Human Development Index

This paper seeks mainly to contribute to the debate on how the relative degree of development of a country should be measured by proposing an indicator to build on the valuable starting point provided by the Human Development Index (HDI). The indicator proposed is called the “Composite, Dynamic Human Development Index”. It incorporates in a simple way additional points which are significant for the current concept of human development and provides a dynamic factor that distinguishes between countries on the basis of achievements attained. It helps ensure that the static average data on which the HDI is based does not conceal wide-ranging economic, social and political differences within countries, lack of sustainability in current levels of development or effective development strategies drawn up by governments.     

科技创新人才的培养及其发展策略

进入21世纪,经济全球化进程不断加快,知识、科技、产业创新加速发展,科技创新人才的培养和发展成为最重要的战略。目前国内对科技创新人才的研究尚处于刚刚起步的阶段,缺乏成熟的理论和研究方法,研究成果也尚处于积累阶段。本文分析了我国在科技创新人才培养和发展的研究过程中存在的不可避免的一些问题,并且提出了建议。     

Health is Wealth: A Dynamic SUR Approach of Examining a Link Between Climate Changes and Human Health Expenditures

Social Indicators Research - Health is considered as one of the critical inputs in the production function. This study is an endeavour to identify and quantify the impact of climate change measured...     

Inequality in Human Development: An Empirical Assessment of 32 Countries

One of the most frequent critiques of the HDI is that is does not take into account inequality within countries in its three dimensions. In this paper, we apply a simply approach to compute the three components and the overall HDI for quintiles of the income distribution. This allows a comparison of the level in human development of the poor with the level of the non-poor within countries, but also across countries. This is an application of the method presented in Grimm et al. (World Development 36(12):2527–2546, 2008) to a sample of 21 low and middle income countries and 11 industrialized countries. In particular the inclusion of the industrialized countries, which were not included in the previous work, implies to deal with a number of additional challenges, which we outline in this paper. Our results show that inequality in human development within countries is high, both in developed and industrialized countries. In fact, the HDI of the lowest quintiles in industrialized countries is often below the HDI of the richest quintile in many middle income countries. We also find, however, a strong overall negative correlation between the level of human development and inequality in human development.     

On the Relationship Between Atypical Work(s) and Mental Health: New Insights from the Italian Case

The new forms of atypical contracts increasingly diffused beside standard permanent full-time employment has been argued being detrimental for workers’ mental health. Despite a growing body of studies is now appearing on the topic, they generally fail to recognize that atypical workers represent a heterogeneous group. This study addresses such oversight for Italy by scrutinizing the association between four major domains of mental health—vitality, social functioning, role emotional, and general mental health—and six types of atypical contract—temporary, casual, part-time by choice permanent, part-time by choice temporary, not chosen part-time permanent, and not chosen part-time temporary. First, we find that mental health is compromised by atypical working arrangements depending on the specific atypical contract considered. Second, we verify that the choice of the atypical experience is relevant in shaping the relationship with mental health (a novelty for Italy). Third, we prove that, regardless the type of contract, variations across mental health outcomes exist. We conclude that more reflection is needed when designing studies on atypical works and their consequences on workers’ well-being.     

Declines in Health and Support Between Parents and Adult Children: Insights from Diabetes

Population Research and Policy Review - We investigate associations between a diabetes diagnosis and financial and instrumental transfers between parents and adult children. Data are from...     

Illicit Financial Flows: Another Road Block to Human Development in Low- and Middle-Income Countries

Social Indicators Research - This article analysed the relationship between illicit financial flows (IFFs) and human development, as measured with the United Nations Human Development Index (HDI),...     

The Relationship Between Resources and Human Migration Patterns in Central Kamchatka During the Post-Soviet Period

This paper examines the relationship between resources and migration in post-Soviet Kamchatka (Russian Far East). During the post-Soviet period of socio-economic hardship, migration trends have changed drastically both in central Kamchatka and throughout the Russian Far East. I predicted that there would be a clear relationship between resource scarcity and people's decisions to leave in search of more propitious opportunities. Against the backdrop of economic decline, out-migration prevailed in central Kamchatka throughout the post-Soviet period; however, migration patterns among villages in this rural and resource-dependent region diverge considerably. Villages in central Kamchatka facing a local natural resource crisis show greater net negative migration than those with a relatively intact resource base. Such variation is notable, given the relatively contained area of the study; it suggests migration patterns are closely tied to ecological conditions. Besides socio-economic and ecological factors, historical circumstances also influence migration patterns. The decision to migrate is complex, arising from the interaction of socio-economic, political, ecological, and historical conditions.     

科技人力资本与高技术产业发展关系的实证研究

近年区域人力资本与产业发展关系的研究引起人们重视。各地人力资本的利用效率是导致区域经济发展不平衡的重要因素之一,本文运用典型相关分析法,对区域科技人力资本与高技术产业发展的关系进行了实证研究,发现科技人力资本投入利用和高技术产业发展是紧密正相关的。从全国范围来看,科技人力资本的重要投入—大学生的培养,对我国高技术产业的长期和整体发展产生显著影响。但影响各区域高技术产业发展的科技人力资本因素却不同,因为人才的流动性,各地实际从事科技活动的人员对当地高技术产业发展产生了重要影响,从而印证了本文提出的假设。文章最后对地方经济决策提出了相关建议。     

The Relationship Between Age and Subjective Well-Being: Evidence from Five Capital Cities in Mainland China

Since the mid-60s of the twentieth-century, the researchers have made lots of studies on the relationship between age and subjective well-being (SWB), and yielded some contradictory conclusions. By using an urban sample (N = 3,099) from five capital cities in Mainland China, this paper presents some new evidence on this issue in the Chinese context. The paper reconfirms a significant relationship between age and subjective well-being, and argues that different measure instruments of subjective well-being lead to different types of relationship. It is partly testified that subjective well-being follows approximate U-shape across age groups, and the minimum point lies in the age band 45–49. It is also found that age is not always a strong significant predictor of subjective well-being when a different dependent variable was adopted to multiple regression analysis. It is suggested that the researchers should pay more attention to the specific content of subjective well-being while examining the relationship between age and subjective well-being.     

科技进步对人力资源开发利用的影响

作为当代和未来社会经济发展的两大支柱 ,科技进步与人力资源开发利用之间有着密切的联系。科技进步对人力资源开发利用的理念、战略、模式、运行机制、途径和方向有重大影响     

The Relationship between Birth History and Current Fertility in Developing Countries

The aim of this research is to find a model of fertility in terms of ‘birth-history’ factors which is common to a diversity of developing countries. Data for nine WFS countries are analysed. The analysis is essentially a birth-interval life-table analysis with regression where factor effects are allowed to vary smoothly over time since previous birth. Strong evidence for a common model is found, with surprisingly similar patterns in the parameters emerging for each country. The main components of the model may be interpreted in terms of ‘tempo’ of previous reproduction, age-related infecundity, and birth-order-related fertility control.     

Twenty Years of Research on the Relationship Between Economic and Social Performance: A Meta-analysis Approach

This study examines the role of political efficacy and social networks in rural China to understand the social characteristics that might affect an individual’s disposition to join in public deliberations. A model is developed and empirically tested by Partial Least Squares analysis. This shows active involvement in public deliberation to be positively influenced by political efficacy (with external political efficacy being a partial mediator), high internal or external political efficacy, and a high internal efficacy leading to high external political efficacy. Social networks have a moderating effect, individuals with a high social network status having an enhanced positive internal political efficacy-public deliberation involvement but weakened positive external political efficacy-public deliberation involvement. The research advances the theoretical understanding of complex political psycho-behavior relationships and provided insights into the role of social settings. The findings could also help boost deliberative democracy in such limited democratic societies as China.     

The Measurement of Economic, Social and Environmental Performance of Countries: A Novel Approach

This paper presents a new analytical framework for assessing spatial disparities among countries. It takes for granted that the analysis of a country’s performance cannot be limited solely to either economic or social factors. The aim of the paper is to combine relevant economic and ‘non-economic’ (mainly social) aspects of a country’s performance in an integrated logical framework. Based on this idea, a structural simultaneous equation model will be presented and estimated in order to explore the direction of the causal relationship between economic and non-economic aspects of a country’s performance. Furthermore, an exploration of the trajectory that each country has registered over time along a virtuous path will be offered. By means of a matrix persistency/transition analysis, the countries will be classified in clusters of good/bad performance. One of the most interesting conclusions concerns the inability of most countries to turn the higher educational skills of the population into greater economic performance over time. In addition, our analysis also shows that making an accurate picture record and formulating related policy aiming at environmental care is highly desirable. It is surprising that only a few countries have reached a favourable economic and environmental performance simultaneously.     

Nexus Between Globalization,Income Inequality and Human Development in Indonesian Economy: Evidence from Application of Partial and Multiple Wavelet Coherence

Social Indicators Research - This paper aims at understanding the vigorous connection between globalization, income inequality and human development in Indonesian economy. This study employs...     

The Incompatibility of Materialism and the Desire for Children: Psychological Insights into the Fertility Discrepancy Among Modern Countries

We examined factors related to attitudes toward marriage and the importance of having children in both the US and Singapore. Path analysis indicated that life dissatisfaction leads to materialism, and both of these factors lead to favorable attitudes toward marriage, which leads to greater desire for children. Further analysis indicated this model was effective in explaining the difference in desire for children between Singaporeans and Americans, whereby Singaporeans have lower life satisfaction, higher materialism, and lower attitudes toward marriage and children. Materialistic standards of success were also related to the emphasis women placed on potential marriage partners’ earning capacity. As Singaporean women had higher materialistic standards, they also placed higher emphasis on potential mates’ earning capacity. Results suggest a consideration of psychological variables such as life satisfaction, materialism, and mate preferences may lead to a better understanding of larger-scale socioeconomic issues, including low fertility rates among developed East Asian countries.     

人力资本、技术创新与创新型城市建设——基于济南与青岛的比较分析

山东省经济龙头济南与青岛的经济发展水平和创新型经济发展能力存在差异。实证研究表明,不涉及技术变量的情况下,分别考查劳动力身体素质、脑力素质以及综合素质时,青岛市人力资本的产出贡献率都高于济南;而在涉及技术变量后,结果正好相反;同时,两市粗放型增长特征明显,技术创新贡献率都较低。因此,以经济发展方式转型为引导,加快人力资本积累与技术创新,是实现创新型城市和省份建设的关键。     

The Relationship Between Social Leisure and Life Satisfaction: Causality and Policy Implications

Social leisure is generally found to be positively correlated with life satisfaction in the empirical literature. We ask if this association captures a genuine causal effect by using panel data from the GSOEP. Our identification strategy exploits the change in social leisure brought about by retirement, since the latter is an event after which the time investable in (the outside job) relational life increases. We instrument social leisure with various measures of the age cohort specific probability of retirement. With such approach we document that social leisure has a positive and significant effect on life satisfaction. Our findings shed some light on the age-happiness pattern. Policy implications are also discussed.     

The Guardianship Experience of Women: The Relationship Between Older Wards and Their Guardians

SUMMARY

This research examined how 156 female legal caregivers responded to difficulties of being a guardian, how they derived meaning from their guardianship activities, and how the role of guardian influenced their perception of aging. The most frequent activities in which guardians engaged were visiting, providing emotional support, and to a lesser extent, giving instrumental assistance. Guardians described their emotional relationships with their wards as either “sympathetic,” “sad,” “challenged,” or “hostile.” Despite hardships associated with the duties of being a guardian, most of the women perceived benefits and expressed satisfaction from this role. Guardians reported that the relationship with their female wards shaped their perception of aging and the conception of their own aging.