Podcast episode 4: Reflections on Travel Seminar to India

This article and podcast was originally published in The Prophet -- a journal created by and for the students at the Boston University School of Theology (BUSTH) to amplify the voices of STH students by promoting and sharing a range of perspectives on matters of concern including, but not limited to, spiritual practices, faith communities and society, the nature of theology, and current affairs. It serves as a platform for STH students to share their academic work, theological reflections, and life experiences with one another and the wider community.Christina Richardson (MDiv ’19) and David Schultz (MDiv ’18) discuss their experience abroad in India

Trade Adjustment Assistance under the U.S. Trade Act of 1974: An Analytical Examination and Worker Survey

The goals of trade adjustment assistance (TAA) are to ease transition, compensate injury, and bleed political pressure for protectionism. Section I of the paper outlines the economic principles underlying these goals, and their shifting historical importance in the U.S. Sections II and III of the paper discuss the personal characteristics of a representative sample of worker recipients of TAA in 1976, and their labor market success in several subsequent years. Their experience is compared to that of a matched sample of workers receiving standard unemployment insurance (UI) . Comparisons in Section II focus on differences in mean characteristics and experience between the TAA and UT samples, controlling only for whether workers returned eventually to the firm from which they were initially separated. Comparisons in Section III focus on differences between the TAA and UI samples in their ability to recover lost employment and income, using a regression approach that in principle controls for all relevant variables, and not for just one. The most important conclusions of the research are the following. (1) The majority of TAA recipients in 1976 were not permanently displaced, but returned eventually to their former employers. A far greater proportion of UI recipients suffered permanent displacement. (2) Workers receiving TAA had higher incomes on average than their counterparts who received only UI. Their incomes furthermore fell less frequently below the poverty line. (3) TAA recipients nevertheless experienced more frequent and enduring transitional unemployment than did UI recipients, and did not return to their former income level as rapidly. (4) The reasons for conclusion (3) were unclear. It could not readily be explained by differences between the TAA and UI samples in permanence of layoff, generosity of program benefits, age, experience, industry, affluence, economic environment, socioeconomic status, or behavioral responses to any of these variables. Conclusions (1) and (2) are at variance with most previous work on TAA. Conclusion (3) is not, but the traditional explanations for it are those that conclusion (4) rules out.

The readability of Australia’s taxation laws and supplemetary materials: an empirical investigation

Australian taxation law has been criticised for many years for its difficulty to read and understand. The Tax Law Improvement Project (TLIP) was established in December 1993 to rewrite in plain language Australia’s income tax legislation. The primary purpose of this study is to test empirically the effectiveness of attempts at simplifying the Income Tax Assessment Act 1936 as amended. The study utilises empirical measures in analysing the level of readability of Australia’s taxation laws. In doing so, it builds on earlier research, which applied similar methods in examining the New Zealand taxation simplification process. It was found that the sections of Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 sampled were slightly more readable than corresponding sections of Income Tax Assessment Act 1936 as amended, which is consistent with Wallschutzky’s (1995) findings. Nevertheless, the results fall well short of acceptable bench-marks, suggesting that the goal of simplification has not been achieved.

Optical properties of a low-loss polarization maintaining microfiber

A polarization preserving single-mode microfiber was successfully fabricated by a flame brushing method. A polarization extinction ratio of 16dB is typically maintained through the device with excess loss of 0.2dB

Analgesic Effects of Fatty Acid Amide Hydrolase Inhibition in a Rat Model of Neuropathic Pain

Cannabinoid-based medicines have therapeutic potential for the treatment of pain. Augmentation of levels of endocannabinoids with inhibitors of fatty acid amide hydrolase (FAAH) is analgesic in models of acute and inflammatory pain states. The aim of this study was to determine whether local inhibition of FAAH alters nociceptive responses of spinal neurons in the spinal nerve ligation model of neuropathic pain. Electrophysiological studies were performed 14-18 days after spinal nerve ligation or sham surgery, and the effects of the FAAHinhibitor cyclohexylcarbamic acid 3-carbamoyl biphenyl-3-yl ester (URB597) on mechanically evoked responses of spinal neurons and levels of endocannabinoids were determined. Intraplantar URB597 (25 _g in 50 _l) significantly ( p _ 0.01) attenuated mechanically evoked responses of spinal neurons in sham-operated rats. Effects of URB597 were blocked by the cannabinoid 1 receptor (CB1 ) antagonist AM251 [N-1-(2,4-dichlorophenyl)-5-(4-iodophenyl)-4-methyl-N-1-piperidinyl-1H-pyrazole-3-carboxamide] (30_g in50_l) and the opioid receptor antagonist naloxone. URB597 treatment increased levels of anandamide, 2-arachidonyl glycerol, and oleoyl ethanolamide in the ipsilateral hindpaw of shamoperated rats. Intraplantar URB597 (25 _g in 50 _l) did not, however, alter mechanically evoked responses of spinal neurons in spinal nerve ligated (SNL) rats or hindpaw levels of endocannabinoids. Intraplantar injection of a higher dose of URB597 (100 _g in 50 _l) significantly ( p_0.05) attenuated evoked responses of spinal neurons in SNL rats but did not alter hindpaw levels of endocannabinoids. Spinal administration of URB597 attenuated evoked responses of spinal neurons and elevated levels of endocannabinoids in shamoperated and SNL rats. These data suggest that peripheral FAAH activity may be altered or that alternative pathways of metabolism have greater importance in SNL rats

Comparative study of the effective single mode operational bandwidth in sub-wavelength optical wires and conventional single-mode fibers

We present the first experimental comparison of effective single mode operation bandwidth in sub-wavelength optical wires (SOWs) and conventional single-mode fibers (SMFs). The full transmission spectrum, half-turn bend loss and mode field diameter were measured and compared for a variety of SMFs of different cut-off wavelength and a SOW. The SOW was shown to offer an enormously broadband single-mode operation bandwidth with a larger mode field area than the SMFs. Applications of SOWs include fiber lasers, sensors, photolithography and optical coherence tomography amongst other

Texas: Round 1 - State-Level Field network Study of the Implementation of the Affordable Care Act

This report is part of a series of 21 state and regional studies examining the rollout of the ACA. The national network -- with 36 states and 61 researchers -- is led by the Rockefeller Institute of Government, the public policy research arm of the State University of New York, the Brookings Institution, and the Fels Institute of Government at the University of Pennsylvania.Since the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) was signed into law on March 23, 2010, Texas has reviewed and debated the different policy directives of the legislation. In 2011, Texas decided against administering a state-run health insurance exchange and opted in to a federally run exchange. This decision occurred prior to the Supreme Court decision on the constitutionality of ACA provisions. In 2013, after the 2012 Supreme Court decision allowed states to decide whether to expand Medicaid, Texas chose not to expand Medicaid eligibility and enrollment