Substance abuse coverage provided by employer medical plans

In summary, substance abuse is a serious problem in America. In fact, a Gallup poll ranked drug use as the Nation's number one problem. As a rapidly accelerating component of health care costs, charges for alcohol and drug abuse treatment are helping to drive up medical care expenses. The substance abuse crisis is also affecting employers, both public and private, who are struggling to provide needed health benefits while controlling spiraling plan costs. Despite the upward pressure on health costs, the problem is so serious that there has been a steady increase in the incidence of coverage for substance abuse treatment in employer-provided medical care plans, to the point that virtually all plans now provide some benefits. Nevertheless, health plans typically cover substance abuse treatment on a more restrictive basis than other illnesses. This may change, however, as the interest in, and the need for, comprehensive substance abuse treatment benefits grows.     

Justice in preferential hiring

This paper reports studies designed to examine perceptions of preferential selection. Subjects evaluated the fairness of hypothetical cases of selection decisions based on either candidate sex or ethnic origin. A within-subjects design and a between-subjects design yielded convergent results showing that (1) preferential selection was perceived as unfair, irrespective of respondent sex or the basis for the preferential treatment (i.e., candidate sex or ethnic origin), (2) the level of perceived injustice was directly related to the discrepancy in merits between the successful minority candidate and the more qualified yet unsuccessful majority candidate, and (3) the provision of either an ethical or legislative justification for the selection decisions further exacerbated feelings of injustice. Possible interpretations for the findings and practical implications of the study were then discussed. M. S. Singer is a senior lecturer in psychology at Canterbury University. Her published work includes papers in Personnel Psychology, Journal of Applied Psychology, Current Psychology: Research and Reviews,and Applied Psychology: An International Review. A. E. Singer is a senior lecturer in strategic management and business ethics at Canterbury University. He has published various papers in academic journals including Omega: The International Journal of Management Science, Decision Sciences, International Journal of Forecasting, International Journal of Research in Marketing,and Journal of Business Ethics.     

Team up to meet child-care needs

Recognizing the importance of child care is not the same as providing it. The options for many employees are limited, but some employers are trying to assist employees with their child-care needs. One option that benefits many small to medium-sized companies is a child-care consortium.     

A vision for excellence

One hospital integrates employee relations, customer service and commitment to quality into one successful, award-winning program. Employees at AMI Palmetto General are motivated to constantly consider the hospital's goals and strive for excellence.     

Discriminating Among Alternative Theories of the Multinational Enterprise

Recent theoretical developments have incorporated endogenous multinational firms into the general–equilibrium model of trade. One simple taxonomy separates the theory into "vertical" models, in which firms geographically separate activities by stages of production, and "horizontal" models, in which multiplant firms duplicate roughly the same activities in many countries. The authors nest a horizontal and a vertical model within a hybrid (unrestricted) "knowledge–capital model" and estimate the specifications with data on US foreign direct investment activity. In the nested econometric tests, the data sample cannot distinguish statistically between the unrestricted model and the restricted horizontal model, indicating that the latter captures virtually all of the determinants of FDI. The tests overwhelmingly reject the vertical model.