Working and Caring for a Child with Chronic Illness: Challenges in Maintaining Employment

This paper shares some pertinent findings from an initial, qualitative stage of a larger, national study currently being undertaken in Australia, exploring the support needs of parents who are working full time and caring for a child with chronic illness. The findings presented here depict the negative impact of these parents caring responsibilities on their work life and the increased stress they experience trying to maintain full time employment. In-depth interviews revealed how these parents had to rearrange their working hours, use up their leave entitlements, work unsatisfactory hours, sacrifice their careers and even change their jobs in order to balance their dual roles. In addition, the findings also highlight the negative and unsupportive attitude that employers had towards these parents. These employment conditions were extremely stressful and frustrating for parents affecting their physical and emotional well being.     

Perceived value of corporate donations: an empirical investigation

• There is current recognition that value is the fundamental basis for all marketing activities. The present research provides an empirical examination of perceptions of value within the voluntary sector and specifically donations made by organisations towards the funding of charitable projects. The impact of a number of charity and project‐related variables on the formation of value and the corresponding effect of value on satisfaction and behavioural variables are examined.
• The results support claims that past experience with and information about a charity as well as information about a specific project are significant determinants of value. However, the impact of these constructs is differential between the two components of value (i.e. get/benefits and give/sacrifices). We confirm the significant effect of value on satisfaction and indicate that satisfaction and benefits derived from a donation have a direct impact on behavioural intention.

Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Content aggregation by platforms: The case of the news media

The digitization of content has led to the emergence of platforms that draw information from multiple sources. This paper investigates whether aggregation of content by a single platform encourages users to “skim” content or to investigate it in depth. We study a contract dispute that led a major aggregator to remove information from a major content provider. After the removal, users were less likely to investigate additional, related content in depth, particularly sources that were horizontally or vertically differentiated.     

Determinants of farmers' indigenous soil and water conservation investments in semi-arid India

This paper investigates the determinants of farmers' indigenous soil and water conservation investments in the semi-arid tropics of India. A simple theoretical model is used to develop hypotheses about the determinants of investment under alternative factor market conditions, and these are tested using data on conservation investment from three villages. We find that conservation investment is significantly lower on leased land in two of the study villages and lower on plots that are subject to sales restrictions in one village, suggesting the potential for land market reforms to increase conservation investment. In one village, households with more adult males, more farm servants, and less land invest more in conservation, as predicted by Ihe model of imperfect labor markets; and households with more debt and off - farm income invest more, consistent with the model of imperfect credit markets. Evidence that conservation investment is affected by factor market imperfections is weaker in the other villages, where investments are much larger, suggesting transaction costs as the source of the differences between villages. Other factors that have a significant effect on investment include the farmer's education and caste, characteristics of the plot (size, slope, irrigation status, and quality ranking) and the presence of existing land investments. The results suggest the importance of accounting for differences across communities and households in factor market and agroelimatic conditions in designing programs to promote investments in soil and water conservation.     

Discount rates and credit markets: Theory and evidence from rural india

Three models of credit markets - (1) the permanent income model, (2) upward sloping credit supply to individual borrowers, and (3) constrained credit due to imperfect enforcement - are tested using credit market data and an experimental study of individuals' discount rates in south India. The permanent income model is rejected by both the discount rate and the credit market data. The discount rate data are consistent with either of the other two models, while the credit market data are consistent with a combination of these two models. Other explanations are found to be insufficient to explain the results of this study.