Can Cultural Competency Speak to the Race Disparities in Methadone Dosage Levels?

Although national methadone treatment trends have improved substantially from 1988 to 2001, current research has found that African Americans still receive lower dosages of methadone treatment than their white and Hispanic counterparts, which has significant public health concerns. We sought to empirically examine whether the degree of cultural competency within an outpatient substance abuse treatment (OSAT) organization has influence on the methadone dosage levels received by African Americans in 1995 and in 2005. The 1995 and 2005 National Drug Abuse Treatment System Survey (NDATSS) provided a nationally-representative, stratified sample of 618 and 566 OSAT organizations, respectively, of which 121 and 140 affiliated methadone maintenance treatment programs, respectively, were analyzed. The organizations’ director and clinical supervisor were surveyed. Fixed-effects linear regression models were fitted with measures of cultural competency, client, and organizational characteristics to assess methadone dosage levels. Culturally-competent units have smaller numbers of methadone clients, greater percentages of clients who receive methadone dosages of less than 40 mg/d, smaller percentages of clients who receive methadone dosages of 80 mg/d or more, and provide a larger number of therapeutic and ancillary services during treatment than non-culturally-competent units. OSAT units with more African Americans are significantly more likely to have clients who receive dosages of less than 40 mg/d and are significantly less likely to have clients who receive dosages of 80 mg/d or more. There is no racial difference among culturally-competent unit clients who receive dosages of less than 40 mg/d, between 40 and 59 mg/d, between 60 and 79 mg/d, and 80 mg/d or more. However, among non-culturally-competent units, a racial difference exists among African Americans and other clients who receive these various dosage levels. Research indicating that African Americans receive lower dosages of methadone than their White and Hispanic counterparts may now be explained by whether these clients receive treatment in culturally competent organizations, rather than solely by arguments related to organizational differences in resources, experience and training of staff, staff bias and/or racism. Culturally competent organizations may seek a method of treatment that dissuades “replacing one drug for another,” while simultaneously treating the root cause of the addiction through the provision of comprehensive therapeutic and ancillary support services. Further research is needed to determine if cultural competency results in better substance abuse treatment outcomes for African Americans.     

Gender effects on consumers’ symbolic and hedonic preferences and actual clothing consumption in the Czech Republic

During the last decade or so consumer products have become more divided by gender than ever before. These changes in marketing practices are likely to introduce, alter or increase any existing gender differences regarding consumers’ product preferences and actual consumption. This is a very timely study examining how gender relates to consumers’ interest in clothing artefacts and their preferences for the self‐ and social‐symbolic and hedonic meanings of clothing. The influence of gender on actual purchase behaviour towards clothing is also explored. The proposed hypotheses are tested on a large‐scale sample of some 1,000+ respondents drawn in the Czech Republic. Using analysis of variance tests, gender differences were found with regard to all but one consumer behaviour phenomenon. No gender effect was found only regarding consumer preference for clothing affiliation symbolism. The study contributes to the theoretical development and empirical evidence in the field of gendered symbolic and hedonic consumption of clothing artefacts. Its findings also suggest possible actions by fashion marketers, as well as some interesting venues for future research.     

Mortgage Loans to Nonoccupants as an Indicator of Racial Redlining

Where racial redlining prevents potential residents of a neighborhood from obtaining mortgage loans, a greater number of houses will be sold to investors and a greter number of residents will rent homes owned by such investors. It may be possible, therefore, to measure the extent of redlining by using HMDA data on loans made to nonoccupants. This study models the flow of mortgage credit to nonoccupants in nine MSAs, using traditional economic and demographic variables and variables describing the racial composition of the neighborhood. The percentage of the census tract population that is black has a small but statistically significant coefficient in Los Angeles, Chicago, and Nashville, and the Hispanic population variable is statistically significant in Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, and Albuquerque. The model explains a high percentage of the variation in mortgage lending to nonoccupants across census tracts and is robust with respect to alternative formulations of the dependent va riable, and the independent variables have the hypothesized signs.     

Improving Marketing Communication & Innovation Strategies in the Small Business Context

This paper is derived from another which was awarded the bestpaper prize at the 9th International Entrepreneurship Conference. Its theme is that while inventions and innovations make significant contributions to the growth and competitiveness of national economies, there are problems in the U.K. surrounding independent inventors (often a small, one person business) and their marketing, where there has been failure to stimulate and exploit inventions compared to other industrialised countries. There are long term implications for economic competitiveness when new ideas are lost. Organisations pursue innovations as an important route in the search for competitive advantage, but this route is fraught with difficulties for independent inventors in getting organisations to accept their products and to market them. This paper reports from and builds on an earlier study from a small business perspective which focuses, firstly, on the importance of capitalising on this source of embryonic talent and secondly, the problems within the marketing communication process between potential adopter marketing organisations and independent inventors. A purposive, non-random sample was drawn, consisting of prominent independent inventors (exemplars of good practice) who marketed both nationally and internationally and the potential adopter manufacturing and marketing organisations (customers). Trade associations with a role in facilitating the adoption process were also contacted. The method of enquiry in the study was by personal and telephone interviews. The findings from these three different groups seem to suggest that stereotypical views of independent inventors held by potential business adopters coupled with the often weak marketing communications and interpersonal skills reportedly possessed by independent inventors present very real barriers to the adoption of new ideas by the business community. The paper concludes that small businesses may be better placed to "exploit" ideas from independent inventors by virtue of their simpler organisational structure. Recommendations for the improvement of strategies to facilitate adoption of inventions with commercial potential are made for both types of small businesses (inventors and small business adopters).     

Wealth Effects and Consumption: A Panel VAR Approach

We provide new evidence on the comparison between the stock and housing wealth effects on consumption. Using a panel VAR approach applied to OECD data, we find evidence that the stock market wealth effect is generally the larger. However, with regard to the evolution of asset wealth effects over time, our findings show that the housing wealth effect has outweighed the share market wealth effect in the last decade. We further find that asset wealth has asymmetric effects on consumption, with stronger and more persistent effects from positive asset wealth shocks. Our results have important monetary policy implications for both stock and real estate markets, and offer timely insights into the desirability of current proposals to reduce house price volatility, such as through macro prudential regulations.     

Does home market size matter for the pattern of trade?

Does home market size matter for the pattern of trade? Krugman started the literature, showing it does matter. Davis overturned his result, arguing that an assumption of convenience—transport costs only for the differentiated goods—conveniently obtained the result. Here we relax another persistent assumption of convenience—two industry types differentiated only by the degree of scale economies—and find that market size reemerges as a relevant force in determining industrial structure.