The relationship between wellness participation and health care benefit utilization

To examine the relationship between participation in a wellness program and the amount of absenteeism and medical claims, seven years of retrospective absenteeism and medical claims records were collected for 207 employees (pre- and postwellness intervention) and entered into a database. A proportional stratified random sample of workers by wellness participation was selected. While there was no significant change in the amount of sick leave taken over time, a log transformation revealed a significant increase in the dollar amount of medical claims over time, particularly for the middle-aged group of employees. This confirms that wellness intervention slowed the rate of increasing claims among middle-aged participants after just three years of wellness intervention.     

Neo‐Liberal Transformation of Turkish Agriculture

This paper analyses the relationship between the internationalization of agriculture under the hegemony of transnational corporations and the transformation of Turkish agriculture by specifically looking at the implementation of neo‐liberal policies in rural areas. It contends that neo‐liberalism in Turkish agriculture since the 1980s represents the abandonment of the nationalist project that underlined state policies in industry and agriculture between 1930 and the late 1970s. Neo‐liberal policies implemented since 1980 have consolidated the stronghold of transnational agribusiness companies in Turkish agriculture. In cooperation with the World Bank, the EU and the WTO, the Turkish state has been preparing the necessary conditions for transnational agribusiness firms to control Turkish agriculture. Since 1999, the Turkish state has introduced fundamental institutional changes to ensure the smooth internationalization of Turkish agriculture, which has inevitably led to the impoverishment of the rural masses and to the abandonment of agriculture by small‐ and medium‐sized households.