THE EMPLOYMENT PROBLEM,AGRICULTURAL CHANGE,AND POLICY OBJECTIVES IN INDUSTRIALLY ADVANCED COUNTRIES

Traditional macroeconomic approaches to the employment problem are insufficient at the stage of development reached in the industrially advanced capitalist economies, and employment policy has to encompass a much wider range of incentives, public expenditure criteria, and investment decisions affecting all sectors of the economy. Implications for the agricultural sector are discussed. Employment and labour use are seen as inter-related with other aspects of agricultural policy, including those concerned with agronomic and ecological problems. Performance criteria often adopted in evaluating agricultural change are called into question, and a reappraisal of cost concepts is found to raise some fundamental issues faced by industrially advanced societies.     

Comparing employment interviews in Latin America with other countries

This study compares job interviews (n = 11,667) in Mexico with those in the following countries: Belgium, Russia, Taiwan, and the U.S. The findings support our hypotheses, which are based on a meta-cultural framework. The results reveal that in Mexico and Taiwan women are less likely to conduct interviews. In addition, interviewers asked different questions. Outside the U.S., interviewers asked applicants about their family, marital status, and children. In Russia and Taiwan, they asked about applicants' reasons for quitting their last job. In Belgium, Russia, and Taiwan, they asked about applicants' wage and salary expectations. In Belgium and Russia, they less often asked about applicants' values, opinions, and beliefs. This study suggests that in some countries employment interviews are more than a test of job-related knowledge, skills, and abilities. This report provides a taxonomy that is useful for comparing interview questions in Latin American and other countries as well as directions for future research.     

Sex Differences in Perceived Weight-Based Employment Discrimination When Weight Discrimination is Illegal

The reported study explores sex differences in both overt and subtle forms of perceived weight discrimination in employment using original data from a telephone survey of 1,010 randomly selected residents of Michigan, the only U.S. state with a law prohibiting weight discrimination. Sex differences in the experience of overt forms of weight discrimination (e.g., refusing to hire a person) that have been consistently found in other work and non-work settings were not found in this unique legal context. However, overweight women reported experiencing subtle forms of weight discrimination (e.g., verbal harassment, exclusion from social activities) to a significantly greater extent than men. Implications for employers’ discharge of their responsibilities and for policy makers’ consideration of greater legal protection against weight discrimination are discussed.     

THE ECONOMIC SURPLUS OF AGRICULTURE IN THE UNITED KINGDOM*

The economic surplus of an industry is defined as the difference between its real product, and the real income accruing to it. The surplus from U.K. agriculture measured at 1964/65–66/67 prices is estimated to have risen by about 20 million per year in recent years. The absorption of this surplus by other sectors is identified and an approximate indication is given of the equivalent surpluses and deficits of other industry groups. The economic surplus from agriculture is transferred principally through changes in relative prices, the necessity of which tends to create an unavoidable minimum rate of inflation. There is an international equivalent of these transfers of real income through price changes, but without the institutional constraints on the market which in the domestic economy preserve some measure of equity in the distribution of income.     

Responses to Discrimination: Relationships Between Social Support Seeking,Core Self‐Evaluations,and Withdrawal Behaviors

Drawing from the theory of conservation of resources (Hobfoll, 1989), we examined relationships between social support seeking as a response to perceived discrimination from supervisors, core self‐evaluations, and withdrawal behaviors. We further studied how the relationship between social support seeking and withdrawal behaviors was moderated by core self‐evaluations. With two different samples, we found, as expected, that social support seeking in response to discrimination from supervisors is positively related to employee withdrawal behaviors, and core self‐evaluations is negatively related to withdrawal behaviors. Across the two samples, we also found evidence that the relationship between social support seeking and withdrawal behaviors was weaker when core self‐evaluations were high compared to low. We discuss implications of our results in the context of past research. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

What Makes the Personal Income Tax Progressive? A Comparative Analysis for Fifteen OECD Countries

In this paper, we explore the roles of tax credits, rate structures, allowances and deductions in determining the overall progressivity of net income tax liabilities in fifteen OECD countries. Three clusters emerge: (i) the rate-structure countries, Australia, France, Italy, the Netherlands and Spain, where the rate effect is the dominant (but not the only) source of progressivity of gross and net tax liabilities; (ii) the allowance countries, the English-speaking countries other than Australia, where allowances are the dominant source of progressivity; and (iii) the mixed structure countries, Belgium, Finland, Germany and Sweden, where roughly half of the progressivity of gross tax liabilities is attributable to the rate structure.