Skip to main content
Cover image of the book The Vulnerable Age Phenomenon
Books

The Vulnerable Age Phenomenon

Author
Michael Inbar
Paperback
Add to Cart
Publication Date
6 in. × 9 in. 64 pages
ISBN
978-0-87154-397-4
Also Available From

About This Book

A volume in the Social Science Frontiers series, which are occasional publications reviewing new fields for social science development.

These occasional publications seek to summarize recent work being done in particular areas of social research, to review new developments in the field, and to indicate issues needing further investigation. The publications are intended to help orient those concerned with developing current research programs and broadening the use of social science in the policy-making process.

A Volume in the the Russell Sage Foundation's Social Science Frontiers Series

MICHAEL INBAR was lecturer, Hebrew University, Jerusalem.

RSF Journal
View Book Series
Sign Up For Our Mailing List
Apply For Funding
Cover image of the book Taking Society's Measure
Books

Taking Society's Measure

A Personal History of Survey Research
Editor
Herbert H. Hyman
Hardcover
Add to Cart
Publication Date
6 in. × 9 in. 288 pages
ISBN
978-0-87154-395-0
Also Available From

About This Book

How are we, as members of a society, informed of conditions that affect our social welfare? How does the government register the impact of its actions on its citizens? The turbulent 1930s saw the emergence of sample survey research as an increasingly valuable technique of social inquiry. Perhaps no one championed this nascent discipline as vigorously as Herbert Hyman, one of those pioneering investigators whose talents were so closely associated with the rapid growth of survey research that their professional careers and reputations became virtually indistinguishable from the field itself.

Hyman’s personal account is a remarkable contribution to the history and sociology of social research. His experiences with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Office of War Information, the U.S. Bombing Surveys of Germany and Japan, the National Opinion Research Center, and the Bureau of Applied Social Research are all documented with fascinating insight into the critical events and prominent individuals that shaped the field of survey research between the late 1930s and the late 1950s.

The late HERBERT H. HYMAN retired from Wesleyan University in 1983 as Professor of Sociology Emeritus.

HUBERT O'GORMAN was, until his untimely death, professor of sociology at the same university.

ELEANOR SINGER is senior research scholar at the Center for the Social Sciences at Columbia University.

RSF Journal
View Book Series
Sign Up For Our Mailing List
Apply For Funding
Cover image of the book What Employers Want
Books

What Employers Want

Job Prospects for Less-Educated Workers
Author
Harry J. Holzer
Paperback
$24.95
Add to Cart
Publication Date
6 in. × 9 in. 192 pages
ISBN
978-0-87154-388-2
Also Available From

About This Book

A very important contribution to the field of labor economics, and in particular to the understanding of the labor market forworkers with relatively low skill levels. I think we have the sense that the market looks bad, but haven't been clear on how bad it is, or how it got that way. What Employers Want provides some of the answers and identifies the important questions. It is essential reading. —Jeffrey S. Zax, University of Colorado at Boulder

The substantial deterioration in employment and earnings among the nation's less-educated workers, especially minorities and younger males in the nation's big cities, has been tentatively ascribed to a variety of causes: an increase in required job skills, the movement of companies from the cities to the suburbs, and a rising unwillingness to hire minority job seekers. What Employers Want is the first book to replace conjecture about today's job market with first-hand information gleaned from employers about who gets hired. Drawn from asurvey of over 3,000 employers in four major metropolitan areas—Los Angeles, Boston, Atlanta, and Detroit—this volume provides a wealth of data on what jobs are available to the less-educated, in what industries, what skills they require, where they are located, what they pay, and how they are filled.

The evidence points to a dramatic surge in suburban, white-collar jobs. The manufacturing industry—once a steady employer of blue-collar workers—has been eclipsed by the expanding retail trade and service industries, where the vast majority of jobs are in clerical, managerial, or sales positions. Since manufacturing establishments have been the most likely employers to move from the central cities to the suburbs, the shortage of jobs for low-skill urban workers is particularly acute. In the central cities, the problem is compounded and available jobs remain vacant because employers increasingly require greater cognitive and social skills as well as specific job-related experience. Holzer reveals the extent to which minorities are routinely excluded by employer recruitment and screening practices that rely heavily on testing, informal referrals, and stable work histories. The inaccessible location and discriminatory hiring patterns of suburban employers further limit the hiring of black males in particular, while earnings, especially for minority females, remain low.

Proponents of welfare reform often assume that stricter work requirements and shorter eligibility periods will effectively channel welfare recipients toward steady employment and off federal subsidies. What Employers Want directly challenges this premise and demonstrates that only concerted efforts to close the gap between urban employers and inner city residents can produce healthy levels of employment in the nation's cities. Professor Holzer outlines the measures that will benecessary—targeted education and training programs, improved transportation and job placement, heightened enforcement of antidiscrimination laws, and aggressive job creation strategies. Repairing urban labor markets will not be easy. This book shows why.

HARRY J. HOLZER is currently Chief Economist at the U.S. Department of Labor and professor of economics at Michigan State University.

A Volume in the Multi-City Study of Urban Inequality

RSF Journal
View Book Series
Sign Up For Our Mailing List
Apply For Funding
Cover image of the book Handbook of International Migration
Books

Handbook of International Migration

The American Experience
Editors
Charles Hirschman
Philip Kasinitz
Joshua DeWind
Hardcover
$75.00
Add to Cart
Publication Date
7.5 in. × 10 in. 520 pages
ISBN
978-0-87154-244-1
Also Available From

About This Book

Winner of the 2000 Thomas and Znaniecki Award from the International Migration Section of the American Sociological Association

The historic rise in international migration over the past thirty years has brought a tide of new immigrants to the United States from Asia, South America, and other parts of the globe. Their arrival has reverberated throughout American society, prompting an outpouring of scholarship on the causes and consequences of the new migrations. The Handbook of International Migration gathers the best of this scholarship in one volume to present a comprehensive overview of the state of immigration research in this country, bringing coherence and fresh insight to this fast growing field.

The contributors to The Handbook of International Migration—a virtual who's who of immigration scholars—draw upon the best social science theory and demographic research to examine the effects and implications of immigration in the United States. The dramatic shift in the national background of today's immigrants away from primarily European roots has led many researchers to rethink traditional theories of assimilation,and has called into question the usefulness of making historical comparisons between today's immigrants and those of previous generations.

Part I of the Handbook examines current theories of international migration, including the forces that motivate people to migrate, often at great financial and personal cost. Part II focuses on how immigrants are changed after their arrival, addressing such issues as adaptation, assimilation, pluralism, and socioeconomic mobility. Finally, Part III looks at the social, economic, and political effects of the surge of new immigrants on American society. Here the Handbook explores how the complex politics of immigration have become intertwined with economic perceptions and realities, racial and ethnic divisions,and international relations.

A landmark compendium of richly nuanced investigations, The Handbook of International Migration will be the major reference work on recent immigration to this country and will enhance the development of a truly interdisciplinary field of international migration studies.

CHARLES HIRSCHMAN is professor of sociology at the University of Washington.

PHILIP KASINITZ is professor of sociology at Hunter College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.

JOSH DEWIND is program director of the Social Science Research Council and professor of anthropology at Hunter College of the City University of New York.

CONTRIBUTORS: Charles Hirschman, Philip Kasinitz, Josh DeWind, Richard Alba, Susan B. Carter, Thomas J. Espenshade, Reynolds Farley, Walter C. Farrell Jr., Nancy Foner, Rachel M. Friedberg, Herbert J. Gans, Gary Gerstle, Nina Glick Schiller, Chandra Guinn, John Higham, Gregory A. Huber, Jennifer Hunt, James H. Johnson Jr., David E. López, Douglas S. Massey, John Hull Mollenkopf, Victor Nee, Joel Perlmann, Patricia R. Pessar, David Plotke, Alejandro Portes, Rebeca Raijman, Nestor Rodriguez, Rubén G. Rumbaut, George J. Sánchez, Richard Sutch, Marta Tienda, Roger Waldinger, Min Zhou, and Aristide R. Zolberg.

RSF Journal
View Book Series
Sign Up For Our Mailing List
Apply For Funding
Cover image of the book The Hard Count
Books

The Hard Count

The Political and Social Challenges of Census Mobilization
Authors
D. Sunshine Hillygus
Norman H. Nie
Kenneth Prewitt
Heili Pals
Paperback
Add to Cart
Publication Date
6 in. × 9 in. 168 pages
ISBN
978-0-87154-335-6
Also Available From

About This Book

American democracy relies on an accurate census to fairly allocate political representation and billions of dollars in federal funds. Declining participation in previous censuses and a general waning of civic engagement in society raised the possibility that the 2000 count would miss many Americans—disproportionately ethnic and racial minorities—depriving them of their share of influence in American society and yielding an unfair distribution of federal resources. Faced with this possibility, the Census Bureau launched a massive mobilization campaign to encourage Americans to complete and return their census forms. In The Hard Count, former Census Bureau director Kenneth Prewitt, D. Sunshine Hillygus, Norman H. Nie, and Heili Pals present a rigorous evaluation of this campaign. Can a busy, mobile, disengaged public be motivatived to participate in this civic activity? Using a rich set of data and drawing on theories of civic mobilization, political persuasion, and media effects, the authors assess the factors that influenced participation in the 2000 census.

The Hard Count profiles a watershed moment in the history of the American census. As the mobilization campaign was underway, political opposition to the census sprang up, citing privacy issues and seeking to limit the kind of data the census could collect. Hillygus, Nie, Prewitt, and Pals analyze the competing effects of the mobilization campaign and the privacy controversy on public attitudes and cooperation with the census. Using an internet based survey, the authors tracked a representative sample of Americans over time to gauge changes in census attitudes, privacy concerns, and their eventual decision whether or not to return their census form. The study uniquely captures the public’s exposure to census advertising, community mobilization, and news stories, and was designed so people could view video clips and photos of actual campaign advertisements on their sets in their homes. The authors find that the Census Bureau campaign did in fact raise awareness of the census and census participation. The mobilization campaign was especially effective at increasing participation among groups historically undercounted by the census. They also find that census participation would have been higher if not for the privacy controversy, which discouraged many people from cooperating with the census and led others to omit information from their census form. The findings of The Hard Count have important policy implications for future census counts and offer theoretical insights regarding the influence of mobilization campaigns on civic participation.

The goal of full and equal cooperation with the decennial census and other government surveys is an important national priority. The Hard Count shows that a mobilization campaign can dramatically increase voluntary participation in the decennial headcount and identifies emerging social and political challenges that may threaten future census counts and contribute to the growing fragility of our national statistical system.

D. SUNSHINE HILLYGUS is assistant professor of government at Harvard University.

NORMAN H. NIE is director of the Stanford Institute for the Quantitative Study of Society.

KENNETH PREWITT is Carnegie Professor of Public Affairs at Columbia University.

HEILI PALS is a doctoral student in the Department of Sociology at Stanford University.

A Volume in the RSF Census Series

RSF Journal
View Book Series
Sign Up For Our Mailing List
Apply For Funding
Cover image of the book America's Children
Books

America's Children

Resources from Family, Government, and the Economy
Author
Donald J. Hernandez
Paperback
Add to Cart
Publication Date
6.63 in. × 9.25 in. 504 pages
ISBN
978-0-87154-382-0
Also Available From

About This Book

America’s Children offers a valuable overview of the dramatic transformations in American childhood over the past fifty years, a period of historic shifts that reduced the human and material resources available to our children. Alarmingly, one fifth of all U.S. children now grow up in poverty, many are without health insurance, and about 30 percent never graduate from high school. Despite such conditions, economic, family, and educational programs for children earn low national priority and must depend on inconsistent state and local management.

Drawing upon both historical and recent data, including census information from 1940 to 1980, Donald J. Hernandez provides a vivid portrait of children in America and puts forth a forceful case for overhauling our national child welfare policies. Hernandez shows how important revolutions in household composition and income, parental education and employment, childcare, and levels of poverty have affected children’s well-being. As working wives and single mothers increasingly replace the traditional homemaker, children spend greater portions of time in educational and daycare facilities outside the home, and those with single mothers stand the greatest chance of being welfare dependent. Wider changes in society have created even greater stress for children in certain groups as they age: out-of-wedlock births are on the rise for white teenagers, half of all Hispanic youths never graduate high school, and violence accounts for nearly 90 per cent of all black teenage deaths.

America’s Children explores the interaction of many trends in children’s lives and the fundamental social, demographic, and economic processes that lie at their core. The book concludes with a thoughtful analysis of the ability of families and government to provide for a new age of children, with emphasis on reducing racial inequities and providing greater public support for families, comparable to the family policies of other developed countries. As the traditional “Ozzie and Harriet” family recedes into collective memory, the importance of creating strong national policies for children is amplified, particularly in the areas of financial assistance, health insurance, education, and daycare. America’s Children provides a compelling guide for reassessing the forces that shape our children and the resources available to safeguard their future.

"In this conceptually creative, methodologically rigorous, and empirically rich book, Hernandez uses census and survey data to describe several quite profound changes that have characterized the life courses of America's children and their families over the last 50 to 150 years....this erudite book is destined to be a classic." —Richard M. Lerner, Contemporary Psychology

"America's Children goes a long way toward informing the debate on the causes of increasing poverty, and it challenges some widely held misperceptions....its study of resources available to children (and their families) lays a valuable foundation for surveying trends in family structure, education, and income sources....Anyone interested in the changing lives of children should read it; anyone interested in understanding the causes and patterns of poverty, and in designing a better welfare system, must read it." —Ellen B. Magenheim, Journal of Policy Analysis and Management

DONALD J. HERNANDEZ is chief of the marriage and family branch of the U.S. Bureau of the Census.

A Volume in the RSF Census Series

RSF Journal
View Book Series
Sign Up For Our Mailing List
Apply For Funding
Cover image of the book Spin Cycle
Books

Spin Cycle

How Research Is Used in Policy Debates: The Case of Charter Schools
Author
Jeffrey R. Henig
Paperback
$33.95
Add to Cart
Publication Date
6 in. × 9 in. 312 pages
ISBN
978-0-87154-337-0
Also Available From

About This Book

Winner of the 2010 Outstanding Book Award of the American Educational Research Association

One important aim of social science research is to provide unbiased information that can help guide public policies. However, social science is often construed as politics by other means. Nowhere is the polarized nature of social science research more visible than in the heated debate over charter schools. In Spin Cycle, noted political scientist and education expert Jeffrey Henig explores how controversies over the charter school movement illustrate the use and misuse of research in policy debates. Henig’s compelling narrative reveals that, despite all of the political maneuvering on the public stage, research on school choice has gradually converged on a number of widely accepted findings. This quiet consensus shows how solid research can supersede partisan cleavages and sensationalized media headlines.

In Spin Cycle, Henig draws on extensive interviews with researchers, journalists, and funding agencies on both sides of the debate, as well as data on federal and foundation grants and a close analysis of media coverage, to explore how social science research is “spun” in the public sphere. Henig looks at the consequences of a highly controversial New York Times article that cited evidence of poor test performance among charter school students. The front-page story, based on research findings released by the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), sparked an explosive debate over the effectiveness of charter schools. In the ensuing drama, reputable scholars from both ends of the political spectrum launched charges and counter-charges over the research methodology and the implications of the data. Henig uses this political tug-of-war to illustrate broader problems relating to social science: of what relevance is supposedly non-partisan research when findings are wielded as political weapons on both sides of the debate?

In the case of charter schools, Henig shows that despite the political posturing in public forums, many researchers have since revised their stances according to accumulating new evidence and have begun to find common ground. Over time, those who favored charter schools were willing to admit that in many instances charter schools are no better than traditional schools. And many who were initially alarmed by the potentially destructive consequences of school choice admitted that their fears were overblown. The core problem, Henig concludes, has less to do with research itself than with the way it is often sensationalized or misrepresented in public discourse.

Despite considerable frustration over the politicization of research, until now there has been no systematic analysis of the problem. Spin Cycle provides an engaging narrative and instructive guide with far-reaching implications for the way research is presented to the public. Ultimately, Henig argues, we can do a better job of bringing research to bear on the task of social betterment.

JEFFREY R. HENIG is professor of political science and education at Teachers College and professor of political science at Columbia University.

Copublished with The Century Foundation

 

RSF Journal
View Book Series
Sign Up For Our Mailing List
Apply For Funding
Cover image of the book Making the Work-Based Safety Net Work Better
Books

Making the Work-Based Safety Net Work Better

Forward-Looking Policies to Help Low-Income Families
Editors
Carolyn J. Heinrich
John Karl Scholz
Paperback
$42.50
Add to Cart
Publication Date
6.63 in. × 9.25 in. 360 pages
ISBN
978-0-87154-422-3
Also Available From

About This Book

Work first. That is the core idea behind the 1996 welfare reform legislation. It sounds appealing, but according to Making the Work-Based Safety Net Work Better, it collides with an exceptionally difficult reality. The degree to which work provides a way out of poverty depends greatly on the ability of low-skilled people to maintain stable employment and make progress toward an income that provides an adequate standard of living. This forward-looking volume examines eight areas of the safety net where families are falling through and describes how current policies and institutions could evolve to enhance the self-sufficiency of low-income families.

David Neumark analyzes a range of labor market policies and finds overwhelming evidence that the minimum wage is ineffective in promoting self-sufficiency. Neumark suggests the Earned Income Tax Credit is a much more promising policy to boost employment among single mothers and family incomes. Greg Duncan, Lisa Gennetian, and Pamela Morris find no evidence that encouraging parents to work leads to better parenting, improved psychological health, or more positive role models for children. Instead, the connection between parental work and child achievement is linked to parents’ improved access to quality child care. Rebecca Blank and Brian Kovak document an alarming increase in the number of single mothers who receive neither wages nor public assistance and who are significantly more likely to suffer from medical problems of their own or of a child. Time caps and work hour requirements embedded in benefits policies leave some mothers unable to work and ineligible for cash benefits.

Marcia Meyers and Janet Gornick identify another gap: low-income families tend to lose financial support and health coverage long before they earn enough to access employer-based benefits and tax provisions. They propose building “institutional bridges” that minimize discontinuities associated with changes in employment, earnings, or family structure. Steven Raphael addresses a particularly troubling weakness of the work-based safety net—its inadequate provision for the large number of individuals who are or were incarcerated in the United States. He offers tractable suggestions for policy changes that could ease their transition back into non-institutionalized society and the labor market.

Making the Work-Based Safety Net Work Better shows that the “work first” approach alone isn’t working and suggests specific ways the social welfare system might be modified to produce greater gains for vulnerable families.

CAROLYN J. HEINRICH is director of the La Follette School of Public Affairs, professor of public affairs and affiliated professor of economics, and associate director of research and training at the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

JOHN KARL SCHOLZ is professor of economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

CONTRIBUTORS: Jayanta Bhattacharya, Rebecca M. Blank, Greg J. Duncan, David N. Figlio, Lisa Gennetian, Janet C. Gornick, Brian K. Kovak, Marcia K. Meyers, Pamela Morris, David Neumark, Steven Raphael, Peter Richmond, R. Kent Weaver.

 

An Institute for Research on Poverty Affiliated Book on Poverty and Public Policy

 

RSF Journal
View Book Series
Sign Up For Our Mailing List
Apply For Funding
Cover image of the book The Social Organization of Schooling
Books

The Social Organization of Schooling

Editors
Larry V. Hedges
Barbara Schneider
Hardcover
Add to Cart
Publication Date
6.63 in. × 9.25 in. 384 pages
ISBN
978-0-87154-340-0
Also Available From

About This Book

Schools are complex social settings where students, teachers, administrators, and parents interact to shape a child’s educational experience. Any effort to improve educational outcomes for America’s children requires a dynamic understanding of the environments in which children learn. In The Social Organization of Schooling, editors Larry Hedges and Barbara Schneider assemble researchers from the fields of education, organizational theory, and sociology to provide a new framework for understanding and analyzing America’s schools and the many challenges they face.

The Social Organization of Schooling closely examines the varied components that make up a school’s social environment. Contributors Adam Gamoran, Ramona Gunter, and Tona Williams focus on the social organization of teaching. Using intensive case studies, they show how positive professional relations among teachers contribute to greater collaboration, the dissemination of effective teaching practices, and ultimately, a better learning environment for children. Children learn more from better teachers, but those best equipped to teach often opt for professions with higher social stature, such as law or medicine. In his chapter, Robert Dreeben calls for the establishment of universal principles and practices to define good teaching, arguing that such standards are necessary to legitimize teaching as a high status profession. The Social Organization of Schooling also looks at how social norms in schools are shaped and reinforced by interactions among teachers and students. Sociologist Maureen Hallinan shows that students who are challenged intellectually and accepted socially are more likely to embrace school norms and accept responsibility for their own actions. Using classroom observations, surveys, and school records, Daniel McFarland finds that group-based classroom activities are effective tools in promoting both social and scholastic development in adolescents. The Social Organization of Schooling also addresses educational reforms and the way they affect a school’s social structures. Examining how testing policies affect children’s opportunities to learn, Chandra Muller and Kathryn Schiller find that policies which increased school accountability boosted student enrollment in math courses, reflecting a shift in the school culture towards higher standards.

Employing a variety of analytical methods, The Social Organization of Schooling provides a sound understanding of the social mechanisms at work in our educational system. This important volume brings a fresh perspective to the many ongoing debates in education policy and is essential reading for anyone concerned with the future of America’s children.

LARRY V. HEDGES is Stella M. Rowley Professor of Education, Psychology, and Sociology in the Harris School at the University of Chicago.

BARBARA SCHNEIDER is professor of sociology and human development and codirector of the Alfred P. Sloan Center on Parents, Children, and Work at the University of Chicago.

CONTRIBUTORS: Charles E. Bidwell, Robert Dreeban,  Kenneth A. Frank,  Adam Gamoran,  Ramona Gunter,   Maureen T. Hallinan, Lori Diane Hill, Richard M. Ingersoll,  Susan Moore Johnson,  Daniel A. McFarland,  Chandra Muller,  Robert A. Petrin,  Catherine Riegle-Crumb, Kathryn S. Schiller, W. Richard Scott,  Christopher B. Swanson,  Tona Williams, Yong Zhao.

RSF Journal
View Book Series
Sign Up For Our Mailing List
Apply For Funding
Cover image of the book Succeeding Generations
Books

Succeeding Generations

On the Effects of Investments in Children
Authors
Robert Haveman
Barbara Wolfe
Paperback
Add to Cart
Publication Date
6 in. × 9 in. 344 pages
ISBN
978-0-87154-380-6
Also Available From

About This Book

Drawn from an extensive two-decade longitudinal survey of American families, Succeeding Generations traces a representative group of America's children from their early years through young adulthood. It evaluates the many background factors that are most influential in determining how much education children will obtain, whether or not they will become teen parents, and how economically active they will be when they reach their twenties. Succeeding Generations demonstrates how our children's future has been placed at risk by social and economic conditions such as fractured families, a troubled economy, rising poverty rates, and neighborhood erosion. The authors also pinpoint some significant causes of children's later success, emphasizing the importance of parents' education and, despite the apparent loss of time spent with children, the generally positive influence of maternal employment. Haveman and Wolfe supplement their research with a comprehensive review of the many debates among economists, sociologists, developmental psychologists, and other experts on how best to improve the lot of America's children.

"A state-of-the-art investigation of the determinants of children's success in the United States....Clearly written, highly readable, and compelling."—Contemporary Sociology

"Haveman and Wolfe are professors of economics who bring sophisticated statistical and econometric techniques to the analysis of the economic and educational success of children as they progress into young adulthood."—Choice

"This study is one of the most comprehensive of its kind, in part because the researchers collected detailed information about a wide range of children each year for more than two decades." —Wisconsin State Journal

"The research at the core of this book addresses critically important questions in social science...an important contribution to the literature." —Robert Plotnick, University of Washington

ROBERT H. HAVEMAN is John Bascom Professor in the department of economics and at the La Follette Institute of Public Affairs at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

BARBARA L. WOLFE is professor of economics and preventative medicine, and professor at La Follette Institute of Public Affairs, University of Wisconsin, Madison.

RSF Journal
View Book Series
Sign Up For Our Mailing List
Apply For Funding