Senior Women Web

Author: SeniorWomenWeb

  • Improving People’s Relationships with Technology and With Fellow Humans

    By Milenko MartinovicKara Weisman

    When Stanford researchers asked people to think about the sensations and emotions of inanimate or non-human entities, they got a glimpse into how those people think about mental life.

    Lead Stanford author of study, Kara Weisman

    What they found is that Americans break mental life into three parts — body, heart and mind — a finding that challenges earlier research on this topic and could have important implications for understanding people’s social interactions and moral judgments. The findings were published Oct. 11 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

    Deep, philosophical questions about mental life, like “What is consciousness?” or “What does it mean to be alive?” are difficult for most people to answer, according to Kara Weisman, a PhD student in psychology and the study’s lead author.

    Rather than looking at broad, philosophical questions, Weisman, along with Stanford psychologists and the study’s co-authors Carol Dweck and Ellen Markman, explored how ordinary people make sense of the sensations, emotions, thoughts and other mental capacities that make up mental life.

    The group asked 1,400 U.S. adults simple questions about the mental capacities of different beings. For example, in the first study, half the participants were shown a picture of a robot and the other half a picture of a beetle. They were then asked questions such as, “Is a beetle capable of experiencing joy?” and “Is a robot capable of experiencing guilt?” In total, they asked each participant 40 similar questions, then analyzed how all the responses related to each other.

    “Our primary interest was really in the patterns of people’s answers to these questions,” Weisman said. “So, when a certain person thought a robot could think or remember things, what else did they think it was capable of doing? By looking at the patterns in people’s responses to these questions, we could infer the underlying, conceptual structure.”

    Those patterns resulted in three main clusters of mental capacities: body (physiological sensations, like hunger and pain), heart (social-emotional abilities, like guilt and pride) and mind (perceptual and cognitive abilities, like memory and vision). These clusters were prominent whether participants judged beings individually, when they were compared directly against each other or when the researchers expanded the cast of characters to include entities like a fetus, a chimpanzee or a stapler.

    A 2007 study from Harvard psychologists has largely served as the standard in mind perception. That study produced a framework with two components: experience (the ability to feel hunger and joy) and agency (the ability to plan or have self-control).

    The Stanford scholars called that study “pioneering work,” but said it does not address how people parse mental life itself. Instead, Weisman said that the Harvard study addressed the difference among beings, for example, between a beetle and a dog, but didn’t identify the categories or parts of the mind.

    “If the question is, ‘What are the parts of the mind?’ then I think our studies indicate the answer is more like this body-heart-mind than the agency-experience framework. I think these two frameworks can work together to inform our social reasoning more broadly, and it would be fascinating to explore this in future research,” Weisman said.

    The findings, the researchers say, may play a role in improving people’s relationships with technology and with fellow humans. For example, through the body-heart-mind framework, viewing a robot as having a “mind” – or even a “heart”– may allow people to humanize robots, therefore increasing the likelihood of a smooth interaction.

    The framework could also shed light on how to reduce dehumanization between people, the researchers say. For example, objectification might take the form of emphasizing a person’s body over the mind and heart, while other forms of prejudice and stereotyping might take the form of focusing only on people’s “minds” and neglecting their emotional life, or focusing only on people’s “hearts” and underestimating their intellectual abilities. The body-mind-heart model may provide a useful perspective for understanding how and why people enhance or reduce mental capacities within those three major clusters.

    “This is an exciting new framework, but it’s just the beginning,” Dweck said. “We hope it can serve as a takeoff point for theory and research on how ordinary people think about age-old questions about the mind.”

    The work was supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation and by a William R. and Sara Hart Kimball Stanford Graduate Fellowship.

     

  • A Pew Research Center Report: Wide Partisan Gaps in US Over How Far the Country Has Come on Gender Equality

    Man and Woman image at window 

    Democrats sharply divided along educational lines on whether life is easier for men than for women

    BY ,  AND 

    Women in the United States have made significant strides toward closing the gaps that have kept them from achieving equality with men. But the country is sharply divided over how much work remains to be done, and those divisions are rooted mainly in the growing partisan schism that pervades American values and culture these days.

    A new Pew Research Center survey finds that Democrats are largely dissatisfied with the nation’s progress on this issue – 69% say the country hasn’t gone far enough when it comes to giving women equal rights with men. Among Republicans, more than half (54%) say things are about right, while only 26% say the country has more work to do.

    Democrats are also much more likely than Republicans to say that men have easier lives than women these days: 49% of Democrats say this compared with 19% of Republicans. A majority of Republicans (68%) say neither men nor women have it easier today (compared with 45% of Democrats). Those who see an advantage for men often say these inequities are rooted in the workplace.


    Politics also underpins views about who has benefited from the changing roles of men and women. Among Democrats and Republicans, more see an upside for women than for men as women have taken on a greater role in the workplace and men have assumed more responsibility for child care and housework, but Democrats are far more likely than Republicans to see benefits flowing from this societal shift.

    Roughly six-in-ten Democrats (58%) say that changing gender roles have made it easier for women to lead satisfying lives; about a third of Republicans (36%) say the same. And while about half of Democrats (48%) say these changes have made it easier for men to lead satisfying lives, only 30% of Republicans share this view. In addition, Democrats are more likely than Republicans to say changing gender roles have made it easier for parents to raise children, for marriages to be successful and for families to earn enough money to live comfortably.

    To be sure, men and women have different perspectives on how far the country has come in achieving gender equality, but these differences are relatively narrow when partisanship is considered. More than half of women (57%) say the country hasn’t done enough to give women equal rights with men, while 33% say things are about right. For their part, men are equally split between saying there is more work to be done (42%) and things are about right (44%). And women are much more likely than men to say that men have it easier these days (41% vs. 28%). Among Democrats, a majority of women (74%) and men (64%) say the country hasn’t gone far enough when it comes to achieving gender equality. And while Republican women are more likely than their male counterparts to share this view (33% vs. 20%), relatively small shares of each group do so.

    The nationally representative survey of 4,573 adults was conducted online Aug. 8-21 and Sept. 14-28, 2017, using Pew Research Center’s American Trends Panel.1 Among the key findings:

    Democrats are divided along educational lines in their views on gender equality


    About eight-in-ten Democrats with a bachelor’s degree or higher (81%) and 73% of those with some college experience say the country has not gone far enough in giving women equal rights with men; 55% of those with a high school degree or less education say the same. Among Republicans, views are consistent across educational groups.

    The education gap among Democrats is even wider when it comes to whether men or women have easier lives these days. Among Democrats with a bachelor’s degree or higher, 69% say men have it easier. By comparison, 52% of Democrats with some college education and only 27% of those with a high school degree or less education say the same. Again, Republicans are more consistent in their views, regardless of educational attainment.

    Democrats are also divided in their assessments of how the changing roles of men and women have affected women’s lives. Roughly seven-in-ten Democrats with a four-year college degree (71%) say these changes have made it easier for women to live satisfying lives. Only about half of Democrats with some college experience (54%) or less education (49%) share that view.

    Republican views of the benefits of changing gender roles are also divided along educational lines. Those with a bachelor’s or higher degree are more likely than those with less education to say the changing roles of men and women have had a positive impact, particularly when it comes to women’s success at work: 62% of Republicans with at least a bachelor’s degree say these changes have made it easier for women to be successful at work, compared with 49% of those with less education.

  • The Movie Star and Me or Beauty and The Geek

    My dear friend, the legendary, Oscar-winning actress, Joan Fontaine, died in December 2013.  Had she lived, she would have celebrated her 100th birthday on October 22nd this year. In her memory,  I am reprising an essay I wrote long ago commemorating our remarkable, unlikely friendship which endured for four decades until her death, despite the fact that our lifestyles were 180 degrees apart. 

    by Rose Madeline MulaJoan Fontaine

    The year, 1940.  The place, the Embassy Theater, a movie house in Waltham, Massachusetts.  Unlike the sterile, stark cubicles that serve as screening rooms today, the spacious Embassy was a fantasyland.  It boasted a ceiling of twinkling stars against a midnight-blue sky, a huge screen draped in lush, red velvet; gilded, highly-ornamented walls; uninformed ushers; and a richly-carpeted, imposing lobby with a grand staircase curving upward to the balcony seats.

    In short, the Embassy was an enchanting oasis in a dreary former mill town that had morphed into a nondescript watch manufacturing city.  

    I was twelve years old, painfully shy, self-conscious, gawky, and near-sighted.  In that pre-contact lenses era, I was condemned to wearing glasses and enduring the “Four Eyes!” taunts of mean-spirited classmates, which did not inspire confidence.

    But at the Embassy I forgot my insecurities as I got lost in the wonderful world of the silver screen.  One day in 1940 a memorable movie mesmerized me — Rebecca, starring Joan Fontaine and Laurence Olivier.  He was handsome, wealthy, aloof.  She was awkward, timid, withdrawn.  She was me!  Except she was lovely.  But she didn’t think so.  Hey!  Could it be that maybe I, too, was pretty behind my glasses but just didn’t realize it?  I have never identified so strongly with a character in a movie.  And when she implausibly won the heart of the brooding Maxim de Winter (Laurence Olivier), I was as ecstatic as if he were carrying me off to be his wife and the mistress of his mansion, Manderlay — which was even more magnificent than the Embassy Theater.

    The only scenario that was even more incredible was that the woman on that screen would one day become my friend — we would correspond, chat on the phone, and even visit each other’s homes.  No way!  Man would walk on the moon before that happened!

    Well, of course, man did eventually walk on the moon; and, equally miraculously, the glamorous Joan Fontaine of Hollywood, California, did meet and befriend the shrinking violet from Waltham, Massachusetts.  Both events occurred many years after that day in 1940 when Rebecca captured my soul and took up permanent residence there as my favorite movie of all time.  Surprisingly, it is the least loved work of its beautiful star, even though it had won her an Oscar nomination.* 

    I learned of Joan’s aversion to Rebecca when I first met her in 1975.   After years of slaving as Susie Steno in a series of companies, I had landed my dream job as Operations Manager of the Chateau de Ville, a chain of five theaters in New England, where I had the privilege of working with many of the idols of my youth — including the fabled Joan Fontaine, who had come to star in our production of Cactus Flower. 

    The Chateau’s shows played each of our five theaters for a month, and my responsibilities included overseeing housing for the casts in each location — Spartan furnished apartments for supporting players and more luxurious digs for our stars.  For the first leg of Joan’s Cactus Flower tour with us, I had found a lovely apartment for her on Boston’s Beacon Hill, overlooking the Charles River.

     As soon as she was settled there, I was dispatched to pick her up and drive her to Connecticut, Cactus Flower‘s next venue, so she could inspect some housing choices I had lined up for her there.   I hadn’t yet met her and was both excited and extremely nervous.  When she opened the door, I gushed, “It’s such a pleasure to meet you, Miss Fontaine!  I absolutely loved Rebecca!”  I expected a “Thank you!” or at least a smile.  Instead, my compliment was greeted with a frown and disconcerting silence.  Huh?  What was that about?   I feared I was going to have to carry on a one-sided dialogue all the way to Connecticut and back.  Fortunately, however,  as we started down the highway, she began to relax, and conversation became very easy.  She was witty, friendly and warm.  Soon I felt comfortable enough to ask her who had been her favorite leading man.

    “Charles Boyer,” she responded immediately.  “He was a true gentleman.  Working with him was a joy.”

    “And dare I ask who was your least favorite co-star?”  I dared to ask.  

    Again, not a moment’s hesitation.  “Laurence Olivier,” she replied emphatically.

    Aha!  A clue as to her reaction to my mention of Rebecca.

    *Editor’s Note: Although Joan Fontaine did not win the Oscar for her Best Actress nomination for her role in Rebecca in 1941, she did win 1942’s Best Actress Oscar for her role in Alfred Hitchcock’s Suspicion.

  • Women’s Issues in Congress: House Small Business Subcommittee Considers Women’s Entrepreneurship

    Testimony of Antonella Pianalto on behalf of the Association of Women’s Business Centers to the US House of Representatives Committee on Small Business Subcommittee on Health and Technology, October 12,2017

    Antonella Pianalto; AWBC’s photo

    Antonella PianaltoFostering Women’s Entrepreneurial Success

    Thank you, Chairman Radewagen, Ranking Member Lawson and distinguished Members of the Subcommittee for the opportunity to share this testimony with you. My name is Antonella Pianalto, and I serve as the President & CEO of the Association of Women’s Business Centers.

    The Association of Women’s Business Centers (AWBC) supports the national network of Women’s Business Centers (WBCs) by providing training, mentoring, programming, and advocacy with the goal of improving services to women entrepreneurs. The AWBC’s membership includes every WBC throughout the United States.

    As you know, the Women’s Business Center program is a public-private partnership with nearly 30 years of success in providing training, counseling, mentoring, and access to capital to women entrepreneurs across the country. Our network reaches into communities – urban and rural alike – to assist America’s job creators in launching and growing their own businesses.

    Women’s Business Centers are focused on being an effective and efficient resource for one of the fastest growing sectors of the economy. Our continued growth leaves an enormous footprint of successful business owners and job creators. In fiscal year 2016, our centers reached more than 145,000 clients leading to more than 17,000 new businesses and nearly 25,000 new jobs.  In 2015, the most recent data, WBCs assisted with nearly $429 million in private capital infusion and last year helped to secure nearly $40 million in government contracts for women-owned businesses.

    First, let me thank the subcommittee for holding this hearing today. It is especially fitting to hold it during National Women’s Small Business Month when we recognize the accomplishments of women entrepreneurs, acknowledge existing challenges, and highlight resources available — including our own members, women business centers.

    Creating an environment where women can start and grow businesses has always been a vital part of our economic security. Today that is truer than ever, with women starting ventures at four times the rate of men.  Their success is vital to the US economy as women-owned businesses have a significant impact on their local communities and collectively drive growth and create jobs.

    Today’s testimony briefly provides our perspective on women’s entrepreneurship in 2017, the enormous potential of fostering a stronger environment for women business owners, barriers to achieving that potential, the role of WBCs, as well as policy recommendations for this Committee to consider. Before addressing those, however, a recent statistic captures the truly impressive scope of women entrepreneurs: if American women business owners were their own country, they would have the 10th largest GDP in the world, outstripping entire nations like Canada, Mexico and even Russia. 

    Women Entrepreneurship Today

    The most recent federal data, collated from the U.S. Census 2012 Survey of Business Owners, captures a snapshot of the explosion of women entrepreneurs. The census found 9.9 million women business owners in 2012 with $1.4 trillion in annual receipts — an 18.7% increase from 2007. The number of small businesses owned by women grew by 26.8%, compared to 1.9% for all firms; put another way, from 2007-2012, there were 1,143 woman-owned businesses started each day.

    From our own perspective as advisors to these firms, we can confirm that the explosion of women business owners occurred across the spectrum of businesses, as is reflected in the clients’ stages of businesses served by the WBCs: 15% start-ups, 28% 1-4 years, 31% 5-10 years, and 26% 11+ years.

  • Janet Yellen: “The Biggest Surprise in the US Economy This Year Has Been Inflation”

    Group of Thirty

    October 15, 2017

    The U.S. Economy and Monetary Policy

    Chair Janet L. Yellen

    *At the Group of 30 International Banking Seminar, Washington, DC

    I would like to thank the Group of Thirty for inviting me to participate in their International Banking Seminar and also thank Luis Alberto Moreno of the Inter-American Development Bank for hosting this event. My comments today will focus on U.S. economic prospects and monetary policy.

    Economic activity in the United States has been growing moderately so far this year, and the labor market has continued to strengthen. The terrible hurricanes that hit Texas, Florida, Puerto Rico, and our neighbors in the Caribbean caused tremendous damage and upended many lives, and our hearts go out to those affected. While the effects of the hurricanes on the U.S. economy are quite noticeable in the short term, history suggests that the longer-term effects will be modest and that aggregate economic activity will recover quickly.

    Starting with the labor market, through August, payroll job gains averaged 170,000 per month this year, down only a little from the average pace of gains in 2016 and still well above estimates of the pace necessary to absorb new entrants to the labor force. In September, payrolls were reported to have declined 33,000, but that weakness reflected the effects of Hurricane Irma, which hit Florida during the reference week for the September labor market surveys. I would expect employment to bounce back in subsequent months as communities recover and people return to their jobs. Other aspects of the jobs report for September were strong. The unemployment rate, which seems not to have been noticeably affected by the hurricanes, declined further to 4.2 percent, down about 1/2 percentage point from the end of 2016 and below the median of Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) participants’ estimates of its longer-run normal level. Labor force participation continues to strengthen relative to a downward trend that reflects, in part, the aging of the population. Other labor market indicators, including the rates of job openings and the number of people who voluntarily quit their jobs, also point to strength.

    Wage indicators have been mixed, and the most recent news, on average hourly earnings through September, was encouraging. On balance, wage gains appear moderate, and the pace seems broadly consistent with a tightening labor market once we account for the disappointing productivity growth in recent years.

    I expect the labor market to strengthen further as economic growth continues. The hurricanes will likely result in some hit to GDP growth in the third quarter but a rebound thereafter, and smoothing through those movements, I’m expecting growth that continues to exceed potential in the second half of the year. The latest projections from FOMC participants have a median of 2-1/2 percent GDP growth this year. Growth of consumer spending has been supported by the ongoing job gains and relatively high levels of household wealth and consumer sentiment. Business investment has strengthened this year following surprising weakness in 2016. The faster gains partly reflect an upturn in investment in the energy sector as oil prices have firmed. But the gains have been broader than that, and some measures of business sentiment remain quite strong. Exports also have risen this year, as growth abroad has solidified and the exchange value of the dollar has declined somewhat. My fellow FOMC participants and I perceive that risks to global growth have receded somewhat and expect growth to continue to improve over the near term.

    The biggest surprise in the U.S. economy this year has been inflation. Earlier this year, the 12-month change in the price index for personal consumption expenditures (PCE) reached 2 percent, and core PCE inflation reached 1.9 percent. These readings seemed consistent with the view that inflation had been held down by both the sizable fall in oil prices and the appreciation of the dollar starting around mid-2014, and that these influences have diminished significantly by this year. Accordingly, inflation seemed well on its way to the FOMC’s 2 percent inflation objective on a sustainable basis.

    Inflation readings over the past several months have been surprisingly soft, however, and the 12-month change in core PCE prices has fallen to 1.3 percent. The recent softness seems to have been exaggerated by what look like one-off reductions in some categories of prices, especially a large decline in quality-adjusted prices for wireless telephone services. More generally, it is common to see movements in inflation of a few tenths of a percentage point that are hard to explain, and such “surprises” should not really be surprising. My best guess is that these soft readings will not persist, and with the ongoing strengthening of labor markets, I expect inflation to move higher next year. Most of my colleagues on the FOMC agree. In the latest Summary of Economic Projections, my colleagues and I project inflation to move higher next year and to reach 2 percent by 2019.

    To be sure, our understanding of the forces that drive inflation is imperfect, and we recognize that this year’s low inflation could reflect something more persistent than is reflected in our baseline projections. The fact that a number of other advanced economies are also experiencing persistently low inflation understandably adds to the sense among many analysts that something more structural may be going on. Let me mention a few possibilities of more fundamental influences.1

    First, given that estimates of the natural rate of unemployment are so uncertain, it is possible that there is more slack in U.S. labor markets than is commonly recognized, which may be true for some other advanced economies as well. If so, some further tightening in the labor market might be needed to lift inflation back to 2 percent.

    Second, some measures of longer-term inflation expectations have edged lower over the past few years in several major economies, and it remains an open question whether these measures might be reflecting a true decline in expectations that is broad enough to be affecting actual inflation outcomes.

  • Walker Evans, Celebrating the Beauty of Everyday Life: “The Street Was An Inexhaustible Source of Poetic Finds”

    Floyd and Lucille Burroughs

    The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA ) is the exclusive United States venue for the retrospective exhibition Walker Evans, on view through February 4, 2018. As one of the preeminent photographers of the 20th century, Walker Evans’ 50-year body of work documents and distills the essence of life in America, leaving a legacy that continues to influence generations of contemporary photographers and artists. The exhibition encompasses all galleries in the museum’s Pritzker Center for Photography, the largest space dedicated to the exhibition, study and interpretation of photography at any art museum in the United States.

    Walker Evans, 1936, Floyd and Lucille Burroughs on Porch, Hale County, Alabama; © Walker Evans Archive, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

    “Conceived as a complete retrospective of Evans’ work, this exhibition highlights the photographer’s fascination with American popular culture, or vernacular,” explains Clément Chéroux, senior curator of photography at SFMOMA. “Evans was intrigued by the vernacular as both a subject and a method. By elevating it to the rank of art, he created a unique body of work celebrating the beauty of everyday life.”

    Using examples from Evans’ most notable photographs ? including iconic images from his work for the Farm Security Administration (FSA) documenting the effects of the Great Depression on American life; early visits to Cuba; street photography and portraits made on the New York City subway; layouts and portfolios from his more than 20-year collaboration with Fortune magazine and 1970s Polaroids;  Walker Evans explores Evans’ passionate search for the fundamental characteristics of American vernacular culture: the familiar, quotidian street language and symbols through which a society tells its own story. Decidedly popular and more linked to the masses than the cultural elite, vernacular culture is perceived as the antithesis of fine art.

  • Trump Executive Order Will Create a Health Insurance Race to the Bottom; Going Back to the Days of Junk Insurance and Insurers That Cannot Pay Claims Hurts Consumers

    Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones

    Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones issued the following statement in response to Trump’s executive order to allow the sale of health insurance across state lines and change rules relating to short-term insurance: 

    Commissioner Dave Jones; credit California Government, Wikimedia Commons

    “Today’s Executive Order is President Trump’s latest attempt to sabotage the Affordable Care Act and undermine state consumer protection laws. The ACA brought health insurance coverage to over five million additional Californians and makes comprehensive health care coverage available even for those with pre-existing conditions. This Executive Order is President Trump’s latest way of trying to take away Affordable Care Act protections. 

    President Trump’s Executive Order threatens the continued existence of comprehensive health insurance coverage. Once Trump’s Executive Order is implemented by federal agencies, those who are sick may no longer be provided coverage that meets their health care needs.

    Health insurers may sell across state lines today, but Trump’s Executive Order is intended to allow the sale of products across state lines without requiring compliance with the consumer protection laws of the state in which the product is sold. This change in the long-standing state-based regulatory approach is very harmful to consumers. We will do everything within our power to prevent it from going into effect.

    This does not promote competition, but instead forces a race to the bottom. The Executive Order’s implementation will provide an opening to sell products that are exempt from state consumer protection laws and that won’t be subject to the same state protections to make sure that they pay claims when you seek health care.

    Trump’s Executive Order calls on federal agencies to adopt rules that infringe upon states’ rights, undermines state regulatory authority, and prevents the enforcement of state consumer protections. We can expect this to result in the sale of products that don’t cover our health care needs, cost most consumers more money, and further destabilization of health insurance markets.

    The non-partisan National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) expressed strong objections to proposals to allow the sale of insurance across state lines without complying with state consumer protection laws in the state in which insurance is sold. The NAIC has appropriately noted that one of the major causes of the recent financial crisis was the ability of banks to choose their regulator, and that ‘interstate sales of insurance will allow insurers to choose their regulator, the very dynamic that led to the financial collapse.’

    Each state has important consumer protections in place, which have been enacted by the state’s legislature and Governor to protect the consumers in that state. If cross-border sales are permitted without complying with state laws, it would promote a race to the bottom, where insurers choose to incorporate in the state with the weakest laws and requirements providing the fewest benefits and skimpiest consumer protections, and then selling those products to consumers in other states regardless of those state’s laws.

    Increased sale of short-term policies that don’t cover essential health care needs or comply with most rules that apply to health insurance will harm consumers and create health insurance market instability.

    California has had a bad history with some Multiple Employer Welfare Arrangements (MEWA) which the Executive Order may expand, including cases of MEWA fiscal insolvency, the inability to pay consumer claims, and allegations of fraud.”

    Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones 

     

  • Why Write? It’s Like Everest! – Because It’s There

    by Joan L. CannonHartford Courant

    I write because I can’t help it. A better question would be why can’t I help it?

    First, I need to find out what I know; second, I need to discover what I don’t know; third, I need to note what I must not forget.  I’m an indifferent amateur painter, and the other visual arts are beyond my talents altogether; I can’t perform music. I find I can put words on paper. They can do for me what nothing else can.

    Since I have a poor memory and perhaps a little too much emotion, the act of writing helps to suggest the perspective I need to cope with what is happening or what has happened to me, and to suggest how one experience might be useful to others.  Utility is not all there is to that.  Love for rhythm and cadence and image-making, and the opportunity to cause a chuckle and the frisson of recognition are involved.

    Read the rest of Joan’s essay:  http://www.seniorwomen.com/news/index.php/why-write-like-everest-because-there

  • New Regulations Broadening Employer Exemptions to Contraceptive Coverage: For Many Women, Their Employers Will Determine Whether They Have No-cost Coverage to the Full Range of FDA Approved Methods

    Oct 06, 2017 | Laurie Sobel, Alina Salganicoff , and Caroline Rosenzweig, The Henry J. Kaiser Foundation*

    The Trump Administration has issued new regulations that significantly broaden employers’ ability to be exempt from the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) contraceptive coverage requirement.  The regulation opens the door for any employer or college/ university with a student health plan with objections to contraceptive coverage based on religious beliefs to qualify for an exemption. Any nonprofit or closely-held for-profit employer with moral objections to contraceptive coverage also qualifies for an exemption. Their female employees, dependents and students will no longer be entitled to coverage for the full range of FDA approved contraceptives at no cost.

    Above: positive pregnancy test, wikimedia commons

    On October 6, 2017, the Trump Administration issued two new regulations greatly expanding the types of employers that may be exempt from the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) contraceptive coverage requirement.  These regulations are a significant departure from the Obama-era regulations that only granted an exception to houses of worship.  One of the regulations allows nonprofits or for-profit employer with an objection to contraceptive coverage based on religious beliefs to qualify for an exemption and drop contraceptive coverage from their plans.  The other regulation also exempts all but publicly traded employers with moral objections to contraception from rule. These new policies, effective immediately, also apply to private institutions of higher education that issue student health plans. The immediate impact of these regulations on the number of women who are eligible for contraceptive coverage is unknown, but the new regulations open the door for many more employers to withhold contraceptive coverage from their plans.

    New regulations from the Trump administration greatly expand exemption from #ACA contraceptive coverage rule

    Contraceptive coverage under the ACA has made access to the full range of contraceptive methods affordable to millions of women. This provision is part of a set of key preventive services that has been identified by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) for women that must be covered without cost-sharing. Since it was first issued in 2012, the contraceptive coverage provision has been controversial. While very popular with the public, with over 77% of women and 64% of men reporting support for no-cost contraceptive coverage, it has been the focus of litigation brought by religious employers, with two cases (Zubik v Burwell and Burwell v Hobby Lobby)  reaching the Supreme Court. This brief explains the contraceptive coverage rule under the ACA, the impact it has had on coverage, and how the new regulations issued by the Trump Administration change the contraceptive coverage requirement for employers and affect women’s coverage.

    How do the new regulations change contraceptive coverage requirements for employers?

    Since they were announced in 2011, the contraceptive coverage rules have evolved through litigation and new regulations. Most employers were required to include the coverage in their plans. Houses of worship could choose to be exempt from the requirement if they had religious objections. This exception meant that women workers and female dependents of exempt employers did not have guaranteed coverage for either some or all FDA approved contraceptive methods if their employer had an objection. Religiously affiliated nonprofits and closely held for-profit corporations were not eligible for an exemption, but could choose an accommodation. This option was offered to religiously affiliated nonprofit employers and then extended to closely held for-profitsafter the Supreme Court ruling in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby. The accommodation allowed these employers to opt out of providing and paying for contraceptive coverage in their plans by either notifying their insurer, third party administrator, or the federal government of their objection. The insurers were then responsible for covering the costs of contraception, which assured that their workers and dependents had contraceptive coverage while relieving the employers of the requirement to pay for it.

    As of 2015, 10% of nonprofits with 5,000 or more employees had elected for an accommodation without challenging the requirement. This approach, however, has not been acceptable to all nonprofits with religious objections.1 In May 2016, the Supreme Court remanded Zubik v. Burwell, sending seven cases brought by religious nonprofits objecting to the contraceptive coverage accommodation back to the respective district Courts of Appeal. The Supreme Court instructed the parties to work together to “arrive at an approach going forward that accommodates petitioners’ religious exercise while at the same time ensuring that women covered by petitioners’ health plans receive full and equal health coverage, including contraceptive coverage.”2

    On October 6, 2017, the Trump Administration issued new regulations greatly expanding eligibility for the exemption to all nonprofit and closely-held for-profit employers with objections to contraceptive coverage based on religious beliefs or moral convictions, including private institutions of higher education that issue student health plans (Figure 1).  In addition, publicly traded for-profit companies with objections based on religious beliefs also qualify for an exemption. There is no guaranteed right of contraceptive coverage for their female employees and dependents or students. Table 1 presents the changes to the contraceptive coverage rule from the Obama Administration in the new Interim Final regulations issued by the Trump Administration.

  • Effects of Missouri’s Repeal of Its Handgun Purchaser Licensing Law on Homicides: The Repeal Coincided with a Sharp Increase in the Percentage of Crime Guns Recovered by Missouri Police From 56.4% in 2006 to 71.8% in 2012

    A study from the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research:Bump Stock patent

    ABSTRACT

    In the United States, homicide is a leading cause of death for young males and a major cause of racial disparities in life expectancy for men. There is intense debate and little rigorous research on the effects of firearm sales regulation on homicides. This study estimates the impact of Missouri’s 2007 repeal of its permit-to-purchase (PTP) handgun law on states’ homicide rates and controls for changes in poverty, unemployment, crime, incarceration, policing levels, and other policies that could potentially affect homicides. Using death certificate data available through 2010, the repeal of Missouri’s PTP law was associated with an increase in annual increase in firearm homicides rates of 1.09 per 100,000 (+23%), but was unrelated to changes in non-firearm homicide rates. Using Uniform Crime Reporting data from police through 2012, the law’s repeal was associated with increased annual murders rates of 0.93 per 100,000 (+16%). These estimated effects translate to increases of between 55 and 63 homicides per year in Missouri.

    INTRODUCTION

    Homicide is the second leading cause of death for people age 15-34 in the United States, and the leading cause of death for black males in this age group.  Homicide also accounts for 5 percent of the years of potential life lost (YPLL) in the U.S., and is the second leading cause of the racial disparity in life expectancy between black and white males. Two-thirds of all homicides in the US are committed with firearms and the firearm homicide rate in the US is 19.5 times higher than the average firearm homicide rate in other high-income countries.

    It has been argued that weaknesses in federal and state firearms laws contribute to the unusually high homicide rate in the US, especially the lack of background checks or recordkeeping requirements for private, unlicensed sellers of firearms. Many perpetrators of homicide have backgrounds that would prohibit them from possessing firearms as a result of prior convictions for felony crimes or for misdemeanors involving domestic violence, being under a restraining order for domestic violence, young age, or other disqualifications. Federal law requires background checks and record-keeping for sales by federally licensed firearms dealers, but exempts these regulations when the firearm seller is unlicensed. Fifteen states require individuals purchasing handguns from unlicensed sellers to pass background checks and 10 of these states require all handgun purchasers to acquire a permit-to-purchase (PTP) license.

    PTP systems require prospective handgun purchasers to obtain a license verifying that they have passed a background check. All handgun sellers, both licensed dealers and private sellers, may only sell to those with a current PTP license. Most states with PTP handgun licensing require applicants to apply for the license directly at a law enforcement agency. In all other states, individuals wishing to purchase a handgun from a licensed dealer must complete a purchase application form. The dealer or dealer’s employee submits the form to the Federal  Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) National Instant Check System (NICS), or in some cases to state police, to determine whether the applicant is prohibited from possessing firearms.

    Prior research has shown that cities and states that require background checks and recordkeeping for handgun sales by unlicensed sellers and stricter PTP handgun licensing laws have lower levels of guns being diverted to criminals within a year of retail sale and fewer guns exported to criminals across state borders. A recent study found a cross-sectional association between states having PTP handgun licensing or other forms of universal background check requirements for gun sales and lower homicide rates.

    Missouri repealed its PTP handgun licensing law effective August 28, 2007. Missouri’s law had been in place since 1921 and required all handgun purchasers to have a valid PTP license (good for 30 days) in order to lawfully purchase a handgun from any seller, licensed or unlicensed. Applicants applied in person at their local sheriff’s office which facilitated the background check. Webster and colleagues reported that immediately following the repeal of Missouri’s PTP handgun law there was a two-fold increase in the percentage of guns that had unusually short intervals between the retail sale and recovery by police, an indicator of firearm diversion or trafficking.  The repeal also coincided with a sharp increase in the percentage of crime guns recovered by police in Missouri that had been originally sold by in-state retailers, from 56.4 percent in 2006 to 71.8 percent in 2012.13

    This study examines the effects of the repeal of Missouri’s PTP handgun licensing law on homicide rates. Because this change eliminated mandatory background checks for handguns sold by unlicensed sellers, it is of particular relevance for debates in the U.S. Congress and in several states about proposals to extend background check requirements to all firearm sales.