An Econometric Analysis on Selected Socioeconomic Indicators: Evidence from State of Malacca, Malaysia

Economic development and the nutritional status of Chinese school-aged children and adolescents from 1995 to 2014: an analysis of five successive national surveys

From 2005 to 2017, the prevalence of mortality in Vietnamese children under five years old showed large regional disparities. In 2017, mortality in the wealthiest region was 12.6‰, whereas the most disadvantaged region it was three times as high, at 36‰. This study aims to identify factors affecting regional disparities of the under-five mortality rate (U5MR) in Vietnam. We applied Structural Equation Modelling to estimate the degree and the pathway through which undernutrition and socio-economic status (SES) contributed to the under-five mortality disparities. SES is estimated as a common latent factor of three socio-economic measures, that is, education, poverty and income. The direct effect of SES on U5MR is at 2.16 through the underweight pathway, which is 5 times higher than the effect of underweight on U5MR. Through the stunting channel, this direct impact is 1.43, nearly twice as high as the impact of the stunting rate. SES also has an indirect effect on U5MR through these undernutrition pathways. In total, we estimate that an increase in SES index will make the U5MR increase by 2.73‰. Among the three indicators of SES, poverty conveys the strongest signal of a considerable change in SES, thus to a subsequent change in U5MR. Among two types of undernutrition, the effect of stunting on U5MR is dominant, more than 3 times as high as that of underweight. These findings have important implications for socio-economic and health interventions: those that strongly focus on the reduction of regional poverty and stunting rates would be effective in bridging the regional gap in the U5MR in Vietnam.

36 Background: Socioeconomic status has been associated with increased mortality from ischemic heart disease as well as decreased access to interventions such as coronary angiography, even in countries with universal health care. We undertook a study to determine whether a similar association between socioeconomic status and mortality exists in the setting of stroke. Methods: We linked hospital discharge abstracts and vital-status data for all patients with acute stroke who were admitted to hospitals in Ontario between April 1994 and March 1997. Socioeconomic status for each patient was imputed based on their median neighborhood income as documented in Canada’s 1996 census. We determined the risk of death at thirty days and one year based on neighborhood income. Secondary analyses compared use of medications and carotid endarterectomy by income level. We used multivariate analyses to adjust for age, sex, stroke type, comorbid conditions and hospital and physician characteristics. Results: Overall, 39,545 patients were admitted with stroke during the study time frame. The crude 30-day and 1-year mortality rates were 19% and 33%, respectively. Thirty-day mortality was higher in those in the lowest income quintile than in the highest quintile (20% vs. 17%, P=0.002), with an adjusted hazard ratio of 1.1. One-year mortality was also higher in the lowest compared to the highest income quintile (34% vs. 31%, P=0.001), with an adjusted hazard ratio of 1.1. Each $10,000 increase in median neighborhood income was associated with a 9% reduction in the risk of death at 30 days (adjusted hazard ratio 0.91) and a 5% reduction in the risk of death at one year (adjusted hazard ratio 0.95). There were no differences in the use of medications (aspirin, ticlopidine, warfarin) or carotid endarterectomy based on socioeconomic status. However, waiting times for carotid surgery were significantly longer in the lowest income quintile compared to the highest (90 days vs. 60 days, P=0.001). Conclusion: Socioeconomic status affects mortality following stroke, even in a province with universal health care. The exact reasons for this effect on survival remain topics for future research.

Pregnancy out of wedlock is an offence that requires attention and is one of the most concerning social problems, especially in Muslim societies. In Islam, pregnancy out of wedlock is considered a crime, an offence, and a sin that must be curbed and avoided. Therefore, it is the responsibility of the Religious Authority to address and manage such offences through systematic enforcement. Additionally, the provisions of Shariah law and the implementation of more effective punishments must be emphasised to enhance the quality of Shariah law enforcement. This research aims to examine the enforcement practices of the Alor Gajah District Islamic Religious Office in Malacca concerning the Shariah offence of pregnancy out of wedlock. This study adopts a qualitative research approach using content analysis by referring to the Acts or Enactments of Shariah Criminal Offences of various states, relevant journals and theses, as well as the statistics of Shariah offence cases under the Syariah Criminal Offences (State of Malacca) Enactment 1991, specifically those related to pregnancy out of wedlock. The findings of the study indicate that there are legal provisions for the offence of pregnancy out of wedlock in Malacca under Section 54 of the Syariah Criminal Offences (State of Malacca) Enactment 1991 (EKSNM 1991). Furthermore, the study found that enforcement measures have been implemented to curb such offences, particularly in the Alor Gajah District of Malacca. However, these efforts must be continuously improved based on current needs to ensure that religious enforcement remains a relevant authority in addressing the Shariah offence of pregnancy out of wedlock and effectively tackling moral issues, particularly in Malacca.

METHODOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES OF ANALYSIS OF HOUSEHOLD EXPENDITURES IN UKRAINE

Africa's Unique Fertility Transition

Socioeconomic status and modifiable risk factors for osteoporosis and knee osteoarthritis.

This paper assesses the impact of non-traditional agriculture exports (NTAE) in highland Guatemala on the level and distribution of household income, and the financing and purchase of food items. Heckman's two-step procedure was used to control for self-selection of NTAE producers and potential correlation of preferences. Farmers with greater extension of land, as well as younger Catholic farmers with higher-quality land, are most likely to adopt the new crops (broccoli, snow peas (mange-tout!), and NTAE crops are highly profitable for those who adopt them. Despite the widespread use of female labour in the production of NTAE crops, the extent of adoption is not negatively associated with women's ability to generate independent income. Land devoted to the new crops also exhibits a strong positive relationship with subsistence production of corn and beans. Weak evidence supports the hypothesis that distinct intra-household income transfer patterns obtained in NTAE crop-adopting households compared with non-adopting households: in the former, the level of the weekly food allowance provided to women by their husbands is less responsive to changes in both household and female income, making women's earnings a more important overall determinant of food expenditure. A simulation exercise showed that households that have not adopted new crops would use increases in income to augment food expenditures to a much greater extent than adopting households. Within adopting households, the impact of increases in women's income on food expenditures is nearly double that of increases in men's income. Women's flexibility with regard to the allocation of their labour time and income plays an important role in the relative success of non-traditional agriculture as a means of improving household food availability. Improving the food consumption of poor households is often an important implicit or explicit goal of income-generating strategies such as the promotion of non-traditional agricultural export (NTAE) crops. However, a fair amount of controversy surrounds the strength of the relationship between increases in household income and greater access to and intake of nutritious foods. This is particularly the case when those increases in income are based on the displacement of subsistence crops and/or are biased in flavour of men, who may have less propensity than women to spend marginal income gains on food for the family. The nutritional impact of NTAE in highland Guatemala was assessed in a conceptual framework that accounts for the mediating influences of changes in household income, subsistence food production, and alterations in intra-household resource transfers. The data were drawn from a survey of over 300 rural households in five central highland communities between October 1990 and August 1991.

Using yearly data from1990 to 2009, and adopting the econometric methodology of Johansen-Juselius's co-integration analysis, this paper makes an analysis on the effect of inbound tourism on of Shaanxi economic development. The article uses the income of inbound tourism as the index of inbound tourism in Shaanxi, uses Gross Domestic Product, investment in fixed assets, income of tertiary-industry and total retail value of social consumption goods as the index of economic in Shaanxi. The study finds that there are long-term co-integration relationships between income of inbound tourism and each economic index including Gross Domestic Product, investment in fixed assets, income of tertiary-industry and total retail value of social consumption goods in Shaanxi, and the impact of income of inbound tourism on those indexes are positive, that means the increase in income of inbound tourism could make those indexes increase. 1% increase in income of inbound tourism could make Gross Domestic Product, investment in fixed assets, income of tertiary-industry and total retail value of social consumption goods increase 1.03%, 1.41%, 0.12% and 0.97% respectively in Shaanxi. Therefore, we should make great efforts to open up inbound tourism market in Shaanxi to promote the economic development of Shaanxi.

To examine income-related inequalities in access to dental services from 1975 to 2018. In Norway, dental care services for adults are privately financed. This may lead to income-related inequalities in access. In the early 1970s, that is, at the beginning of the study period, there were marked inequalities in access to dental services according to personal income. However, from the beginning of the 1970s, there has been a large increase in gross national income per capita in Norway as a result of the growth of the oil and gas industry. This increase in income also meant that people with a low income in 1975had a rise in their level of income. According to the law of diminishing utility, an increase in income leads to higher consumption of dental services for people with a low level of income compared to people with a high level of income. The study hypothesis is that the inequalities in access to dental services that existed in 1975 became less over time. Statistics Norway collected samples of cross-sectional health survey data for the following years: 1975, 1985, 1995, 2002, 2008, 2012 and 2018. For each sample, individuals 21years and older were drawn randomly from the non-institutionalized adult population using a two-stage stratified cluster sample technique. Inequalities were measured using the concentration index. The dependent variable was the use of dental services during the last year, and the key independent variable was equivalized household income. The concentration index for inequalities in use of dental services according to income decreased from 0.10 (95% CI=0.09, 0.11) in 1975 to 0.04 (95% CI=0.03, 0.05) in 2018. The decrease was particularly large from 2002 to 2012. This was a period with a large growth in gross national income. People with a low income had a marked increase in their purchasing power from 1975 to 2018. This coincided with an increase in demand for dental care for this low-income group.

ResumoFundamento:Estudos prévios identificaram desigualdade na variação das taxas de mortalidade por doença isquêmica do coração (DIC) e doença cerebrovascular (DCBV) quando comparadas regiões com diferentes níveis de indicadores de desenvolvimento socioeconômico.Objetivo:Analisar a variação das taxas de mortalidade por DIC e DCBV e do desenvolvimento econômico, avaliado pelos índices sociodemográfico (ISD) e de vulnerabilidade social (IVS) no Brasil, em um período de 20 anos.Métodos:Estudo ecológico de séries temporais das taxas de mortalidade bruta e padronizada (método direto com a população brasileira de 2000) por DIC e DCBV por sexo e UF entre 2000 e 2019 comparadas com o ISD e com o IVS.Resultados:Houve melhora do ISD e IVS concomitante a redução da taxa de mortalidade padronizada por faixa etária por DIC e por DCBV no país, entretanto isso ocorreu de modo desigual entre as unidades federativas (UFs). As UFs com melhores indicadores socioeconômicos obtiveram maior redução nas taxas de mortalidade.Discussão:A variação das taxas de mortalidade por DIC e DCBV em comparação com a variação do desenvolvimento socioeconômico são compatíveis com estudos prévios, mas vamos além ao comparar de modo concomitante com o ISD e o IVS. As limitações são o fato de ser um estudo observacional, trabalhar com bancos de dados e estar sujeito ao viés ecológico.Conclusão:Os dados observados levantam a hipótese de que a melhora das condições socioeconômicas é um dos fatores responsáveis pela redução das taxas de mortalidade por DIC e DCBV.

Fertility behavior poses a significant impact on people's lives throughout the world, which has become even more observable especially in the last thirty years. The decision to give birth in a household is influenced by many economic and social variables such as the time cost of the raised child, social structure, the employment status of women and total family income. The aim of our study is to reveal how fertility characteristics are affected by social and economic variables. Our model was applied to three groups in 49 countries within the period of 1990-2018 focusing on the income levels of these countries. The outcomes of the study reveal that fertility characteristics are affected more by economic variables than social variables in all country groups, signifying that a positive increase in economic variables improves the quality of human capital in high-income countries while a positive increase in economic variables in low-income countries increases the number of human capital.

This study aims to look at the impact of the Career Exploration Module on the ability of career planning, career self-efficacy and career maturity among community college students. A quasi-experimental design was used to evaluate using non-equivalent pre-test and post-test control group. The sample comprised 122 semester four students from two community colleges in the state of Malacca. Data were collected using three sets of instruments; i) Career Planning Competencies Instruments to measure the ability of career planning, ii) Career Maturity Inventory-Revised (CM-R) to measure attitudes and skills in career planning and iii) Career Decision Making Self Efficacy Scale (CDMSE-SF) to measure the level of students' career self-efficacy. The reliability of the instruments was analyzed using Cronbach Alpha and the value for all three instruments exceeded .70. Data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Descriptive analysis uses mean, frequency and percentage to see the difference between groups while inferential analysis uses MANOVA to see the difference between the groups after the experiment. The results showed that there was a significant difference between the control group and the experimental group for the variables of the abilities of career planning, career self-efficacy and career maturity after the experiment. The results of the experiment have shown that the ability of career planning, career self-efficacy and career maturity can be improved if students follow a systematic career program. The usage of Careers Exploration Module has proven to build community college students in improving their career skills. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n6s1p464

Lower socioeconomic status strengthens the effect of cooking fuel use on anemia risk and anemia-related parameters: Findings from the Henan Rural Cohort

It is sometimes pointed out that economic research is prone to move in cycles and react to particular events such as crises and recessions. The present paper analyses this issue through a quantitative analysis by answering the research question of whether or not the economic literature on business cycles is correlated with movements and changes in actual economic activity. To tackle this question, a bibliometric analysis of key terms related to business cycle and crises theory is performed. In a second step, these results are confronted with data on actual economic developments in order to investigate the question of whether or not the theoretical literature follows trends and developments in economic data. To determine the connection between economic activity and developments in the academic literature, a descriptive analysis is scrutinized by econometric tests. In the short run, the VARs with cyclical fluctuations point out multiple cases where economic variables Granger-cause bibliometric ones. In the long run, the fractionally cointegrated VARs suggest that many bibliometric variables respond to economic shocks. In the multivariate framework, the Diebold---Mariano test shows that economic variables significantly improve the quality of the forecast of bibliometric indices. The paper also includes impulse-response function analysis for a quantitative assessment of the effects from economic to bibliometric variables. The results point towards a qualified confirmation of the hypothesis of an effect of business cycles and crises in economic variables on discussions in the literature.