Mitigating regional employment disparities through flexible coal power phasedown and workforce resettlement

We investigate the regional disparities in high-skilled foreign employment in Germany. The importance of different factors that influence highly qualified migrants’ decision to migrate to specific regions and especially the role of labour migration policy is analysed. Our results show that labour market variables and the supply of tertiary education are important for the location choice. Based on these empirical results, we discuss options of decentralised labour migration policy in Germany.

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Executive Summary: Many countries are considering accelerating their coal transition. A coal transition refers to an energy sector’s shift from a reliance on coal toward an energy mix largely based on cleaner fuels and renewable energy sources. Such a transition is not just related to greenhouse gas emissions, but also encompasses a range of benefits, recognizing that global energy costs and options are changing. Since 2015, proposed new coal power capacity has dropped by three-quarters globally, leaving only a few countries that develop coal-fired power plants at scale (Littlecott et al., 2021). Historic steps were taken at the United Nations Climate Change 26th Conference of Parties (COP26) in Glasgow, as countries pledged to stop new coal builds, end international coal financing, phase down and phase out unabated coal use, and transition to clean energy. In South Asia, there have been several indicators suggesting that countries may be open to moving toward a coal transition. For example, the number of coal power plants under development across South Asia has decreased by 87% since 2015 (Littlecott et al., 2021). However, the challenges of assuring a just transition are substantial. Because coal plays a critical role in the energy and economic systems in South Asia, especially India, moving away from coal means realizing a broader country-wide economic and social transition. A comprehensive, integrated transition strategy for each state is thus needed urgently. This report briefly reviews the current trends and policies on coal in South Asian countries, develops a framework for a comprehensive economic coal transition, and assesses the opportunities and challenges of the transition in key countries. Several important findings emerge from the analysis. First, a coal transition can support overall economic growth and stability. Financial advantages to a well-planned coal transition include mitigating the risk of stranded assets and taking advantage of low-cost renewables. As a global coal transition proceeds, funds are being diverted from new unabated coal power plants, and utilization rates are declining. The likelihood that coal assets will become stranded is increasing, and the potential for future losses therefore increases as well. Second, coal imports in South Asia are rising. Of the coal consumed in Bangladesh, India, Nepal, and Sri Lanka, 32% is imported; this number increases to 94% when excluding India (International Energy Agency [IEA], 2021d). This illustrates a serious energy security risk. One example is the recent increase in coal prices in South Asia, to be discussed in Section 2.2.1. A diverse energy portfolio that incorporates local renewable energy can provide resilience in the face of changing commodity prices and availability. Third, the social benefits of a coal transition include positive health impacts and broader economic improvements in job creation, although assuring a just transition may be a challenge. Phasing out or phasing down coal can significantly reduce air pollutant emissions and therefore minimize associated premature mortality and improve life expectancy. Additional societal benefits of a coal transition include the high economy-wide potential for job creation, although it creates challenges in terms of reintegration and resettlement for coal miners and their communities.

This study evaluated whether selected sociodemographic factors and exposures may be associated with utilization of poison centers in Texas during 1998–2002. Data were obtained from the six poison centers that service the entire state. Cases were all human exposures where the caller county was known. The utilization rate (calls per 1000 population) was calculated for the entire state and for each county. Counties were then grouped into those with utilization rates lower than the utilization rate for the entire state and those with utilization rates higher than the rate for the entire state. The two groups were then compared with respect to sociodemographic factors derived from the 2000 Census and exposure categories derived from the poison centers. The group of counties with lower utilization rates had a lower population density, higher African-American and Hispanic populations, lower median household incomes, and higher percentage of the population who spoke a language other than English at home and spoke English less than "very well." Gender, age, and education factors were not related to utilization rates, and the most frequently reported exposure categories were similar between counties with lower and higher utilization rates. This information can be used to focus education and prevention efforts at those populations with lower utilization of the Texas Poison Center Network.

The Private Sector in Japan’s State-Led Liberal Strategy Kristin Vekasi (bio) When Donald Trump won the 2016 presidential election, it was immediately evident that Japan’s already difficult regional choices would become even more fraught. As China’s economic and political power has surged over the past three decades, Japan has had to make difficult choices about balancing between coordinating with a close neighbor and cooperating with its powerful security ally. Saori Katada’s book Japan’s New Regional Reality: Geoeconomic Strategy in the Asia-Pacific is an important contribution to understanding Japan’s navigation of its geoeconomic situation. Many scholars emphasize deepening the U.S.-Japan alliance as key to Japan’s future stability and prosperity,1 or have found that Japan has deepened security ties in order to keep the United States in the region and hedge against China’s rise.2 Katada makes an important new contribution to this discussion, showing how Japan’s “state-led liberal strategy” has opened up new political space for the country to achieve its interests (introduction and chapter 1). She provides important nuance to our understanding of Japan’s geoeconomic strategy, particularly with evidence suggesting that it could be a “pivotal state” in the region. Japan’s maneuvers within the U.S.-China nexus are particularly evident in trade policy. Over the past decade, the two major attempts at regional integration have been the U.S.-led Trans-Pacific Partnership, which excluded China, and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, which excludes the United States. Japan’s role in both of these efforts demonstrates the characteristics of the state-led liberal strategy: regional integration, promotion of rules and standards, and formal institution building. Katada argues that while Japan overall leans toward the United States, its state-led liberal strategy has also allowed Japan to influence the direction of Chinese regional policy by guiding the types of rules, standards, and institutions [End Page 139] that have started to characterize Asian regional economic partnerships. One of the strengths of the book is that it gives Japan more agency and credit for its regional policy and places its strategy in an interesting domestic political economy story about new and “disembedded” relationships between the Japanese government and business. As all good pieces of scholarship do, this book introduces important new avenues of research. The voices and roles of the private sector are somewhat muted in the text. In the chapter on trade strategy, for example, Katada argues that the state, rather than the economic interests of the private sector, are driving Japan’s regional free trade agreement (FTA) strategy—a point of departure from the more integrated and bilateral strategy of the country in the past. She offers two points of evidence that are worth further interrogation as they provide additional insight into Japan’s strategy: a low FTA utilization rate and a seeming lack of eagerness to swiftly negotiate an FTA with China, despite early desire to do so from the business community (chapter 5). FTAs often have low utilization rates, in part because many are “cut and paste” agreements rather than completely novel texts. They try to cover a broad swath of industries in the context of ongoing negotiations, even if those industries are not key in that specific bilateral economic relationship. A UN Conference on Trade and Development report found that European Union FTAs have comparatively high utilization rates, with the amount of actual trade covered ranging from 40% to an astounding 90%. However, this does not reflect the actual number of companies utilizing the agreement, which analysts hypothesize is likely low, with small and medium-sized firms not taking advantage of new trade opportunities.3 Similarly, with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) the smaller firms that make up the majority of the Southeast Asian economies rarely utilize FTAs.4 All of this is to say that the low utilization rates by Japanese firms of the freshly negotiated agreements does not necessarily indicate passivity or a lack of representation of their interests at the table. Most-favored-nation rates in Asia are already low, and so the benefits of newly negotiated trade agreements often take time to surface...

Hospital variation in utilization and success of trial of labor after a prior cesarean

The future of coal investment, trade, and stranded assets

Previous studies of racial disparities in total joint replacement, particularly total knee arthroplasty, in the U.S. have predominantly focused on disparities between blacks and whites and were limited to Medicare patients or veterans, populations that are not representative of the entire U.S. We sought to study racial disparities in the utilization of total knee arthroplasty, the use of high-volume hospitals, and total knee arthroplasty outcomes, including mortality and complications, using all-payer databases. We analyzed data from 8 years and 8 racially diverse states in the State Inpatient Databases (SID). Patient race was categorized according to the SID as white, black, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, and mixed race. Both crude and adjusted racial and/or ethnic disparities were evaluated. In comparison with whites (4.65 per 1000 population per year), black (3.90), Hispanic (3.71), Asian (3.89), Native American (4.40), and mixed-race (3.69) populations had lower rates of total knee arthroplasty utilization (p < 0.0001). After risk adjustment, the rate of total knee arthroplasty utilization was significantly lower for blacks (odds ratio [OR] = 0.87 [95% confidence interval (CI), 0.85 to 0.89]; p < 0.0001), Hispanics (OR = 0.76 [95% CI, 0.68 to 0.83]; p < 0.0001), Asians (OR = 0.83 [95% CI, 0.78 to 0.89]; p < 0.0001), Native Americans (OR = 0.87 [95% CI, 0.81 to 0.93]; p < 0.0001), and mixed race (OR = 0.84 [95% CI, 0.79 to 0.90]; p < 0.0001) compared with the rate for whites. Lower rates of total knee arthroplasty utilization for blacks, Hispanics, and mixed-race groups became worse over the years. Patients from minority groups were less likely to undergo total knee arthroplasty in high-volume hospitals than were whites. Moreover, the rates of mortality were significantly higher for blacks (OR = 1.52 [95% CI, 1.17 to 1.97]; p = 0.0017), Native Americans (OR = 6.52 [95% CI, 4.63 to 9.17]; p < 0.0001), and mixed-race patients (OR = 4.35 [95% CI, 3.24 to 5.84]; p < 0.0001). Blacks (OR = 1.08 [95% CI, 1.01 to 1.15]; p = 0.01) and mixed-race patients (OR = 1.17 [95% CI, 1.001 to 1.36]; p = 0.04) had higher rates of complications than whites. Minorities had lower rates of total knee arthroplasty utilization but higher rates of adverse health outcomes associated with the procedure, even after adjusting for patient-related and health-care system-related characteristics. Utilization rates were based on overall population as the proportion of the population with osteoarthritis requiring arthroplasty is unknown. Future studies that consider specific patient-level information with psychosocial and behavioral factors are needed. Prognostic Level III. See Instructions for Authors for a complete description of levels of evidence.

China hosts over half of global coal-fired power generation capacity and has the world’s largest coal reserves. Its 2060 carbon neutrality goal will require coal-fired electricity generation to shrink dramatically, with or without carbon capture and storage technology. Two macroeconomic areas in which the socioeconomic impact of this decline is felt are losses in jobs and tax revenues supported by thermal coal mining, transport and power generation. At the national level, under a ‘baseline’ (B) scenario consistent with China’s carbon neutrality goal, labour productivity growth in coal mining implies that significant job losses will occur nationally in the medium term, even if all coal plants continue operating as planned. Jobs supported by the coal power industry would decline from an estimated 2.7 million in 2021, to 1.44 million in 2035 and 94,000 in 2050, with jobs losses from mining alone expected to exceed 1.1 million by 2035. Tax revenues from thermal coal would total approximately CNY 300 billion annually from 2021–2030, peaking in 2023 at CNY 340 billion. This is significantly less than estimated subsidies of at least CNY 480 billion, suggesting coal is likely a net fiscal drain on China’s public finances, even without accounting for the costs of local pollution and the social cost of carbon. As coal plant retirements accelerate, from 2034 onwards, fiscal revenues begin to fall more rapidly, with rates of decline rising from 1% in the 2020s to over 10% a year by the 2040s. More aggressive climate policy and technology scenarios bring job and tax losses forward in time, while a No Transition policy, in which all currently planned coal plants are built, delays but does not ultimately prevent these losses. At the provincial level, China’s major coal-producing provinces will likely face challenges in managing the localised effects of expected job losses and finding productive alternative uses for this labour. Governments of coal-producing provinces like Inner Mongolia, with an industry highly dependent on exports to other provinces, are more exposed than others to declining tax revenues from coal, and more insulated from job losses, given their high current degree of labour efficiency. Although their provincial revenues are likely to remain stable until the early 2030s under the B scenario, the possibility of increasing policy stringency underlines the need for revenue and skill base diversification. At the firm level, China’s ‘Big Five’ state-owned power companies were responsible for over 40% of both jobs and tax revenues in 2021. The number of jobs supported by the activities of each of the largest ten firms, with one exception, will decline by 71–84% by the early 2040s, with the tax contribution of each declining by 43–69% in the same period.

This paper studied balanced regional development focused on employment in Korea, by analyzing regional disparity between regional and industrial employment. A Gini-coefficient decomposition method and Panel Granger causality test were conducted, using raw data of the Census on Establishments reported by the Statistics Korea. The regional and industrial disparity of employment, based on the Gini-coefficient decomposition method, have increased by year. However, the growth rates of disparity are on the decrease. Most of employment disparity occurred from regional disparity between SMA (Seoul Metropolitan Area) and Non-SMA. Industrial disparity are occurred mainly by the service industry. The amount of contribution to the whole disparity of inter/intra regional employment was differed by each industrial sector. Also the causal relationship between employment growth of manufacture and that of service industry was analyzed by Panel Granger causality test. In national level, the employment growth in manufacture industry has conduced that in service industry. On the other hand, in the Non-SMA, only the employment growth in manufacture industry has augmented that in service industry. In conclusion, to reduce employment disparity, the strategy for balanced regional development should be emphasized. Different strategies are needed across regions and industries. Basically creating new job in the Non-SMA is inevitable. In view of stable employment, manufacture industry is more desirable rather than service industry.

This study examined rates of utilization of mental health care among active duty and National Guard soldiers with mental health problems three and 12 months after they returned from combat in Iraq. Stigma and barriers to care were also reported for each component (active duty and National Guard). Cross-sectional, anonymous surveys were administered to 10,386 soldiers across both time points and components. Mean scores from 11 items measuring stigma and barriers to care were computed. Service utilization was assessed by asking soldiers whether they had received services for a mental health problem from a mental health professional, a medical doctor, or the Department of Veterans Affairs in the past month. Risk of mental problems was measured using the Patient Health Questionnaire, the PTSD Checklist, and items asking about aggressive behaviors and "stress, emotional, alcohol, or family" problems within the past month. A higher proportion of active duty soldiers than National Guard soldiers reported at least one type of mental health problem at both three months (45% versus 33%) and 12 months (44% versus 35%) postdeployment. Among soldiers with mental health problems, National Guard soldiers reported significantly higher rates of mental health care utilization 12 months after deployment, compared with active duty soldiers (27% versus 13%). Mean stigma scores were higher among active duty soldiers than among National Guard soldiers. Active duty soldiers with a mental health problem had significantly lower rates of service utilization than National Guard soldiers and significantly higher endorsements of stigma. Current and future efforts to improve care for veterans should work toward reducing the stigma of receiving mental health care.

Background: Labour market policy aims to fight against unemployment and to raise employment. With this study we attempt to contribute to the evidence of the effectiveness of active labour market policy. Objectives: In the empirical part of the paper we aim to research the relations between the labour market policies and macroeconomic variables. Methods/Approach: In order to distinguish the effects of expenditures for labour market policies on unemployment rate, we separately analysed the effects of expenditures for active labour market policies and the effects of expenditures for passive labour market policies on unemployment rate using panel regression analysis. Results: The expenditures for active labour market policies have negative and statistically significant effect on unemployment rate, whereas the expenditures for passive labour market policies have positive and statistically significant effect on unemployment rate. Conclusions: Not only the activation strategies with benefit conditioning, but also encouraging and enabling unemployed person to actively approach in searching for a job should be implemented. The implementation of activation strategies which create favourable conditions for unemployed people to develop their skills, fulfil their potential, continuously maintain contacts with the employers and actively participate in the society should be supported.

Racial/Ethnic Disparities of Erythropoiesis Stimulating Agent Use Among the Insured Poor: Pre- and Post-Safety Advisories

BackgroundMidwifery education critically shapes graduates’ employment status and satisfaction. This study identifies predictors of employment outcomes and satisfaction among Palestinian midwifery graduates, focusing on sociodemographic factors, curriculum quality, clinical training, and faculty support. It also analyzes regional employment disparities and satisfaction variations across graduation cohorts.Methods273 graduates of the Midwifery Bachelor’s Program at Ibn Sina College of Health Professions completed a cross-sectional survey. Data collected included sociodemographic information, employment status, and satisfaction with curriculum, clinical training, and faculty support. Instrument validity was confirmed with a Content Validity Index (CVI) of 0.84. A pilot study (n = 27) refined the survey. Statistical analyses included Chi-square tests, Pearson’s correlations, and multiple logistic regression, with results presented as odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI).ResultsGraduates under 25 years had lower employment rates (OR = 0.68, 95% CI: 0.50–0.92, p = 0.036), while married graduates were more likely to be employed. Strong faculty mentorship tripled employment odds (OR = 2.75, 95% CI: 1.81–4.18, p = 0.002). Curriculum quality moderately correlated with satisfaction (ρ = 0.32, p = 0.001). Neonatal training satisfaction was lower (33% excellent, 55% good), with identified gaps in clinical preparedness. Employment disparities across regions were statistically significant (χ² = 10.82, p = 0.001), favoring the northern West Bank.ConclusionImprovements are needed in neonatal care training and faculty mentorship. Clinical rotations in high-risk settings should expand. Future research must include socioeconomic status and prior healthcare experience as variables. Regional job placement initiatives are necessary to address employment disparities.Clinical trial numberNot applicable.

Optimal coal power phase-out pathway considering high renewable energy proportion: A provincial example