Federal Government Involvement Research Articles

Independent living programs and services for youth 'aging out' of care in Canada and the U.S.: A systematic review

Evidence from American and Canadian studies over the last three decades demonstrates that youth exiting foster care are at a much higher risk to face a multiplicity of challenges than their peers who are not in care. These challenges result in negative outcomes, such as high rates of homelessness, under-education, unemployment or under-employment, poverty, mental health issues and post-traumatic stress, substance abuse and early pregnancy or parenthood. This systematic review addresses Independent Living Program (ILP) and Independent Living Services (ILS) studies in the U.S. and Canada published between 2000 and 2018. In order to compile a list of relevant ILP and ILS impact studies, a bibliographic search of six databases was conducted for the peer-reviewed literature, and the grey literature was searched using Google and expert consultation. The search yielded a total of 64 studies after applying our study selection protocol, with 50 from the peer review literature and 14 from the grey literature. The clear majority of studies originated from the U.S., with only three Canadian studies emerging from the grey literature. This is most likely due to differences in mandated data collection and reporting. In the U.S., data collection and reporting is mandatory under the Foster Care Independence Act in 1999. In Canada, there is no such mandatory reporting as child welfare services are under the sole jurisdiction of the provinces, with no Federal government involvement aside from First Nations children and youth. Studies to date suggest that ILP and ILS are not producing the intended outcomes, with limited to no impact demonstrated on youth leaving care wellbeing outcomes. In fact, some of the studies found a negative impact, especially related to social support. Much of the ILP and ILS studies did not incorporate the voices of youth in care, but rather focused on program process and components, staff experiences, and outcome measures such as social support, employment, income, housing and self-sufficiency. Of the limited ILP and ILS studies incorporating youth perspectives, youth in care often indicated that emotional support and mentoring are crucial needs during the transition to adulthood, which are often not the focus of ILP or ILS. Moreover, compared to the U.S., program impact studies in Canada are sorely lacking; more research needs to be done in this area to build our knowledge of evidence-based and best practices. This systematic review highlights two main conclusions: (1) Both the U.S. and Canada sorely need innovation with respect to preparing youth in care for the transition to adulthood; and (2) We also must commit to using rigorous research designs with such programming to determine the impact of such new approaches. In sum, we must reconceptualize our investment in youth in care and focus on their interdependence in order to realize their potential.This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Canadian Government Involvement in Calgary’s Failed 1968 Winter Olympic Bid

In the early 1960s the Canadian government in Ottawa saw international events, including major sporting events, as a way to bolster Canada’s position globally. To support Calgary’s bid for the 1968 Olympic Winter Games, the Canadian federal government formed an interdepartmental committee to work with the Calgary Olympic Development Association to try to improve the Canadian city’s chance of winning the Olympic Games. The inclusion of sites within Banff National Park for some of the proposed competition venues required federal government involvement, but John Diefenbaker and Lester Pearson’s governments became even more involved in the bid process than was typical at the time because of the importance with which they viewed the Olympic Games to their broader public diplomacy efforts. The extensive work to support Calgary’s (ultimately unsuccessful) 1968 Olympic Winter Games bid foreshadowed the importance of federal government involvement in the bidding stages and not just their involvement in the organizing of the Olympic Games themselves.

Federal Government Involvement in Australian Disability Sport, 1981–2015

Few historical accounts of Australian sport policy have explicitly profiled the federal government’s involvement in disability sport. In this paper, we draw on the concept of ableism as a lens to address this lacuna. In doing so, we profile the history of the Commonwealth government involvement in disability sport and explore how the policy of ‘mainstreaming’ has emerged through partnerships led by the Australian Paralympic Committee with National Sporting Originations (NSOs) and government. We highlight that whilst these changes have arguably made mainstream NSOs more aware of their legal obligations and have led to positive changes in the provision of opportunities for people with a disability through the development of ‘Paralympic pathways’, there is some evidence of potential caveats of ‘mainstreaming’. Specifically, we point to an emerging body of evidence which suggests that despite these policy measures, people with disabilities still report being marginalized and excluded from ‘mainstream’ sporting programmes. Therefore, we question if less governmental leadership is the right path given the limitations of the present policy framework. Additionally, we highlight how performance-based funding mechanisms such as ‘Winning Edge’ are narrowing who is eligible for funding and thus curtailing finite resources for only the most ‘abled’ of the disabled.

Voting Rights for Whom? Examining the Effects of the Voting Rights Act on Latino Political Incorporation

This study applies insights from principal‐agent models to examine whether and how the language assistance provisions of the Voting Rights Act, Sections 203 and 4(f)(4), affect Latino representation. Using panel data from 1984–2012, we estimate two‐stage models that consider the likelihood and extent of Latino board representation for a sample of 1,661 school districts. In addition, we examine how policy design as well as federal oversight and enforcement shape implementation and compliance with the language assistance provisions. Our findings not only provide the first systemic evidence that the language assistance provisions have a direct effect on Latino representation, but also link the efficacy of the language assistance provisions to the duration and consistency of coverage and the presence of federal elections observers. Overall, our study underscores the continued need for federal government involvement in protecting the voting rights of underrepresented groups, in this case, language minority citizens.

Federal Presence in Higher Institutions in Nigeria and the North/South Dichotomy

Which region gains more from Nigeria's wealth is a subject of heated debate between northerners and southerners. While the former believe that the southern region gets more because it plays host to most of the economic activities of Nigeria, the latter believe that the northern region has through its many years of control of federal power. Given limited space, this study uses the regional distribution of the benefits of student enrolments in federal universities to provide some insights. The reason for the choice of university education is that it combines two features of being a benefit and key to certain other benefits the federal government dispenses. The conclusion from the data analysed is that the greater beneficiary of federal expenditures on education is southern Nigeria, which also likely has greater access to other benefits that come with educational qualifications. It follows that the extent of federal government's involvement in the provision of subsidized university education is the extent of advantage the south enjoys over the north.

Slavery in the American Republic: Developing the Federal Government, 1791-1861 by David F. Ericson (review)

Reviewed by: Slavery in the American Republic: Developing the Federal Government, 1791-1861 by David F. Ericson Richard R. John (bio) Keywords Slavery, Federal government, Politics, State development Slavery in the American Republic: Developing the Federal Government, 1791-1861. By David F. Ericson. (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2011. Pp. ix, 298. Cloth, $37.50.) The relationship of slavery and American politics is a historical perennial. In Slavery in the American Republic, political scientist David F. Ericson joins the discussion by emphasizing the positive role that the presence of slavery in the American republic played the development of the federal government. In the "traditional narrative," Ericson contends, slavery had little to do with the development of the American state, or, at most, slowed its rise (17). Ericson finds this narrative mistaken. The mordant warnings of slaveholders John Randolph and Nathanial Macon that federal public-works spending might establish precedents that could doom the "peculiar institution" were overblown and unrepresentative. More characteristic was the long involvement of the army in the Second Seminole War, a conflict that, in Ericson's view, was less about land hunger or anti-Native American prejudice than the elimination of a popular haven for escaped slaves. To make his point, Ericson proposes a number of counterfactuals that take the form of a syllogism: no slavery, less (federal) government. Ericson freely concedes that his linkage of slavery and federal public policy is not exactly novel. Indeed, it is not altogether obvious how many historians, as opposed to political scientists, he would lump together in the "traditional" category. Don E. Fehrenbacher's The Slaveholding Republic (Oxford, UK, 2001) covered many of the same topics with greater authority, while Robin E. Einhorn's American Taxation, American Slavery (Chicago, 2006) deftly probed the relationship of slavery [End Page 368] and federal taxation. Ericson's innovation, rather, is to demonstrate quantitatively that slavery hastened "state development," a term of art for political scientists that Ericson equates not with the capacity of the state to attain specific goals, as earlier political scientists contended, but, rather, with the ability of federal officeholders to operate independently of constituent pressure. Ericson opens his narrative in 1791, a convenient starting point, since it permits him to sidestep the vexed debate over the relationship of slavery to the federal Constitution. Following an opening chapter in which he distinguishes his approach from the various "politics and history" scholars (2) who persist in downplaying the power of the federal government in the early republic, Ericson devotes chapters to the cost of federal government involvement in the suppression of the international slave trade, the relocation of ex-slaves in Liberia, the capture of fugitive slaves, slavery-related military ventures, and the employment of slaves by the federal government. In the 1791-1861 period, Erickson contends, lawmakers devoted 2.8 percent of federal expenditures ($51 million) to slavery-related tasks. Of this total, over half—$30 million—went to the prosecution of the Second Seminole War, with an additional $10 million for Texas debt relief—an expenditure that he throws into the mix even though he is agnostic as to whether slaveholder-driven land hunger precipitated the Mexican-American War. While Ericson displays considerable ingenuity in number crunching, his interest extends beyond the merely quantitative. How, he asks, did the presence of slavery hasten changes in state behavior that "in turn" led to state development (16)? To answer this question, he ventures a number of speculative claims. Proslavery federal activism, Ericson posits, probably increased the legitimacy of the federal government in the slaveholding states; the hiring of slaves at the Norfolk, Virginia, navy yard almost certainly emboldened middle-level federal administrators to invent novel protocols that increased their autonomy vis à vis their superiors; and the frequent deployment of the military to defend slaveholders' property rights explains the "fit" between the trajectory of state development in the United States and Europe (106). The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 posed a special interpretative challenge, since it perversely underscored the integral relationship of slavery to the expanding mandate of the federal government in the realm of civil rights: "The federal enforcement of the constitutional rights of Southern slaveholders to the return of their...

Global Health Careers: Serving the Navajo Community

Global Health Careers:Serving the Navajo Community Maricruz Merino, Jonathan Iralu, and Sonya Shin Gallup Indian Medical Center (GIMC) sits on a hilltop in Gallup, New Mexico, a town of 20,000 in the four corners region of the Southwestern United States. From its third story windows one can see the red cliffs of the nearby Navajo Nation, a 27,000 square mile reservation that reaches into Arizona, northern New Mexico, and the southern edges of Utah. It is a vast, rural landscape that houses more than 350,000 Navajos. For many on the reservation, healthcare is provided by Indian Health Service hospitals such as GIMC. "Are you going to stay?" is a common question for new doctors at GIMC. The Navajo know that their geographic location, while beautiful and attractive to many young providers, will also be the reason they leave. It is hard for doctors to be away from their own homelands. Aging parents get sick, [End Page 86] educational opportunities arise, and children who need to be near extended family are born. But to the Navajo, the story of an individual provider is not so important or memorable. All they know is that providers come and go. "Are you here to experiment on us?" is yet another question. Years of exploitation and efforts to destroy traditional ways and language have made many Navajo wary of healthcare providers, no matter how genuine their intentions. Many are so fearful of the hospital—they regard it as "the place to go die." Yet despite this initial suspicion, the Navajo are welcoming people at heart, and tend to develop relationships of trust with their providers. Parents will begin to talk about their grief over a son that has committed suicide or a daughter who died from alcoholic cirrhosis. The elderly will tell you how they care for their five orphaned grandchildren while they can barely take care of their own diabetes. A carpenter tells you he has not worked in a year and feels worthless. An HIV-positive woman will tell you she has been sleeping in a dry river bed because she has no place to go. It quickly becomes apparent that as a physician you will be treating patients with enormous social challenges in addition to complex medical conditions. The origins of the Federal Government's involvement in the healthcare of American Indians and Alaskan Natives (AI/ANs) in the 19th century arose out of both legal obligation and concern for self- preservation. Health services were promised to AI/ ANs in exchange for land, settlements, and agreements. In addition, infectious diseases endemic on reservations as a consequence of crowding and abject poverty, including smallpox and tuberculosis, were seen as a major public health concern. The responsibility of Native American health was first granted to the War Department, then to the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and finally to the Public Health Service in 1955 under the heading of the IHS, or Indian Health Service (U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, 2004; National Library of Medicine, 1994). Since then, the IHS has had many successes. Vaccination rates have gone up, and rates of pneumonia and tuberculosis have gone down significantly. Maternal and infant mortality have declined, and life expectancy has increased (Indian Health Services, 1999). Nonetheless, these improvements remain overshadowed by glaring health disparities among AI/ANs across a broad spectrum of diseases, both communicable and non-communicable, acute and chronic. Native Americans experience higher rates of obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease than the general United States population. They are also more likely to die from alcohol-related causes and in accidents. Life expectancy remains more than five years less than that of the general U.S. population (U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, 2004; U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2000). Underlying these health indicators is the continued impoverished status of most AI/ANs. In Navajo, almost half of the population lives below the poverty line. According to the Navajo Nation, the current unemployment rate is 42% (Navajo Nation Department of Economic Development, 2011). Many Navajo on the reservation do not have running water or electricity. They heat with wood, which they chop and haul themselves—regardless...

Can Additional Resources Lead to Higher Levels of Productivity (Arrests) in Police Agencies?

While most police chiefs might be willing to make such a claim that there is a positive relationship between COPS grants and police arrests, empirical research on this topic is very limited. Following from an earlier study by Zhao, Scheider, and Thurman (2003), this research makes several contributions to the current literature. First, it includes additional years of data from police agencies receiving federal funding to examine the effects of additional resources on arrests. Second, making use of the two waves of census data (1990 and 2000) allowed time-varying analysis of the relationship between police arrests and demographics. Finally, a hierarchical statistical method for longitudinal analysis (HMLM) was used in the analysis of police arrest data from 5,871 cities during 1993 and 2000 when the involvement of federal government for promoting community policing or quality of life policing was unprecedented. Our primary findings suggest a positive relationship between COPS hiring grants and all four types of police arrests during the period of study though COPS funding usually accounted for only a small percentage of the total budget in a police department (GAO, 2005). More specifically, the hiring grant, the largest part of the COPS funding project, had consistently significant impact on police arrests after controlling for the socioeconomic variables and crimes. In addition, the hiring grant was significant predictor of all four categories of arrests, indicating that additional manpower did have a direct casual relationship with number of police arrests.

National curriculum and federalism: the Australian experience

Whilst the past 35 years have seen numerous attempts at national curriculum collaboration in Australia, these have invariably failed largely due to the constitutional reality that the States have responsibility for curriculum. Federal government involvement in curriculum can only be achieved, therefore, with the consent of the States. To achieve this, in 2008 the Rudd Federal government passed the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) Act (2008) which legislated the establishment of ACARA, a national education authority which brought together, for the first time ‘the functions of curriculum, assessment and reporting at the national level’ (Julia Gillard, media release, 2008). Among its mandates, ACARA is responsible for the development of national curriculum, one of the key election platforms on which the current Rudd Federal Labor government was elected in November 2007. Whilst the ACARA Act appears on the surface to represent unprecedented intergovernmental collaboration and a transition to co‐operative federalism; cracks in this co‐operative veneer are starting to appear. In this article I draw on critical theory to examine three varied forms of Federal–State relations spanning three different eras, as they relate to issues of national curriculum – those of corporate federalism, coercive federalism and co‐operative federalism. Specifically, I will argue that the ACARA Act is not an instrument of co‐operative federalism but rather a euphemism for a continued reliance on a new, more subtle form of coercive federalism as a means to ‘deliver’ national curriculum in Australia.

State emergency plans: assessing the inclusiveness of vulnerable populations

The US federal government's involvement in emergency management has evolved in magnitude since the 1800s. Each significant change usually occurred following a catastrophic event. The USA had two large-scale emergencies in 2001 and 2005 – man-made (September 11 terrorist attacks in 2001) and natural (Hurricane Katrina in 2005) – that shaped a new policy regarding emergency management. These disasters revealed numerous failures in planning for, preparedness for and response to disasters. Of the identified failures, accessible emergency communications for all and, distinctively, for Vulnerable Populations (VPs), were studied in this paper. With over 37 million people over 65 years of age and 38.22 million people (over the age of 5) with disabilities, it is important that these populations be appropriately included in emergency management plans. This paper looks at the change in national emergency policy from the National Response Plan to the National Response Framework in 2008 to determine how this change has affected the state emergency plans. The results show that recent changes in the national emergency plan has had little effect on state emergency plans (in Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Region IV) with regard to VPs.

Bringing Oceanography into the Canadian University Classroom

The University of British Columbia's Institute of Oceanography, established in 1949, inaugurated graduate education in oceanography in Canada. It is a rare example of federal government involvement in the content ofhigher education. In the face of competition from McGill and Dalhousie, UBC's success was due to the need for new personnel in oceanography after World War Two, to the presence of the Pacific Oceanographic Group under J.P. Tully nearby in Nanaimo, to Canadian interest in defence during the Cold War and in Arctic development, and to the postwar growth and success of UBC under its president, N.A.M. MacKenzie. UBC exploited the interest of the Canadian Joint Committee on Oceanography, made up of senior civil servants, in physical oceanography to get support for its endeavour. By contrast, Dalhousie, which attempted to base a graduate programme upon bacteriology, failed to find a federal government patron until oceanography expanded further in the late 1950s.

Leaping Tall Buildings--The Science-to-Service Gap in Schizophrenia Treatment

Leaping Tall Buildings--The Science-to-Service Gap in Schizophrenia Treatment

The Political Fallout of Taking a Stand: The President, Congress, and the Schiavo Case

Federal government involvement in the case of terminally ill Terri Schiavo provides an interesting opportunity to explore the potential impact of specific institutional actions on public approval of those institutions. We analyze national survey data from the period of federal intervention and a poll conducted several months later. Our analyses, which account for time and exposure to political news, suggest that presidential and congressional actions in the case were associated with a decline in approval for the president and congressional leaders. Thus, the president and Congress can pay a political price when they take high-profile actions a significant majority of the public opposes. ********** In American politics, many policy actions by Congress and the president do not receive a high degree of public attention. As such, assessment of public approval ratings of these institutions often takes the form of time-series analyses which explore the influence of broad trends, such as economic conditions (Kimball 2005; Rudolph 2002), or dramatic events, such as the start of a military conflict (Clarke et al. 2004; Rosenblatt 1998). But each year, even some policy decisions receive widespread attention. In one recent example, the federal government attempted to intervene in a dispute between members of a Florida family--the case of maintaining life support for Terri Schiavo. Such a high-profile case allows an opportunity for researchers to investigate the impact of specific policy actions on public approval ratings of political institutions using individual-level data. The death of Terri Schiavo on March 31, 2005, ended nearly seven years of bitter private and public battles over her care. Throughout most of that time, the battle had been waged in the Florida legislature and judicial system, but during the period from January 24, 2005, until Schiavo's death, all three branches of the federal government became involved in the debate over prolonging her life. Throughout March 2005, media coverage of the case was intense, and government officials played a highly visible role in the public drama (Cerminara 2006; Edwards 2007, 244; Kohut 2005). Nevertheless, the American public was opposed to federal government intervention in the Schiavo case, and broader trends in public opinion suggest that Americans prefer that the government refrain from intervening in end-of-life issues and leave the decision to families in consultation with doctors (Benson 1999; Pew Research Center for the People and the Press 2005, 2006). In fact, even a majority of those who self-described themselves as conservatives (68 percent) and white evangelicals (69 percent) disapproved of federal government intervention in the Schiavo case months after the salience of the issue had declined dramatically (Jacobson 2007, 220-21; Pew 2005). Given this context, our research explores the impact of federal government intervention on public opinion in a case where the public clearly disapproved of intervention. Our goal is to determine whether approval of congressional leaders and the president declined as a result of their specific actions in the case. We begin with an overview of theoretical perspectives that seek to explain institutional approval ratings. We then shift our attention to a detailed examination of the Schiavo case. Our discussion makes it clear that the Schiavo case was highly salient to the public and that public opinion strongly favored patient/family resolution of end-of-life issues. Nevertheless, in something of a media circus, Congress and the president intervened in the case. Based on the theoretical overview and details of the Schiavo case, we move to examining individual-level approval ratings of congressional leaders and the president, employing national survey data collected during the key days in which Congress and the president were intervening in the case. Based on the way we are able to structure the survey data, our analysis suggests that federal government intervention in the case contributed to a decline in public approval of the president and congressional Republican leaders and, to a lesser extent, approval of congressional Democratic leaders. …

Qualitative Methods and the Evaluation of Community Renewal Programs in Australia: Towards a National Framework

The emergence of public housing estate renewal programs in Australia in the last decade has been one of the most prominent developments in social housing policy. These programs have undertaken a broad mix of renewal activity, ranging from outright physical redevelopment and stock replacement for sale, to community development type initiatives to improve social and employment outcomes for residents. However, while a number of evaluations of these programs have been undertaken, the development of evaluation methodology has lagged behind that of other countries. This in part is due to the lack of federal government interest or involvement in these programs which are essentially state specific. The article reviews the evaluations that have been undertaken in the last 10 years in Australia and assesses the relative importance of qualitative methodologies in these evaluations. Despite a strong focus among policy makers on value-for-money aspects of renewal, the authors show that qualitative methods have been commonplace, if limited in range, and argue this is a result of both the difficulty of obtaining comparative quantitative information especially when comparing dissimilar programs between states. In this context, qualitative methods are more easily managed by researchers and offer more insightful assessments than quantitatively based approaches. The article concludes by arguing for a national evaluation methodology to assist in more rigorous evaluations and the extension of qualitative evaluation methods.

Diversity in the Workplace: A Legal and Statistical Analysis

Although most major corporations in the United States claim they are attempting to create a workplace environment reflective of society's diversity (race, gender, etc.), there is a lack of available information describing the successes and failures of their efforts. This note provides a legal and statistical framework for evaluating (1) the federal government's involvement in antidiscrimination efforts, (2) a history of the prevalence and resolution of discrimination claims during the 1990s, and (3) a statistical analysis of U.S. workforce demographics and compensation levels.

Beyond Federal Urban Policy

Under Democratic and Republican leaders alike, urban policy has receded into a Washington backwater, and it is unlikely to reemerge as a priority any time soon. This essay provides a brief narrative of the rise and fall of urban policy, with a focus on the climax of urban policy making in the late 1970s. The essay also offers some thoughts on the frameworks—the architecture—the status and alignment of which affects the prospects for federal government involvement in local problem solving and building quality communities.

Does school accountability lead to improved student performance?

The leading school reform policy in the United States revolves around strong accountability of schools with consequences for performance. The federal government's involvement through the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 reinforces the prior movement of many states toward policies based on measured student achievement. Analysis of state achievement growth as measured by the National Assessment of Educational progress shows that accountability systems introduced during the 1990s had a clear positive impact on student achievement. This single policy instrument did not, however, also lead to any narrowing in the Black-White achievement gap (though it did narrow the Hispanic-White achievement gap). Moreover, the Black-White gap appears to have been adversely impacted over the decade by increasing minority concentrations in the schools. An additional issue surrounding stronger accountability has been a concern about unintended outcomes related to such things as higher exclusion rates from testing, increased dropout rates, and the like. Our analysis of special education placement rates, a frequently identified area of concern, does not show any responsiveness to the introduction of accountability systems.© 2005 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management

Viewpoints from generation X: a survey of candidate and associate viewpoints on resident duty-hour regulations 1

The American Medical Student Association, the Committee of Interns and Residents, and Public Citizen petitioned the Occupational Safety and Health Administration for national resident duty-hour limitations. Subsequently, federal legislation was introduced to limit resident duty hours. To preempt the federal government, the Accreditation of Graduate Medical Education implemented resident duty-hour guidelines. To evaluate the viewpoints and attitudes of surgical resident and staff physicians as they pertain to the national resident duty-hour guidelines, we asked attendees of the American College of Surgeons' Candidate Associate Society Forum during the American College of Surgeons Clinical Congress meeting in 2001 to complete a self-administered questionnaire. Analyses were performed to determine the frequency of response for each survey item. Eighty-six of the 102 (84%) surgeons who attended the American College of Surgeons Forum completed the survey. Most disagreed with the federal government involvement in regulating duty hours. Although most agreed that residents should not be on call more than every third night, viewpoints varied on the other duty-hour guidelines. Most (63.4%) reported that residents should work 81 to 100 hours per week, but 11% reported that residents should work > 101 hours per week and 25.6% reported that <or= 80 hours per week was optimal. As future guidelines are considered, further studies must be done to determine the viewpoints and attitudes of surgical resident and staff physicians with regard to resident duty-hour reform. These "front line" individuals may have unique insights into the benefits and barriers of duty-hour regulations.

Convergence of Long-Term Care Planning and Retirement Planning at the Work Place

There is an increasing expectation that the private-sector should provide needed solutions to pressing problems in long-term care. Long-term care insurance has figured prominently in recent discussions. Within the long-term care insurance market, the potential of the employer in making such insurance available to employees has been discussed extensively. This paper traces the increasing convergence of retirement planning and long-term care planning at the work place. The long-term care insurance market has come a long way, and the employer-sponsored segment of the market has recorded the highest rate of growth in recent times. Furthermore, the employer-sponsored market is beginning to diversify. Low take-up rates still remain a problem. Recent rapid growth of the market coupled with the federal government's involvement as an employer offering long-term care insurance is bound to expand the market further.

A matter of priorities

A matter of priorities