Personal Financial Circumstances Research Articles

Exploring the income, savings and debt levels of autistic adults living in Australia

PurposeMany autistic adults experience unemployment, which may impact their financial circumstances. However, no research has examined their personal financial circumstances. Therefore, this study aims to examine the self-reported income, savings and debt of autistic adults living in Australia, as well as the demographic associates and predictors of income and savings.Design/methodology/approachSixty-four autistic adults aged 18–67 years (Mage = 32.78, SDage = 11.36) completed an online survey containing questions relating to their financial circumstances and the autism spectrum quotient-short.FindingsOverall, the authors found that many autistic adults are financially disadvantaged. The mode of income levels was below AU$25,000, which is substantially lower than the mean annual Australian full-time income of AU$89,123. Higher savings was associated with not having any debt or having a greater ability to repay debt. Autism traits were positively associated with income levels. As predicted, being employed was associated with and predicted higher income. People who were employed were four times more likely to have a higher income than unemployed individuals. The authors did not find a relationship between having a co-occurring mental condition with income or savings. The authors also did not find a significant association between employment status and savings.Practical implicationsThese research findings have implications on how we can improve the financial circumstances of autistic adults and provide additional evidence for the importance of increasing employment opportunities for autistic individuals.Originality/valueTo the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to examine the personal financial circumstances of autistic adults.

Payment of Reparation by Third Parties Changing the Prosecution and Sentencing Landscape

Under the Sentencing Act 2002, a court may impose a sentence of reparation if an offender has, “through or by means of an offence of which the offender is convicted, caused a victim to suffer loss of or damage to property, emotional harm or loss or damage consequential on any emotional or physical harm or loss of, or damage to, property.” When reparation was first introduced as a sentence in its own right in the 1983 Criminal Justice Bill, it was promoted as being “consistent with both reformative and deterrent theories of the purpose of punishment”, compensating victims and holding offenders to account. Reparation is determined by reference to the loss or harm suffered by the victim and the offender’s financial means. Over time, this has developed to include the capacity for third parties (including insurers and family members) to pay. In such cases reparation is not dependent on the offender’s personal financial circumstances, the offender does not personally pay, and the victim receives compensation where they may otherwise not do so. However, it is arguable that by shifting the cost of reparation from the offender to a third party, the original policy reasons for the sentence of reparation are undermined. The purpose of this paper is to consider the impact of third party payment of reparation on prosecution decisions and sentencing.

When the Pound in People’s Pocket Matters: How Changes to Personal Financial Circumstances Affect Party Choice

In this paper we revisit the often disregarded ‘pocketbook voting’ thesis that suggests that people evaluate governments based on the state of their own finances. Using data from the British Household Panel Survey over the last 20 years, we measure changes in personal financial circumstances and show that the ‘pocketbook voting’ model works. Crucially, we also argue that the ability to attribute responsibility for these changes to the government matters. People respond much more strongly to changes in their own finances that are linked to government spending, such as welfare transfers, than to similar changes that are less clearly the responsibility of elected officials, such as lower personal earnings. We conclude that pocketbook voting is a real phenomenon, but that more attention should be paid to how people assign credit and blame for changes in their own economic circumstances.

Unsecured Consumer Debt and Mental Health Outcomes in Middle-Aged and Older Americans

Unsecured consumer debt may affect well-being negatively. We evaluated the association between unsecured debt and two distinct outcomes: depressive symptomatology and psychological well-being. Data were obtained from the 2006 Health and Retirement Study. There were 5,817 adults aged ≥ 51 who responded to a core survey and psychosocial leave-behind questionnaire. Depressive symptoms were assessed using the revised 8-item Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale. Psychological well-being was evaluated in a leave-behind questionnaire that had 3 dimensions: self-acceptance, personal growth, and purpose in life. Thirty percent of the respondents had unsecured debt. The magnitude or amount of unsecured debt and the occurrence of unsecured debt were significant predictors of depressive symptoms and lower psychological well-being. Perceived control over personal financial circumstances was a significant predictor of higher psychological well-being. In middle-aged and older Americans, unsecured debt has negative effects on mental health because of the associated depressive symptoms and decreased psychological well-being. The deleterious effects of unsecured debt on mental health are largely accounted for by perceived control over personal financial circumstances. Interventions enhancing older adults' control over personal financial circumstances may protect against the psychological decrements experienced by those grappling with unsecured debt.

Environmental influences on healthy and active ageing: a systematic review

ABSTRACTThis paper explores the evidence for environmental influences on older adult health and activity participation, identifies current knowledge gaps and limitations within this literature, and offers recommendations for future research via a systematic appraisal of 83 quantitative and qualitative studies. A Cochrane-type review procedure was followed, which incorporated structured database searches, inclusion and exclusion criteria, quality appraisal of included studies, and peer review. The review findings identify support for both personal and environmental influences on health and activity participation in later life. Reported personal influences include ethnicity and cultural norms, energy and motivation, sex, age, education, genetic heritage, self-efficacy, and personal financial circumstances. Reported environmental influences on activity participation include climate, level of pollution, street lighting, traffic conditions, accessibility and appropriateness of services and facilities, socio-economic conditions, aesthetics, pedestrian infrastructure, community life, exposure to antisocial behaviour, social network participation, environmental degradation, level of urbanism, exposure to natural settings, familiarity with local environment and others. Recommendations for future research include the need for innovative research methods; involvement of older adults as research collaborators; investigation of wider aspects of the active ageing concept; in-depth assessment of the environmental characteristics of areas; investigation of the pathways leading from environment to health and activity participation; and more theoretically informed research or increased contribution of research to theory development.

Personal Emotions and Political Decision Making: Implications for Voter Competence

According to what criteria do citizens make political decisions, and what do these criteria say about democratic competence? An impressive body of evidence suggests that voters competently evaluate diagnostic information such as macroeconomic trends and their personal financial circumstances to reward good performance while ridding themselves of leaders who are corrupt, incompetent, or ineffective. However, what if some voters' personal emotional reactions to events completely unrelated to public affairs influence their voting decisions? The conflation of personal emotions with political cognition challenges traditional conceptions of citizen competence and democratic accountability. We explore whether emotional reactions unrelated to incumbent performance affect voting behavior by assessing the electoral impact of local college football games, events that government has nothing to do with and for which no government response would be expected. On average, a win before Election Day causes the incumbent to receive about one percentage point more of the vote, with the effect being larger for teams with stronger fan support. We corroborate these aggregate-level results with a survey conducted during the 2009 NCAA Men's College Basketball Tournament, where we find that sports-induced emotional change affects approval of President Obama and assessments of the health of the country. Voters' decisions and attitudes are thus shown to depend considerably on events that affect their personal level of happiness even when those events are entirely disconnected from government activity. Our results provide new evidence on the significant limitations of the electorate's capacity to hold elected officials accountable for their actions.

The Road to Camelot: Lotteries, the Circle of Learning, and the ‘Circulary’ Library of Samuel Fancourt

Samuel Fancourt has often been referred to as the founder of the first circulating library in England, or at least in London, and as the person who first used the phrase ‘circulating library’. This article shows that he although he was pipped to the post for the former claim, he was almost certainly responsible for the latter. However, his main claim to fame should be that he popularized the idea of the private subscription library. Fancourt was a dissenting minister who did not commence his library career until his late fifties. His personal financial circumstances were difficult, and his work as a librarian never brought him profit. However, he did achieve publicity for the benefits of libraries, especially when he developed a curious scheme for disposing of his books by linking them to the State Lottery.

Research analysts’ conflicts of interest: a global solution

Research analysts make investment recommendations and investors, whether retail or wholesale, regard them as experts and important sources of information about the sectors and companies they cover. Many factors, however, can influence an analyst’s independence and objectivity – amongst other things, the investment banking relationships of their employer and aspects of an analyst’s personal financial circumstances.

Heterogeneity in Perceptions of National Economic Conditions

Empirical findings concerning economic voting differ according to the level of analysis employed. A widely accepted explanation for the inconsistency between macroand microlevel evidence of economic voting is the high degree of random variation that plagues survey data. According to this explanation, aggregation purges individual-level noise from mass opinions on policy issues and outcomes. Building on the research of Bartels (1996), we debate the validity of this explanation by demonstrating that public evaluations of the national economy vary systematically with information, media exposure, political attitudes, personal experiences, and demographic characteristics. Furthermore, we show that these sources of subjective heterogeneity produce systematic biases when national economic evaluations are aggregated. These findings challenge a widely accepted notion that because error in individual-level measures (or expressions) of preferences is random, the aggregation of these individual measures ensures that they correctly represent the collective preference. mpirical findings concerning the influence of the economy on political behavior differ depending on the level of analysis employed. Using aggregate-level data, numerous studies have established a statistical relationship between economic conditions and election outcomes or executive popularity (e.g., Kramer 1971; MacKuen, Erikson, and Stimson 1992). On the basis of the macro-level evidence alone one would have little reason to doubt that the economy matters. In contrast, individual-level studies using survey data have produced only mixed evidence that voters consider economic conditions when evaluating the incumbent government and its leaders (e.g., Fiorina 1978, 1981; Kinder and Kiewiet 1979, 1981). Moreover, the strongest survey evidence of economic voting suggests that voters primarily care about national economic conditions not their personal financial situation. This finding contradicts the egocentric theory posited by early macro-level research that national economic indicators matter because they are correlated with personal financial circumstances. The micro-macro dichotomy in economic voting research reflects a similar dichotomy in research on voter sophistication and representation. Aggregate-level studies tend to indicate that voters are reasonably well informed about the economy and make forward-looking, rather sophisticated voting decisions (e.g., Alesina, Londregan, and Rosenthal 1993; Suzuki and Chappell 1996; Palmer and Whitten 1999). These studies infer that mass political decisions conform to rational expectations, or at least limited information rationality (e.g., MacKuen, Erikson, and Stimson 1992). In contrast to this macro-level image of the voter, individual-level survey research has shown that the public in general has low levels of political sophistication, lacking much knowledge of and interest in politics (e.g.,

Canadian Public Opinion and Environmental Action: Evidence from British Columbia

AbstractPublic opinion regarding environmental issues has attracted considerable scholarly attention during the 1990s. Less attention has been paid to links between environmentally friendly attitudes and “green” behaviour and the degree to which behaviour is context or value-driven, especially in Canada. Using survey data from British Columbia, this article analyzes these links, paying particular attention to differences between public perceptions of local versus global environment, and how these concerns influence behaviour. The analysis also demonstrates the importance of distinguishing between different types of behaviour. While the crucial role of postmaterial values for three kinds of environmentally friendly behaviour is confirmed, other factors, particularly left/right ideological differences and personal financial circumstances emerge as significant explanatory variables. “Green consumer behaviour” is largely determined by local context. Local concerns also drive “green political activity,” but value differences are crucial as well. Left/right differences and personal financial circumstances are especially important in explaining “green pocketbook behaviour” — willingness to incur costs, either personally or through taxes, for environmental protection and enhancement.

Reconsidering pocketbook voting: An experimental approach

Despite its deep theoretical roots, the idea that voters reward or punish incumbents in national elections for trends in their personal financial circumstances has not fared well when subjected to empirical test. This paper poses an experimental test of the leading explanations for the surprisingly weak showing of pocketbook influences on vote choice. According to certain of these explanations, the answer lies in distinguishing between sociotropic and self-interested economic voting, or between retrospective and prospective economic voting, or between perceptions of economic trends in general and perceptions of the electorally relevant component of these trends. However, expectations based on these explanations are generally not borne out in the laboratory setting. Consistent with the observed pattern of effects, however, is the idea that pocketbook voting displays little independent impact because economic perceptions and attributions are epiphenomena—strongly biased by the voter's preexisting political commitments.

The Impact of Personal and National Economic Conditions on the Presidential Vote: A Pooled Cross-Sectional Analysis

Studies of the electoral consequences of changing econoomic conditions have not becn able to distinguish the effects of macroeconomic conditions on the vote from those of personal financial circumstances. That is because research to date has relied either on exclusively aggregate-level information analyzed longitudinally or exclusively individual-level survey data analyzed cross-sectionally. This study employs a pooling of National Election Studies survey data, 1956-84, augmented by a time series of national economic statistics to evaluate sociotropic and pocketbook conceptions of voting and to assess the advantage of incumbency in presidential elections. Personal financial predicaments are found to carry weight in individuals' voting decisions, but changing macroeconomic conditions are more important as determinants of election outcomes. Also, the degree to which incumbency is an electoral asset depends upon election-year economic circumstances. Although it was not designed for such purposes, the model presented here generally forecast presidential election outcomes well, even though it ignored the personalities and issues of the campaigns. That result provokes some thoughts about the impact of campaign events and strategies on presidential contests.

The structure of consumer confidence in four EEC countries

This paper reports an exploration of the structure of consumer confidence in four of the countries participating in the EEC harmonized consumer attitudes surveys. The analysis is based on two EEC surveys in each of the countries concerned and uses the rotated solutions on the first three factors of the data. It was found that the different countries and surveys had similar factor structures which were interpreted as general economic conditions: personal financial circumstances; household durable buying intentions. The position of price expectations and attitudes to saving within these factor structures is also of interest in the interpretation of consumer behaviour.