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VA Housing: Guaranteed Loans, Direct Loans, and Specially Adapted Housing Grants
Get PDF[Excerpt] The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) administers several programs that assist individual veterans in purchasing and/or rehabilitating homes. The specific ways in which the VA assists veterans include (1) guaranteeing home mortgages from private lenders (through the Loan Guaranty Program, a form of insurance) to help veterans obtain financing for home purchases, improvements, or refinancing; (2) providing direct loans for home purchases to Native American veterans and to purchasers of homes that are in the VA inventory due to default and foreclosure; and (3) extending grants and loans to veterans with service-connected disabilities so that they can adapt housing to fit their needs through the Specially Adapted Housing Program.
This report discusses some of the legislative history behind each of these housing programs, and provides details about how the programs currently operate. There is a separate section on funding for VA loan programs, and the final section of the report discusses VA efforts to assist borrowers who face default and foreclosure. While the VA also provides housing assistance for homeless veterans, this report does not address these programs
How do United States Consumer Expenditures Compare with the United Kingdom and Japan?
Get PDF[Excerpt] In 2014, U.S. consumers spent almost 19 percent of every dollar on transportation, which is 87 percent higher than what Japan spent. U.S. households also spent about 9 percent on out-of-pocket healthcare expenditures, which was over 5 times higher than the U.K. Expenditure shares are the percentages of total expenditures allotted to each spending category. Japan’s share of food expenditures was the highest among the three countries. The United States had increases in expenditure shares of transportation and healthcare from 2009 to 2014.
This Beyond the Numbers article explores how consumer expenditure shares for selected components have changed in the United States, United Kingdom, and Japan from 2009 to 2014. Consumer expenditure shares usually do not fluctuate much in the short term and are more useful for identifying long-term spending trends than for examining percent changes in expenditures from year to year. For this analysis, BLS harmonizes the spending categories so that we can make valid comparisons between the countries. In order to provide comparisons of the international shares data to U.S. shares data for this report, several adjustments are made to ensure the consistency of components that make up an expenditure category
Jefferson, County and Security and Law Enforcement Employees Council 82, AFSCME, AFL-CIO, Jefferson County Sheriff\u27s Employees Local 3089
Get PDFIn the matter of the fact-finding between the County of Jefferson, employer, and the Security and Law Enforcement Employees Council 82, AFSCME, AFL-CIO, Jefferson County Sheriff\u27s Employees Local 3089, union. PERB case no. M2015-121. Before: Don Mesibov, fact finder
To Cut Pay or Lay Off: Exploring a Vexing HR Challenge
Get PDFKey Findings:
In today’s turbulent business environment the need to reduce payroll costs can arise at any time. Generally, this means resorting to one of two agonizing options: cutting pay or engaging in layoffs. The challenge, of course, is to select the option that meets the firm’s financial needs while minimizing the potential downsides involved. Several studies have examined the negative effects of cutbacks on employees. The results of these studies are of limited value to decision-makers, however, since overwhelmingly they focus either on pay cuts or on layoffs while making no attempt to compare the two. Here we report on a series of three studies that extends previous research in a couple of ways. Initially, by examining pay cuts versus layoffs to test their comparative effects. And then by explicitly considering the ways in which these effects vary depending on the context in which they are executed
Life on a Nickels Edge Struggle and Dignity in Buffalo\u27s Fruit Belt
Get PDFThis purpose of this fact sheet is to give a brief overview of the Fruit Belt neighborhood on Buffalo’s East Side in relation to community demographics, development, and efforts to control land use through the creation of the FB Community Land Trust. This fact sheet has three parts: an introduction to the 2016-2017 Humanities New York public humanities fellowship project; information gained from the conduct of that fellowship; links to other work that has been done in relation to the Fruit Belt
Bringing the Good Food Purchasing Program to Buffalo, Challenges and Lessons Learned
Get PDFThe Good Food Purchasing Program (GFPP) builds on locally established community initiatives and goals to leverage institutional purchasing with the hope of transforming the food system. The program focuses on five core values: local economies, nutrition, a valued workforce, environmental sustainability, and animal welfare. The City of Buffalo shows tremendous potential to benefit from the GFPP. In the Buffalo Niagara region alone, “public institutions feed 163,000 public school students, 89,000 college students, and 6,000 correctional facility inmates each year—a total of 258,000 people.” Los Angeles, California has demonstrated the positive effects that the GFPP has had on the local food system. In order to bring the program to the City of Buffalo a better understanding of the program is necessary. The goal of this report is to aid the organizations in Buffalo who are working to bring the GFPP to the city. The report does this by outlining the time and steps involved in the program, identifying opportunities and challenges, identifying lessons learned, and providing recommendations
2016 Annual Report on the State of Homelessness in WNY
Get PDFThe Homeless Alliance of Western New York is the designated Continuum of Care (CoC) agency for Erie County that is responsible for compiling the annual Continuum of Care grant from the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). In 2011 this grant awarded $11.2 million in funding for new and renewal projects to homeless agencies throughout Erie County
Oceanside Union Free School District and Oceanside Union Free School Pre-K Aides Unit, New York State United Teachers (NYSUT), American Federation of Teachers (AFT), AFL-CIO, Oceanside Federation of Teachers (OFT), Local 1631 (2017)
Get PDFContext, Coalitions, and Organizing: Immigrant Labor Rights Advocacy in San Francisco and Houston
Get PDF[Excerpt] In the pages that follow, we first situate immigrant labor rights struggles in scholarship on the “right to the city.” We then present San Francisco and Houston, focusing on their immigration histories, current demographic profiles, and contexts for advancing immigrant labor rights. We next describe the parallel types of organizations that have advocated for stronger wage and labor rights in San Francisco and Houston and the similar principles that have motivated them to advocate with local government. In discussing the wage and labor rights campaigns in each city, we draw out key differences in the policy changes that advocates have realized, the coalitions they formed to do so, and the issue frames they adopted in the process. The conclusion underscores the need for more research on how, and to what effect, advocates are mobilizing for immigrant labor rights in cities with different historical, economic, political, and demographic contexts
Innovative Changes in European Companies (3rd European Company Survey)
Get PDF[Excerpt] Innovation in its various forms is considered an important driver of improved competitiveness, productivity and the growth potential of companies. By innovating both in their products and in workplace practices and processes, European workplaces may have a better chance to compete internationally.
This report critically reflects on common concepts of innovation and explores the links between innovation, practices, performance and workplace well-being across the EU28. In particular, it examines associations between innovative company behaviour and the implementation of bundles of workplace practices. The report also studies the role of social dialogue in translating innovative workplace practices into higher levels of performance and well-being.
The report contributes to research and policy debates by examining innovation from a different perspective. It acknowledges that companies need to invest in research and development (R&D), increase the number of patents granted and improve technology. However, it highlights other important factors that contribute to innovation such as the organisation of work, human resource practices and employee participation