1,426 research outputs found
The Double Crisis of the Welfare State
No full textThe UK welfare state is under unprecedented attack from (1) harsh spending cuts, focussed particularly on benefits and services for women, children, low-paid people and claimers of working age, and (2) a profound restructuring programme, which is fragmenting services and embedding private provision across the state sector. It is proving surprisingly difficult for pro-welfare state actors to make a case for generous state welfare that is both inclusive and electorally attractive. This paper analyses why this is so and what can be done about it. It discusses trends in the development of the welfare state and in discourse about the problems it faces, the trilemma that pro-welfare policy-making faces, various new directions in policy and a reform programme that might help build a more inclusive welfare discourse. The arguments are necessarily compressed in a paper of this length. More extended discussion and further evidence is available in Taylor-Gooby (2013a) with background in Taylor-Gooby 2013b, c, 2012a to d and Taylor-Gooby and Stoker 2011
The benefits of growth for Indonesian Workers
No full textIndonesia's adopted development model has proved to be the most successful in alleviating poverty and benefiting workers in developing countries. The government's development efforts focused on agriculture, education, and transport infrastructure. It emphasized providing productive employment opportunities and gradually improving the labor quality through education and training. The wage, employment, and income growth rates were left to market forces. Although the rapid growth of labor-intensive manufacturing has led to more jobs and higher wages benefiting workers, workers employed in these industries have expressed growing dissatisfaction. They complain about problems of child labor, the denial of centrally mandated wages and benefits to workers, poor working conditions, and the abuse of young female workers. The government has tried to improve worker's wages and working conditions by centrally mandating higher labor standards, relying principally on minimum wages. Enforcement has improved and, despite low compliance, minimum wages are beginning to bite. Indonesians are debating whether they need labor intensive industries and whether it is a mistake to base Indonesia's growth on cheap labor. They argue that if labor is more expensive, manufacturers must substitute some capital for labor. However, if labor-intensive industries are rejected, the capacity of the economy to absorb plentiful workers will be reduced. The main alternatives are to push up wages now, or to let wages be determined by market forces and strengthen institutions that could improve working conditions, such as labor unions. The author recommends maintaining flexible labor markets and allowing market forces to set the pace of change, while strengthening labor unions.Environmental Economics&Policies,Public Health Promotion,Labor Policies,Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Work&Working Conditions,Environmental Economics&Policies,Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Banks&Banking Reform,Work&Working Conditions,Municipal Financial Management
Search for the Higgs boson decays H -> ee and H -> e mu in pp collisions at root s=13 TeV with the ATLAS detector
No full textSearches for the Higgs boson decays H -> ee and H -> e mu are performed using data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 139 fb(-1) collected with the ATLAS detector in pp collisions at root s = 13 TeV at the LHC. No significant signals are observed, in agreement with the Standard Model expectation. For a Higgs boson mass of 125 GeV, the observed (expected) upper limit at the 95% confidence level on the branching fraction B(H -> ee) is 3.6 x 10(-4) (3.5 x 10(-4)) and on B(H -> e mu) is 6.2 x 10(-5) (5.9 x 10(-5)). These results represent improvements by factors of about five and six on the previous best limits on B(H -> ee) and B(H -> e mu) respectively. (C) 2019 The Author. Published by Elsevier B.V
Observation of H -> b(b)over-bar decays and V H production with the ATLAS detector
No full textA search for the decay of the Standard Model Higgs boson into a b (b) over bar pair when produced in association with a W or Z boson is performed with the ATLAS detector. The data, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 79.8 fb(-1) were collected in proton-proton collisions during Run 2 of the Large Hadron Collider at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV. For a Higgs boson mass of 125 GeV, an excess of events over the expected background from other Standard Model processes is found with an observed (expected) significance of 4.9 (4.3) standard deviations. A combination with the results from other searches in Run 1 and in Run 2 for the Higgs boson in the bb decay mode is performed, which yields an observed (expected) significance of 5.4 (5.5) standard deviations, thus providing direct observation of the Higgs boson decay into b-quarks. The ratio of the measured event yield for a Higgs boson decaying into b (b) over bar to the Standard Model expectation is 1.01 +/- 0.12(stat.) (-0.15) (+0.16)(syst.). Additionally, a combination of Run 2 results searching for the Higgs boson produced in association with a vector boson yields an observed (expected) significance of 5.3 (4.8) standard deviations. (C) 2018 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V
The Brunt-Vaisala frequency of rotating tokamak plasmas
No full textThe continuous spectrum of analytical toroidally rotating magnetically confined plasma equilibria is investigated analytically and numerically. In the presence of purely toroidal flow, the ideal magnetohydrodynamic equations leave the freedom to specify which thermodynamic quantity is constant on the magnetic surfaces. Introducing a general parametrization of this quantity, analytical equilibrium solutions are derived that still posses this freedom. These equilibria and their spectral properties are shown to be ideally suited for testing numerical equilibrium and stability codes including toroidal rotation. Analytical expressions are derived for the low-frequency continuous Alfven spectrum. These expressions still allow one to choose which quantity is constant on the magnetic surfaces of the equilibrium, thereby generalizing previous results. The centrifugal convective effect is shown to modify the lowest Alfven continuum branch to a buoyancy frequency, or Brunt-Vaisala frequency. A comparison with numerical results for the case that the specific entropy, the temperature, or the density is constant on the magnetic surfaces yields excellent agreement, showing the usefulness of the derived expressions for the validation of numerical codes. (C) 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved
Search for the Higgs boson decays H → ee and H → eμ in pp collisions at s=13TeV with the ATLAS detector
No full textSearches for the Higgs boson decays H -> ee and H -> e mu are performed using data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 139 fb(-1) collected with the ATLAS detector in pp collisions at root s = 13 TeV at the LHC. No significant signals are observed, in agreement with the Standard Model expectation. For a Higgs boson mass of 125 GeV, the observed (expected) upper limit at the 95% confidence level on the branching fraction B(H -> ee) is 3.6 x 10(-4) (3.5 x 10(-4)) and on B(H -> e mu) is 6.2 x 10(-5) (5.9 x 10(-5)). These results represent improvements by factors of about five and six on the previous best limits on B(H -> ee) and B(H -> e mu) respectively
Riots, demonstrations, strikes and the Coalition programme
No full textThe current UK government’s policies include headlong spending cuts and a far-reaching restructuring of public provision. State welfare arguably contributes to political legitimacy and social stability, as well as to better social conditions and economic prosperity. The fact that current policies bear disproportionately on lower income groups may damage legitimacy.
This article analyses a dataset covering 26 countries for more than two decades to show that spending cuts, privatisation and increases in poverty undermine legitimacy. It uses a direct measure of legitimacy in terms of the frequency of riots and political demonstrations and strikes rather than the usual indirect measures in terms of attitudes and trust in government. Findings in relation to the increased work-centredness of the benefit and labour market reforms are more equivocal: a stricter benefit regime may not undermine legitimacy
Characterization of a Novel Gamma-Ray Detection System for Tomographic, In-Situ Proton Therapy Quality Assurance
No full textIn the field of hadron therapy, quality assurance is vital to ensure the accurate delivery of radiation to the target while minimizing the dose to healthy tissue. In this work, we present the characterization of a novel gamma-ray detection system developed by Terapet SA for in-situ quality assurance in proton therapy. The detector is intended for use with either phantoms or anatomical targets, and operates by reconstruction of the PET activity induced in the target by proton irradiation. The detector is composed of scintillator-based detection modules, each with an area of 60 mm by 60 mm, a spatial resolution for 511 keV gamma ray interactions of approximately 1 mm and depth of interaction resolution of 1.2 mm. The field of view is extended by rotation and displacement of the detector about the target. The proposed use cases for the device are to detect changes in beam delivery or target positioning, and to assess the accuracy of target modelling by the treatment planning system. The results presented assess the performance of the device and its ability to fulfill the stated quality assurance use cases
Search for new resonances decaying to a or boson and a Higgs boson in the , , and channels with collisions at TeV with the ATLAS detector
No full textSee paper for full list of authors, 18 pages (plus author list + cover pages: 36 pages total), 13 figures, 1 table. Submitted to PLB. All figures including auxiliary figures are available at https://atlas.web.cern.ch/Atlas/GROUPS/PHYSICS/PAPERS/EXOT-2015-18/International audienceA search is presented for new resonances decaying to a or boson and a Higgs boson in the , , and channels in collisions at TeV with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider using a total integrated luminosity of 3.2 fb. The search is conducted by looking for a localized excess in the / invariant or transverse mass distribution. No significant excess is observed, and the results are interpreted in terms of constraints on a simplified model based on a phenomenological Lagrangian of heavy vector triplets
Ultraviolet radiation suppresses obesity and symptoms of metabolic syndrome independently of vitamin d in mice fed a high-fat diet
No full textThe role of vitamin D in curtailing the development of obesity and comorbidities such as the metabolic syndrome (MetS) and type 2 diabetes has received much attention recently. However, clinical trials have failed to conclusively demonstrate the benefits of vitamin D supplementation. In most studies, serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] decreases with increasing BMI above normal weight. These low 25(OH)D levels may also be a proxy for reduced exposure to sunlight-derived ultraviolet radiation (UVR). Here we investigate whether UVR and/or vitamin D supplementation modifies the development of obesity and type 2 diabetes in a murine model of obesity. Long-term suberythemal and erythemal UVR significantly suppressed weight gain, glucose intolerance, insulin resistance, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease measures; and serum levels of fasting insulin, glucose, and cholesterol in C57BL/6 male mice fed a high-fat diet. However, many of the benefits of UVR were not reproduced by vitamin D supplementation. In further mechanistic studies, skin induction of the UVR-induced mediator nitric oxide (NO) reproduced many of the effects of UVR. These studies suggest that UVR (sunlight exposure) may be an effective means of suppressing the development of obesity and MetS, through mechanisms that are independent of vitamin D but dependent on other UVR-induced mediators such as NO.</p
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