Explaining parental dedication to child care in Spain

The quality of the time dedicated to child care has potential positive effects on children’s life chances. However, the determinants of parental time allocation to child care remain largely unexplored, particularly in context undergoing rapid family change such as Spain. We assess two alternative explanations for differences between parents in the amount of time spent with children. The first, based in the relative resources hypothesis, links variation in time spent with children to the relative attributes (occupation, education or income) of one partner to the other. The second, derived from the social status hypothesis, suggests that variation in time spent with children is attributable to the relative social position of the pair (i.e. higher status couples spend more time with children regardless of within-couple difference).To investigate theses questions, we use a sample of adults (18-50) from the Spanish Time Use Survey (STUS) 2002-2003 (n=7,438). Limiting the analysis to adults who are married or in consensual unions, the STUS allows to assess both the quantity and quality of parental time spent with children. We find little support for the “relative resources hypothesis”. Instead, consistent with the “social status hypothesis”, we find that time spent on child care is attributable to the social position of the couple, regardless of between-parent differences in income of education.

Social capital and government in the production of public goods

As a response to the rapidly growing empirical literature on social capital and the evidence of its correlation with government performance, we build a theoretical framework to study the interactions between social capital and government's action. This paper presents a model of homogeneous agents in an overlapping generations framework incorporating social capital as the values transmitted from parent to child. The government's role is to provide public goods. First, government expenditure is exogenously given. Then, it will be chosen at the preferred level of the representative agent. For both setups the equilibrium outcomes are characterized and the resulting dynamics studied. Briefly we include an analysis of the effect of productivity growth on the evolution of social capital. The results obtained caution caution against both the crowding out effect of the welfare state and the impact of sustained economic growth on social capital.

On the relation between tax rates and evasion in a multi-period economy

We extend the basic tax evasion model to a multi-period economy exhibiting sustained growth. When individuals conceal part of their true income from the tax authority, they face the risk of being audited and hence of paying the corresponding fine. Both taxes and fines determine individual saving and the rate of capital accumulation. In this context we show that the sign of the relation between the level of the tax rate and the amount of evaded income is the same as that obtained in static setups. Moreover, high tax rates on income are typically associated with low growth rates as occurs in standard growth models that disregard the tax evasion phenomenon.

The Child is father of the man: implications for the demographic transition

We propose a new theory of the demographic transition based on the evidence that body development during childhood is an important predictor of adult life expectancy. This theory is embodied in an OLG framework where fertility, longevity and education all result from individual decisions. The model displays different regimes, allowing the economy to move slowly from an initial Malthusian regime towards the Modern era. The dynamics reproduces the key features of the demographic transition, including the permanent increase in life expectancy, resulting from improvements in body development, the hump in both population growth and fertility, and a late increase in secondary educational attainments.

Cultural leaders and the clash of civilizations

This article builds a micro founded model of the clash of cultures. The clash is defined as the parent's fear of a trait change by their child in an overlapping generations model with intergenerational transmission of cultural traits. The extent of the clash is manipulated by cultural leaders who benefit from the cultural education effort by parents. We identify three channels through which the leaders can affect the clash of cultures: (i) by providing beneficial cultural values, (ii) by claims of cultural superiority and (iii) by cultural alienation, i.e. by inducing cultural dislike towards their own group. We show that all three channels can be in the leader's interest but channels (ii) and (iii) reduce the utility of the leader's goup members. This hints to a strong conflict of interest within groups - between the population at large and the benefactors of radicalization. We further show how the use of alienation relates to the economic opportunities available to a group.

Revisiting the size-R&D productivity relation: introducing the mediating role of decision-making style on the scale and quality of innovative output

We develop a mediation model in which firm size is proposed to affect the scale and quality of innovative output through the adoption of different decision styles during the R&D process. The aim of this study is to understand how the internal changes that firms undergo as they evolve from small to larger organizations affect R&D productivity. In so doing, we illuminate the underlying theoretical mechanism affecting two different dimensions of R&D productivity, namely the scale and quality of innovative output which have not received much attention in previous literature. Using longitudinal data of Spanish manufacturing firms we explore the validity of this mediation model. Our results show that as firms evolve in size, they increasingly emphasize analytical decision making, and consequently, large-sized firms aim for higher-quality innovations while small firms aim for a larger scale of innovative output.

Nominal plural marking of nonce words in child Spanish

This study addresses the issue of Spanish plural marking considering data from three sources: existent words, loan words and nonce words. Specifically, we are interested in the role of stress placement and word-final sound in the use of /-es/ for plural formation. We present data concerning the interaction of these two features for children and adults. Our findings suggest that this phenomenon is a classic example of over generalization in acquisition. Stress does not seem a determining feature by itself. Its main effect is produced when it interacts with the structure of the syllable

Seeds of hope: Assessing the effect of development aid on the reduction of child mortality

The Millennium Declaration (2000) set as one of its targets a substantial reduction in child mortality. This paper studies whether the massive increase in development aid can account for part of the reduction in child mortality observed in developing countries since the year 2000. To do so, we analyze a panel of more than 130 developing countries over the 2000-2008 period. We use the time trend evolution of aid to identify an exogenous source of variation. Total aid has had no statistically significant effect on child mortality. However, a disaggregate analysis identifies certain sectors of aid that have had a significant impact. The effects have been larger in high mortality countries, including Sub-Saharan Africa. Projections based on our estimates strongly support the concern that most countries in that region will miss the Millennium Goals target on child mortality.

Neither Private nor Public: The Effects of Communal Provision of Water on Child Health in Peru

The literature on local services has focused on the effects of privatization and, if anything, has compared the effects of private and mixed public-private systems versus public provision. However, alternative forms of provision such as cooperatives, which can be very prevalent in many developing countries, have been completely ignored. In this paper, we investigate the effects of communal water provison (Comités Vecinales and Juntas Administrativas de Servicios de Saneamiento) on child health in Peru. Using detailed survey data at the household- and child-level for the years 2006-2010, we exploit the cross-section variability to assess the differential impact of this form of provision. Despite controlling for a wide range of household and local characteristics, the municipalities served by communal organizations are more likely to have poorer health indicators, what would result in a downward bias on the absolute magnitude of the effect of cooperatives. We rely on an instrumental variable strategy to deal with this potential endogeneity problem, and use the personnel resources and the administrative urban/rural classi fication of the municipalities as instruments for the provision type. The results show a negative and signi cant effect of comunal water provision on diarrhea among under- five year old children. Keywords: water utilities, cooperatives, child health, regulation, Peru. JEL Classi fication Numbers: L33; L50; L95

Avaluació i intervenció psicoeducativa en les relacions materno/paterno-filials en famílies desestructurades

Anàlisi, avaluació i intervenció psicoeducativa en un programa assistencial i de suport a les relacions materno/paternofilials en famílies desestructurades. Els usuaris són els pares i les mares separats o divorciats (i els seus fills menors) amb conflictes entre ells i on ha estat el jutge qui ha establert el règim de visites. Es dóna suport i orientació als progenitors i als menors que acudeixen al centre per a fer l'intercanvi o l'estada del menor amb el progenitor no custodi, per a facilitar i millorar la relació entre les parts (menors, part custòdia i part no-custòdia).

Opening Education Beyond the Property Relation: From Commons to Communism

Open Education, and specifically the OER movement, seeks to provide universal access to knowledge, undermining the historical enclosure and the increasing privatisation of the public education system. In this paper we examine this aspiration by submitting the implicit theoretical assumptions of Open Education to the test of critical political economy. We acknowledge the Open Education movement's revolutionary potential but outline the inherent limitations of its current focus on the commons (property relations) rather than the social relations of capitalist production (wage work, the company) and because of this, argue that it will only achieve limited, rather than revolutionary, impact.

Relation between temperature and mortality in thirteen Spanish cities

In this study we examined the shape of the association between temperature and mortality in 13 Spanish cities representing a wide range of climatic and socio demographic conditions. The temperature value linked with minimum mortality (MMT) and the slopes before and after the turning point (MMT) were calculated. Most cities showed a V-shaped temperature-mortality relationship. MMTs were generally higher in cities with warmer climates. Cold and heat effects also depended on climate: effects were greater in hotter cities but lesser in cities with higher variability. The effect of heat was greater than the effect of cold. The effect of cold and MMT was, in general, greater for cardio-respiratory mortality than for total mortality, while the effect of heat was, in general, greater among the elderly

Los medios audiovisuales entre los progenitores y los hijos e hijas

En el presente artículo se exponen los resultados de una investigación realizada con una muestra de adolescentes (N = 1211) entre 12 y 16 años y otra de sus progenitores (N = 462) para explorar cómo las diferentes respuestas generacionales ante la presencia de diversos medios audiovisuales en su entorno próximo afectan las interacciones familiares entre progenitores e hijos/as. Los resultados apuntan al hecho que los progenitores tienden a sobredimensionar tanto el interés como las informaciones de que dispone su propio hijo o hija acerca de la mayor parte de los medios audiovisuales explorados, así como la satisfacción que proporcionan las conversaciones con los adultos acerca de cualquier actividad con estos medios. Los progenitores realizan atribuciones diferentes sobre el uso de medios audiovisuales según se refieran a un hijo o a una hija. Se aprecia una importante diferencia entre la satisfacción con las conversaciones que los y las adolescentes mantienen con sus iguales y la que proporcionan las conversaciones con los adultos respecto a cualquiera de sus actividades con los medios