Parenthood and pay in Australia and the UK: evidence from workplace surveys

This article addresses the effect of parenthood on pay, examining potential reasons for-differences between Australia and the UK that are evident in spite of their similarly minimalist. male, breadwinner style approaches to work/family issues, Although cross-national differences reflect complex intersections of policy combinations, institutional frameworks, patterns of employment and gender contracts that cannot be assessed in a single analysis, the data used in this analysis uncover some of the factors that contribute to different outcomes. Motherhood penalties in the UK appear to be associated primarily with the comparatively low level of part-time earnings in that country, while higher premiums to fatherhood at least in part reflect a wider overall wage distribution. These findings reinforce the heed to interpret earnings effects of parenthood within the context of national patterns of employment and wage distribution; and highlight the breadth of strategies needed to deliver more equitable outcomes.

Public Intellectuals, Book Culture and Civil Society

Introduction: the rise and rise of the public intellectual My starting point is the remarkable rise to prominence of public intellectuals – and talk about public intellectuals – over the last decade in Australia. Since 1997, especially, this has occurred around Indigenous questions with the result that issues such as the stolen generations, genocide, the apology and reconciliation have also gained new prominence. This is undeniably a good thing. New ways of thinking about history and the nation and new kinds of public ethical discourse have been put into circulation. History as battleground is preferable to the great Australian silence. And yet – my starting point is also the ambivalent effects and meanings of these recent developments, not least the way that the debates have centred so much around the figure of the 'public intellectual', the way that certain kinds of intellectuals and intellectual discourse have come to dominate the mainstream representation of the issues.

Public policy and the prevention of substance-use disorders

Drug prevention has traditionally focused on influencing individual attitudes and behaviours. In particular, efforts have been directed towards adolescents in the school setting. However, evaluations of school-based drug education have identified limited success. There is increasing recognition that drug abuse is one of a number of risk behaviours, including truancy, delinquency and mental health problems, which share common antecedents that begin in the early years of childhood. Furthermore, these behaviours are shaped by macroenvironmental influences including the economic, social, cultural, and physical environment. Drug prevention needs to adopt a broader perspective: with greater collaboration in related programmes such as crime prevention and suicide prevention; with greater attention to the macroenvironmental influences on problem behaviours; and with greater attention to healthy development in the first years of childhood. (C) 2002 Lippincott Williams Wilkins.