Andrew S. London

Dangerous Dependencies The Intersection of Welfare Reform and Domestic Violence

Using longitudinal, ethnographic data, the authors examine how the pursuit of self-sufficiency in the context of welfare reform may unintentionally encourage some women to develop alternative dangerous dependencies on abusive or potentially abusive men. In this article, the authors document how women ended up relying on men who have been abusive to them either for instrumental assistance or for more direct financial assistance as they struggled to move from welfare to work. The authors also document how some extremely disadvantaged and vulnerable women became enmeshed in even more dangerous dependencies as they hit time limits and fell through public and private safety nets into drug addiction and sex work. The authors frame this discussion of dangerous dependencies with the recognition that dependency relations are necessary and inevitable components of carework. They argue that the discourse of self-sufficiency should acknowledge the fact that careworkers are productive citizens to the same extent as paid laborers and grapple with the question of the means through which they can support that productivity when personal resources are limited and paid labor is temporarily or permanently impossible.

Military Service and Men's Health Trajectories in Later Life

OBJECTIVES This study examines differences in the relationship between veteran status and mens trajectories of health conditions, activities of daily living limitations, and self-rated health. METHODS We use data on 12,631 men drawn from the 1992-2006 waves of the Health and Retirement Study to estimate growth curve models that examine differences in health trajectories between nonveterans and veterans, veterans with and without wartime service, and war service veterans who served during World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and multiple wars. RESULTS The results indicate that veterans have better health at the mean age of 66.2 years, but experience greater age-related changes in health than nonveterans. Similarly, men who served during wartime have better health at the mean age, but more age-related changes in health than men who did not serve during wartime. Among war veterans, Vietnam veterans are in poorer health at the mean age, but they experience less substantial age-related health changes than men who served during previous wars. DISCUSSION Although veterans experience better health relative to nonveterans around retirement age, they have poorer health than nonveterans among the oldest old. These findings inform our understanding of the veteran-nonveteran health-mortality paradox found in previous research and suggest a health crossover among veterans and nonveterans in later life.

Race, Incarceration, and Health A Life-Course Approach

Significant racial disparities in health outcomes have been consistently documented in the United States. Life-course and population-health models are often used to explain these disparities, but they generally do not take incarceration effects into account. Incarceration may have direct effects on health, but it is more likely to indirectly affect health by shaping employment, income, and marital trajectories. The authors contend that the failure of health researchers to take incarceration effects into account is problematic given the large increase in the incarceration of Black men over the past few decades. Moreover, because large numbers of incarcerated Black men are not present in research samples, racial disparities in health outcomes may be underestimated. Incarceration effects should be included in life-course and population-health models, study designs, and policy development processes.

Maternal employment and the health of low-income young children

This study examines whether maternal employment affects the health status of low-income, elementary-school-aged children using instrumental variables estimation and experimental data from a welfare-to-work program implemented in the early 1990s. Maternal report of child health status is predicted as a function of exogenous variation in maternal employment associated with random assignment to the experimental group. IV estimates show a modest adverse effect of maternal employment on childrens health. Making use of data from another welfare-to-work program we propose that any adverse effect on child health may be tempered by increased family income and access to public health insurance coverage, findings with direct relevance to a number of current policy discussions. In a secondary analysis using fixed effects techniques on longitudinal survey data collected in 1998 and 2001, we find a comparable adverse effect of maternal employment on child health that supports the external validity of our primary result.

Military Service and (Dis)Continuity in the Life Course Evidence on Disadvantage and Mortality From the Health and Retirement Study and the Study of Assets and Health Dynamics Among the Oldest-Old

This study uses a life-course framework and data from the Health and Retirement Study and the Study of Assets and Health Dynamics Among the Oldest-Old to examine three hypotheses related to (dis)continuity in the effects of early-life disadvantage (African American race and low paternal education) and military service on later-life mortality. Specifically, the authors consider whether military service (and age at enlistment) mediates or moderates the effects of early-life disadvantage on later-life mortality and whether mid- to late-life marital status, socioeconomic status, health status, and health behaviors mediate the effects of military service on mortality. The authors find very little evidence to support the notion that any mortality benefits accrue to men as a consequence of military service overall or enlistment at any particular age. Most of the evidence is consistent with life-course disruption and continuity of disadvantage interpretations.

Personal Names and Cultural Change: A Study of the Naming Patterns of Italians and Jews in the United States in 1910

Although individual and personal, names take on their significance in social interaction. Since the context of social interaction changes with immigration, names can be expected to change as well. In this paper, we use information from the Public Use Sample of the 1910 U.S. census to compare the patterns of personal (given) names of first- and second-generation Italian and Jewish immigrants and native-born whites of native parentage, and to examine the association of naming patterns of immigrants with several measures indicating interaction with those outside the ethnic group. Because the information from the census is at a single point in time, we also draw on interviews with elderly Italian and Jewish women in order to provide more direct evidence of change and of the contexts in which this change occurred.

Maternal Work Hours and Adolescents’ School Outcomes Among Low-Income Families in Four Urban Counties

We examine how changes in maternal work hours affect adolescent children’s school participation and performance outcomes using data from interviews in 1998 and 2001 with approximately 1,700 women who, in May 1995, were welfare-reliant, single mothers of adolescents living in neighborhoods of concentrated poverty in Cuyahoga (Cleveland), Los Angeles, Miami-Dade, and Philadelphia counties. Analyses control for a broad array of mothers’ characteristics, including their psychological and physical health, experiences with domestic violence and substance abuse, as well as unobserved time-invariant characteristics. In fixed-effects models, we find unfavorable effects of increased maternal work hours on three of six outcomes: skipping school, performing above average, and parental contact about behavior problems. Adolescent-aged sons seem to be particularly sensitive to changes in mothers’ hours of work.

Service Utilization Among Older Adults With HIV: The Joint Association of Sexual Identity and Gender

This study examines the association of sexual identity and gender among older clients with HIV at an AIDS service organization using the Andersen Model. Data confirm those aging with HIV exhibit high rates of age-associated illnesses 10 to 20 years before expected. They have fragile social networks that cannot supply the informal supports needed. This aging population will need to increasingly access community-based services. Sexual identity and gender were weak covariates of service utilization. Although heterosexual men used more services, utilization was largely predicted by service needs and the use of case management. Implications for service delivery and policy are discussed.

Aging Veterans: Needs and Provisions

Current knowledge about aging is primarily based on cohorts that were born during the early part of the twentieth century. A substantial percentage of men in these cohorts, and subsequent cohorts who are currently middle aged, served in the military during war, peace, Cold War, or some combination thereof. Consequently, veterans are a sizeable demographic group in the United States. In 2000, over 26 million Americans were veterans, representing approximately 12.7% of those aged 18 years or older (U.S. Census Bureau 2003). Military service is particularly prevalent among older cohorts who served in World War II (WWII) and the Korean War (Hogan 1981); almost 9.2 million men age 65 years and older were veterans in 2000, which represents 64% of men in this age group (Interagency Forum on Aging-Related Statistics 2008). In addition, participation in the military has increased substantially among women; in 2000, nearly 1.6 million American women were veterans (U.S. Census Bureau 2003).

Work-related disability, veteran status, and poverty: Implications for family well-being

The authors examine the interrelationships between work-related disability, veteran, and poverty statuses using data from the 1992–2004 panels of the Survey of Income and Program Participation. They find that households with nondisabled veterans present have a lower likelihood of poverty, but that advantage is severely eroded when the veteran or another family member has a work-limiting disability. Nevertheless, all veteran households have substantially lower odds of poverty than disabled nonveteran households, which have the highest poverty rate (32.53%). Veteran and disability statuses interact at the household level in ways that contribute to substantial variability in household-level poverty, which has implications for all household members.