A story appeared in the national newspaper USA TODAY on June 7, 2006, regarding the vital, but illegal, immigrant workers who labored on post-Hurricane Katrina reconstruction in New Orleans. A study conducted by professors at Tulane University and the University of California at Berkeley found that the workers were distinctly vulnerable to exploitation due to their illegal status. Despite the fact that under federal labor law illegal workers are to be afforded the same protections as their legal counterparts, these illegal workers often worked in unsafe conditions without the benefit of safety gear and typically earned much less – $6.50 less on average—than documented workers performing the same duties. Immigrant workers can, however, sue their employers regardless of their legal status. Do you agree that illegal immigrant workers should receive the same protections under the federal Occupational Safety and Health Act as American workers and legal immigrants? If OSHA inspects a site for safety violations and the inspector suspects that illegal workers are employed at the site, should s/he be required to report this suspicion to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency? What if the OSHA inspection was prompted by a call or complaint from one of the illegal workers? Does this change your answer?

b) Braun and Clarke (2006) summarise thematic analysis according to six phases. The first of these phases (i.e., Phase 1) is titled ‘familiarizing yourself with your data’. Reflecting on this phase: summarise the key activities a researcher would perform during this phase; and identify any challenge(s) associated with performing these activities.

c) It is important for qualitative researchers to provide evidence of the trustworthiness of their study. Briefly describe three techniques that could be used by a researcher to increase the trustworthiness of their data and conclusions

The average expenditure on Valentine's Day was expected to be 100.89 (USA Today, February 13, 2006). Do male and female consumers differ in the amounts they spend? The average expenditure in a sample survey of 60 male consumers was 130.6, and the average expenditure in a sample survey of 35 female consumers was 63.24 . Based on past surveys, the standard deviation for male consumers is assumed to be 30 , and the standard deviation for female consumers is assumed to be 14 . The z   value is 2.576.
a. At 99% confidence, what is the margin of error?

b. Develop a 99% confidence interval for the difference between the two population means.

In 2006, two Chinese journalists reported that the working conditions at Hongfujin Precision Industries, which is owned by Taiwanese conglomerate Foxconn, where Apple’s iPODs are produced were substandard. According to the report, not only were workers at the plant poorly paid, but they were also forced to work overtime. Apple immediately responded to the allegations and audited the factory in question. However, managers at the factory filed a defamation lawsuit against the two journalists. Despite the fact that Apple’s audit did indeed show substandard working conditions at the factory, Hongfujin did not withdraw the lawsuit. Eventually the Reporters Without Borders group took up the case for the two reporters and the lawsuit was dropped.

1. Should Apple be responsible for ensuring that its suppliers are safeguarding the basic rights and dignity of their employees? How can Apple be sure that its suppliers do not employ sweatshop labor?

2. Do multinational corporations have a moral obligation to behave in a socially responsible manner although it has adverse effects on profits?

When you answer these questions, also consider exploring Apple’s recent troubles with allegations of sweatshop conditions in supplier factories that have prompted worker suicide.

Go to https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jun/18/foxconn-life-death-forbidden-city-longhua-suicide-apple-iphone-brian-merchant-one-device-extract

In a landmark paper published in 2006, Shinya Yamanaka discovered a minimal number of transcription factors that could transform somatic cells into pluripotent stem cells (iPSC). The discovery of the “Yamanaka factors” was a major break-through in stem cell biology and has revolutionized regenerative medicine. What was the major observation from previous studies that lead Yamanaka (and others) to believe that it would be possible for a somatic cell to be re-programmed back into a pluripotent stem cell?

Read the July 9, 2006 the Freakonomics column in the New York Times Magazine uploaded in the docs and stuff section of this site. The authors examine a simple supply-and-demand gap with tragic implications: the shortage of human organs for transplantation. In the space of just a few decades, transplant surgery has become remarkably safe and reliable. But this success has bred huge demand: as more patients get new organs, more patients want them. So, while the number of kidney transplants has risen by 45% in the past 10 years, the number of people on a kidney waiting list has risen by 119%. Consequently, some 3,500 people die each year while waiting for a kidney transplant. A big problem is that would-be suppliers of kidneys, whether living or dead, are not given very strong incentives to step forward.

1. Summarize the main arguments about providing incentives for the supply side of this volunteer market.

2. Evaluate the argument carefully. What do you think? Why?

July 9, 2006
Freakonomics
Flesh Trade
By STEPHEN J. DUBNER and STEVEN D. LEVITT
Weighing the Repugnance Factor

How's this for a repugnant situation? Take someone you love, perhaps your spouse or your sibling, and find a stranger who will accept a really big bet that your loved one will die prematurely — and if indeed that happens, you pocket a few million dollars.

This, of course, is how life insurance works. And most Americans don't find this idea repugnant at all. They used to, however. Until the mid-19th century, life insurance was considered "a profanation," as the sociologist Viviana Zelizer has written, "which transformed the sacred event of death into a vulgar commodity."

Alvin Roth, a Harvard economist who studies the design of markets, has done a lot of thinking about repugnance. On some issues, he notes, repugnance will recede, as with life insurance — or, even more momentously, the practice of charging interest on loans. In other cases, the reverse happens: a once-accepted behavior like slaveholding comes to be seen as repugnant.

One case of repugnance is far from settled: the dispute over how human organs for transplantation should be allocated — and, perhaps, even sold. If you happen to have a failing heart or liver or kidneys, you will almost certainly die without a transplant, but if you aren't lucky enough to get an organ through an official registry, you can't legally purchase one at any price. So instead of a free market in organs, we have a volunteer market. Some people agree to give up their usable organs once they die. In the case of a living donor, someone sacrifices a kidney or a portion of a liver to a recipient, most likely a family member.
In the space of just a few decades, transplant surgery has become safe and reliable (to say nothing of miraculous). But success breeds demand: as more patients get new organs, more patients want them. In 2005, more than 16,000 kidney transplants were performed in the U.S., an increase of 45 percent over 10 years. But during that time, the number of people on a kidney waiting list rose by 119 percent. More than 3,500 people now die each year waiting for a kidney transplant.

To an economist, this is a basic supply-and-demand gap with tragic consequences. So what can be done to increase the supply of organs?

A big problem is that would-be suppliers are not given very strong incentives to step forward. In much of Europe, the choice is made for them: instead of "opting in" to donate, the default assumption is that your usable organs will be harvested upon your death unless your family "opts out." But Europe, too, still has a sizable organ shortage, in part because traffic fatalities — which tend to produce desirable organs for harvest — are on a downward trend in Western countries.
If it's hard to get people to give up their organs upon death, consider how much harder it is to persuade a living person to donate a kidney. (From a medical perspective, a kidney from a living donor is far more valuable than a cadaver kidney.) Even though most people can live safely on one kidney, there is still a price to be paid in discomfort, risk, fear and lost wages. But the United States, like pretty much every other country in the world, forbids a donor to collect on that price, or any other.

It is hard to find an economist who agrees with this policy. Gary Becker and Julio Jorge Elias argued in a recent paper that "monetary incentives would increase the supply of organs for transplant sufficiently to eliminate the very large queues in organ markets, and the suffering and deaths of many of those waiting, without increasing the total cost of transplant surgery by more than 12 percent."

Some noneconomists may well find this reasoning repugnant. There are many reasons, after all, for banning the sale of organs. Some people consider it immoral to commodify body parts (although it is now commonplace to not only sell sperm and eggs but also to rent a womb). Others fear that most organ sellers would be poor while most buyers would be rich; or that someone might be pressured into selling a kidney without fully understanding the risks.

But why, Becker and Elias ask, should poor people "be deprived of revenue that could be highly useful to them"? Even more compelling is the fact that a poor person is just as likely as a wealthy person (if not more so) to need a new kidney — and, with no legal market for organs, is just as likely to die while waiting on a list.

Alvin Roth, even though he is an economist, is smart enough to realize that repugnance will keep Americans from embracing a true market for organs anytime soon. So, along with several other scholars and medical personnel, he has helped design a clever alternative, the New England Program for Kidney Exchange. Imagine that you have a wife who is dying of renal failure, and that you would give her one of your kidneys, but you are not a biological match. Now imagine that another couple is in the same bind. The kidney exchange locates and matches the couples: you donate your kidney to the stranger's wife, while the stranger gives his kidney to your wife; the operations are performed simultaneously to make sure no one backs out. Although this system has yielded only a couple dozen transplants so far, it illustrates an economist's understanding of incentives: if you can't get someone to give an organ out of altruism, and you can't pay him either, what do you do? Find two parties who are desperate to align their incentives.

Otherwise, who in his right mind would step forward to donate a kidney to a stranger? In fact, we recently spoke to one such potential donor who asked to remain anonymous. Donor is married, with four children and a precarious financial situation. Because Donor had a sibling who nearly needed an organ transplant, the idea got into Donor's head to perhaps sell a kidney to a stranger. Through a donor Web site, Donor met a potential recipient, whom we'll call Recipient. It wasn't until the process was well under way that Donor learned it was illegal to be paid. In the end, however, Donor's moral mission overrode the financial need, and Donor decided to go ahead with the transplant.
Donor has undergone extensive testing at the hospital where Recipient will have the transplant. Both Donor and Recipient have had to lie repeatedly to the doctors, pretending they are old friends. "If they find out you met on the Internet," Donor explains, "they assume it's for money, and they'll call off the operation."

If all goes well, the transplant may happen soon. Consider the parties who stand to profit from this transaction: Recipient, certainly, as well as the transplant surgeons, the nurses, the hospital, the drug companies. Everyone will be paid in some form — except for Donor, who not only isn't being paid but, in return for carrying out a deeply altruistic act, also has to pay the additional price of lying about it.

Surely there are some people, and not just economists, who would find this situation — well, repugnant.

Starting in 2006, Chuck and Luane have been purchasing Series EE bonds in their name to use for the higher education of their daughter Susie, who currently is age 18. During the year, they cash in $12,000 of the bonds to use for freshman year tuition, fees, and room and board. Of this amount, $5,000 represents interest. Of the $12,000, $8,000 is used for tuition and fees, and $4,000 is used for room and board. Chuck and Luane's AGI, before the educational savings bond exclusion, is $120,000. Review § 135, and answer the following questions.

a)Determine the tax consequences for Chuck and Luane, who will file a joint return, and for Susie.

b) Assume that Chuck and Luane purchased the bonds in Susie's name. Determine the tax consequences for Chuck and Luane and for Susie.

c) How would your answer to part(a) change if Chuck and Luane filed separate returns?

An article in the Journal of Family Psychology (March 2006) by research psychologist Scott Stanley, titled "Premarital Education, Marital Quality, and Marital Stability " presents evidence that pre-marital counseling helps to make marriages healthy and strong. Assuming the current divorce rate is 42%, this study suggests that for couples who participated in pre-marital counseling, the divorce rate is less. The study is based on n=3,000 couples and it found that 828 ended in divorce. Answer the following questions.

a. Calculate a two-sided 99% confidence interval for the true divorce rate (proportion) of couples who receive pre-marital counseling. Interpret your interval.

b. Perform a test to determine if the true proportion of couples divorcing who receive pre-marital counseling is less than the current divorce rate of 42%. Use alpha = 0.05 State the hypotheses (Ho, Ha), z*, p-value and conclusion.

c. Check the assumptions of the proportion test, do they pass?

1. Could you conclude that pre-martial counseling ‘statistically’ lowers the divorce rate? Please answer Yes or No and support your answer.
2. Someone suggested that pre-marital counseling reduces the risk of divorce by 50% (cuts the rate in half from 42% to 21%. Based on your interval in (1.), could that claim be reasonably made?
3. What are your views of pre-marital counseling? Does this study support or change your views on pre-marital counseling? Why or why not? (There is no wrong answer here)

The average expenditure on Valentine's Day was expected to be $100.89 (USA Today, February 13, 2006). Do male and female consumers differ in the amounts they spend? The average expenditure in a sample survey of 46 male consumers was$134.51 , and the average expenditure in a sample survey of 31 female consumers was $63.18. Based on past surveys, the standard deviation for male consumers is assumed to be$32 , and the standard deviation for female consumers is assumed to be $18 . The z value is 2.576 . Round your answers to decimal places.

a. What is the point estimate of the difference between the population mean expenditure for males and the population mean expenditure for females?

b. At 99% confidence, what is the margin of error?

c. Develop a 99% confidence interval for the difference between the two population means.