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The Downstream Consequences of Race-Related Managerial Job Insecurity: Insights From College Basketball Coaching Social Currents Pub Date : 2024-03-04 Scott V. Savage, Ryan Seebruck, Sloan Rucker
We examine how in men’s college basketball coaching, race-related managerial job insecurity trickles down to negatively affect the careers of the subordinates who work for them. Using panel data from a randomly selected group of assistant basketball coaches working under the most prestigious and endowed governing body of collegiate sports in the United States—the National Collegiate Athletic Association
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Ruled by the Demons? Exploring the Relationship Between Belief in Demons and Public Attitudes Toward Donald Trump and Joe Biden Social Currents Pub Date : 2024-01-24 Fanhao Nie
Beliefs in supernatural evils are prevalent among many religions. Prior research has shown that beliefs in supernatural evils were tied to various social and health outcomes. However, much less is known about the political implications of beliefs in supernatural evils. To fill this research void, a national survey of 1,092 adults with oversamples of respondents of Asian or Hispanic heritage was conducted
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Revisiting Health Disparities Linked to “Some College”: Incorporating Gender and High School Experiences Social Currents Pub Date : 2023-05-15 Matthew A. Andersson, Renae Wilkinson, Vida Maralani
In the United States, “some college” is attained more frequently than a 4-year college degree. However, attainments below 4-year college vary considerably in terms of credentials and years of highe...
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Gender Egalitarianism and Attitudes Toward Parental Leave Social Currents Pub Date : 2023-05-13 Gayle Kaufman, Richard J. Petts, Trenton D. Mize, Taryn Wield
This paper examines the relationship between gender ideology and attitudes toward parental leave. We use data from two original survey experiments with a total analytic sample of 3332 respondents. ...
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Racialized Emotions When Thinking about Slavery: Associations Between Group Identification and Feelings of Threat, Shame, and Guilt Among White Americans Social Currents Pub Date : 2023-04-26 Ashley V. Reichelmann
This paper highlights the relationship between group identification and racialized emotions among white Americans when asked to think about slavery on U.S. soil. Previous scholarship focuses on the...
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Social Spending, Poverty, and Immigration: A Systematic Analysis of Welfare State Effectiveness and Nativity in 24 Upper- and Middle-Income Democracies Social Currents Pub Date : 2023-04-21 Amie Bostic, Allen Hyde
Previous research has highlighted the disadvantaged position immigrants often face in the economy, particularly when it comes to labor market outcomes such as employment or earnings. Extending this...
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How Media, Information Sources, and Trust Shape Climate Change Denial or Doubt Social Currents Pub Date : 2023-04-14 Dilshani Sarathchandra, Kristin Haltinner
Climate change skepticism presents an opportunity to examine the role of media, information, and trust on views about controversial scientific topics. Building on extant work on predictors of skept...
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Women Walking the Corporate Tightrope: Depictions of Men and Women’s Work Relationships in Success-at-Work Books Social Currents Pub Date : 2023-03-15 Gretchen R. Webber, Patti Giuffre
Women’s empowerment and “success at work” self-help workshops, webinars, and advice books proliferate in our neoliberal economy. These initiatives purport to help women navigate workplaces and over...
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What Color is a Golden Boy? The Glorification and Disparagement of Male Superstar Athletes in Sports Illustrated Social Currents Pub Date : 2023-03-03 Joshua Woods, Matthew Hartwell
This study examined media representations of male superstar athletes over more than three decades. Some journalists portrayed their subjects as smart, physically attractive young men at the top of ...
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“I Went There”: How Parent Experience Shapes School Decisions Social Currents Pub Date : 2023-03-01 Anna Rhodes, Julia Szabo, Siri Warkentien
As school choice expands, families face an increasingly arduous decision-making process around school enrollment. Through interviews with a socioeconomically and ethno-racially diverse sample of 60...
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Understanding Social Disorganization and the Nonprofit Infrastructure; An Ecological Study of Child Maltreatment Rates Social Currents Pub Date : 2023-02-27 Duncan J. Mayer
Advocates and researchers have emphasized the role of disorder in neighborhood processes, with serious consequences for families, however, neighborhood structures may also support families and redu...
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Under Pressure: Social Capital and Trust in Government After Natural Disasters Social Currents Pub Date : 2023-01-20 A. Alexander Priest
In response to the increasing threats posed by natural hazards, both disaster managers and researchers have recognized social networks and trust between communities and government as fundamental bu...
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“You Are Responsible for Your Own Safety”: An Intersectional Analysis of Mask-Wearing During the COVID-19 Pandemic Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-12-14 Vasundhara Kaul, Zachary D. Palmer
The response to the COVID-19 pandemic in the US has been heavily criticized for its reliance on people’s voluntary uptake of health protective behaviors like mask-wearing. Such voluntary approaches...
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Voices in and Uses of Internal Conversations Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-12-08 David Schweingruber, David W. Wahl, Steven Beeman, Deborah Burns, George Weston, Rebecca Haroldson
Although sociologists have a long history of making claims about people’s internal conversations, these claims are based on little or no evidence. We present results from the first sociological ana...
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Opting out of Marriage? Factors Predicting Non-Marriage by Midlife across Race, Ethnicity, and Gender Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-11-30 Xing Zhang, Sharon Sassler
Over the last few decades, a growing proportion of Americans have never married. Factors contributing to adolescent expectations for marriage and the likelihood of non-marriage by midlife, however,...
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Intersectional Wealth Gaps: Contemporary and Historical Trends in Wealth Stratification among Single Households by Race and Gender Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-11-28 Lauren Valentino, Nicole Yadon
Wealth disparities represent one of the starkest measures of contemporary inequality in the US. While many studies have examined stratification in wealth between ethnoracial groups, and to a lesser...
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The Role of Place: An Analysis of Climate Change Perception in the European Union Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-11-26 Pilar Morales-Giner, Tahir Enes Gedik
A clear consideration for designing strong climate policy is to account for the perception of the seriousness of climate change among citizens. In order to understand climate change perceptions in ...
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Resettlement Divorce: The Hidden Costs of Family Separation During Refugee Resettlement Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-11-19 Kamryn Warren
Refugee resettlement is a solution to provide safety and security to individuals left vulnerable from displacement. However, some refugees who intermarry with non-refugees are barred from resettlin...
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Islamophobic Discourse of European Right-Wing Parties: A Narrative Policy Analysis Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-11-19 Lacin Idil Oztig, Turkan Ayda Ersan
In Europe, in tandem with growing social anxiety regarding the so-called threat of Islamization, right-wing, populist parties have increasingly positioned themselves against Muslims and Islam to th...
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Do Fetal Development Markers Influence Attitudes toward Abortion Legality? Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-11-10 Xiana Bueno, Kathryn J. LaRoche, Brandon L. Crawford, Ronna C. Turner, Wen-Juo Lo, Kristen N. Jozkowski
In the United States, legislation intended to limit abortion access based on fetal development markers (e.g., heartbeat, fetal pain) has become increasingly common. We found that people’s support f...
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Poisoning the Well: How Astroturfing Harms Trust in Advocacy Organizations Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-10-22 Edward T. Walker, Andrew N. Le
Sociological research on social movements and politics holds that advocacy organizations are typically trusted to be authentic agents of their constituents. At the same time, however, businesses an...
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Barriers to Access: The Unencumbered Client in Private Food Assistance Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-10-01 Alana Haynes Stein
The private food assistance network has expanded amidst a receding welfare state, signaling the privatization of food assistance and other social services. Simultaneously, the cultural association ...
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Rebuilding Without Papers: Disaster Migration and the Local Reception of Immigrants After Hurricane Katrina Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-09-20 Hana E. Brown, Zhongze Wei, Michelle Lazaran, Christopher Cates, Jennifer A. Jones
After Hurricane Katrina decimated the Gulf Coast in 2005, thousands of Latinx immigrants arrived in the region to work in reconstruction, one case of the growing and global phenomenon of disaster m...
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College Students and “Interracial” Relationships: How Our Measures Matter Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-08-07 Kathryn Harker Tillman, Ladanya Ramirez Surmeier, Byron Miller
We use data from a random sample of students collected at two large public universities, one in the Midwestern region and one in the Southeastern region of the U.S., to document the prevalence of s...
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Organizational Bias in Gender-Based Violence Research Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-06-28 Benjamin R. Weiss, Mahala Shulman
Relatively few victims of gender-based violence (GBV) seek help from nonprofit organizations, healthcare providers, or law enforcement agencies, choosing instead to disclose to friends and family o...
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Sharing Places: Local Socio-Economic Organization and Inequality in Contemporary Short-Term Rental Markets Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-06-20 Yotala Oszkay
Research on markets distinguishes niche markets, characterized by local community engagement and specialization, from mass markets, characterized by arms-length exchange and large-scale production....
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“We Must Work… Toward Justice in Action”: Grievances, Claims Making, and Spillover in the Idle No More Movement Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-06-20 Julie Schweitzer, Tamara L. Mix, Olivia M. Fleming
The Idle No More (INM) movement emerged in reaction to Bill C-45, the Canadian Jobs and Growth Act, in November 2012, inspiring a new wave of activism. Central to the movement’s grievances are Indi...
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Labor Immobility, Stability Discourse, and lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Queer Young Adults’ Career Plans in Japan Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-06-07 Koji Ueno
Recent US studies showed that many lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer (LGBQ) young adults develop hopeful views about their occupational careers by emphasizing future workplaces’ friendly climates a...
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The Business Ownership Patterns of Undocumented Immigrants in the United States: An Exploratory Study Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-06-06 Mahesh Somashekhar
When debating the effect of undocumented immigrants on the economy, scholars often presume that undocumented immigrants are wage laborers rather than business owners. This study imputes the legal s...
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Rules of Engagement: Flexplace and Ideal Workers Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-05-28 Krista M. Brumley, Megan Edgar St George
Employees increasingly claim they do not have enough time to manage the demands of both work and family/life. Workplace flexibility policies have been offered as a key solution to managing these co...
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State Union Density Effects on Workers’ Support for Reducing Income Inequality, 1973-2016 Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-05-26 Shawn Perron
Research often borrows on common yet somewhat unsubstantiated beliefs that unions influence inequality attitudes among unionized and nonunionized workers. This paper draws on inequality attitude da...
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From Invisible to Structural Power to Address Immigrant Farmworkers’ Challenges Through New Assemblages in the U.S. Dairy Industry Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-05-25 Diego Thompson
Latinx immigrant workers on U.S. dairy farms experience multiple challenges. During recent decades, a myriad of stakeholders from the civil society and the food system have worked together to addre...
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Creating Our Gendered Selves—College Experiences, Work and Family Plans, Gender Ideologies, and Desired Work Amenities Among STEM Graduates Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-05-24 Rui Jie Peng, Jennifer Glass, Sharon Sassler
Studies often cite climate issues in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) employment to explain the lack of diversity by gender and race. Yet, little research directly attends to gender and racial differences in the college experiences, expected family roles, and ideological beliefs about gender that create the racialized “gendered selves” graduates bring to STEM occupations. We
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Framing the Black Lives Matter Movement: An Analysis of Shifting News Coverage in 2014 and 2020 Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-05-24 Nikita Carney, Jasmine Kelekay
The police killings of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd sparked a resurgence of Black Lives Matter protests throughout the summer of 2020, reminiscent of the wave of Black Lives Matter protests that occurred after several police killings in 2014 including the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner. Based on qualitative analysis of mainstream media coverage of the protests, this paper examines key themes
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Paying for Work-Family Balance: Assessing the Role of Family-Friendly Job Amenities in Occupational Segregation Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-05-21 Miriam Barcus
Workers in female-dominated occupations earn less, on average, than workers in comparable male-dominated occupations. To explain the gendered occupational wage disparity, com pensating differentials theory focuses on women’s preferences and asserts that women cluster in occupations that pay less in exchange for family-friendly job amenities. On the other hand, the devaluation perspective argues these
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Viral Racism via Videos: A Study of Asians’ Experiences of Interpersonal Discrimination Because of COVID-19 Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-05-22 Tony N. Brown, Chase L. Lesane-Brown, Rachell Davis, Michael A. Carroll
This study analyzes five publicly posted videos wherein Asians experience interpersonal discrimination because of COVID-19. We think social scientists ignore how videos provide data for investigating interpersonal discrimination. We characterize the videos according to multiple features including context, characteristics, and responses of individuals involved, type of threat or mistreatment, and level
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Relationship Status-Based Health Disparities during the COVID-19 Pandemic Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-05-13 Mieke Beth Thomeer
Previous research finds that marriage is a privileged family form with health benefits. These health advantages may have shifted during the pandemic, as more time was spent at home and resources strained. This study compares differences in three health outcomes across relationship statuses between April and December 2020 using a nationally-representative US survey, the Household Pulse Survey (N = 1
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A Slow Downward Road: Occupational Status Attainment in Mexico’s Development Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-05-02 Harold J. Toro
Mexico underwent several economic transformations between the 1950s and the early 21st century, most notably its integration to the world economy as of the 1980s. Sociological perspectives on global economic integration, development, and inequality, have contrasting predictions for the effect of these transformations on labor cohort occupational status. Perspectives that anticipate integration to spawn
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When Kids Hitting Each Other Is Okay: Examining U.S. Adult Support for Youth Tackle Football Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-03-26 Mariah K. Warner, Chris Knoester
Football plays a prominent role in American culture. Yet, youth tackle football has become particularly controversial because of the mixture of benefits and health risks that it offers. Using National Sports and Society Survey (N = 3993) data, this study analyzes public opinion about the appropriateness of children playing tackle football. In the process, we examine how adults’ social structural locations
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Culture’s Gendered Consequences: The Relationship Between Local Cultural Conditions and the Gender Wage Gap Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-03-06 William J. Scarborough, Jessica Moeder
Local economic conditions have been found to be highly influential in shaping patterns of gender inequality across the United States. Less attention, however, has been directed toward exploring the role of cultural characteristics, such as gender norms toward women’s leadership and family divisions of labor. Using data from the American Community Survey and the General Social Survey, we examine the
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Long-Term Correlates of Racially Diverse Schooling: Education, Wealth, and Social Engagement in Later Life Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-03-02 John R. Reynolds, Dawn C. Carr
Racially diverse educational settings yield various benefits according to past research. However, researchers have not fully considered how longlasting the benefits are and whether they exist for adults who attended school prior to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. We analyze a national sample of older adults born between 1931 and 1953 to test for an association between attending a race discordant school
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Varieties of Gendered Capitalism: Status Beliefs and the Gender Gap in Entrepreneurship Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-03-01 Daniel Auguste
Gender status research demonstrates that the power of gender status beliefs in shaping gender inequalities is rooted in the fact that these beliefs are institutionalized and operate at the societal level to shape social relations of inequality at the individual level. However, recent empirical analyses linking gender status beliefs to gender inequality in entrepreneurship have only examined the effect
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Unfair Treatment by the Police and Race: Is Religiosity a Protective Resource for Well-Being Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-02-14 Laura Upenieks, Colton L. Daniels
A growing body of work documents the relationship between criminal justice and health has emerged in recent years, including the association between unfair treatment by the police (UTBP) and violent/racialized policing and health outcomes. However, little is known about the resources that could reduce the harmful consequences to well-being of UTBP. Using data from the Nashville Stress and Health Study
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Introduction from the New Editors Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-02-07
We are excited to assume the role of Editors of Social Currents. While Social Currents is a young journal, it has established itself as a premier generalist journal. This feat is due, in part, to the excellent stewardship of its inaugural Editors, Toni Calasanti and Vinnie Roscigno, and the most recent Editors, Martha Crowley and George Wilson. We are thankful to the previous Editors for their support
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Aging Bodies in Paradise: A Feminist Analysis of Key West’s Fantasy Fest Social Currents Pub Date : 2022-01-04 Rachel Douglas, Anne E. Barrett
Cultural constructions of gender and age may be challenged within politically and socially progressive leisure environments, like Key West, that promote social deviance and out-group acceptance. However, this possibility receives limited scholarly attention. Addressing this gap, our study applies a framework that highlights gender and age as performances and uses interviews (n = 77) collected in 2017
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“I Live Here”: How Residents of Color Experience Racialized Surveillance and Diversity Ideology in a Liberal Predominantly White Neighborhood Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-12-05 Maria R. Lowe, Madeline Carrola, Dakota Cortez, Mary Jalufka
In many liberal predominantly white neighborhoods, white residents view their communities as inclusive yet they also engage in racialized surveillance to monitor individuals they perceive as outsiders. Some of these efforts center on people of color in neighborhood open spaces. We use a diversity ideology framework to analyze this contradiction, paying particular attention to how residents of color
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The Intersecting Consequences of Race-Gender Health Disparities on Workforce Engagement for Older Workers: An Examination of Physical and Mental Health Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-12-05 Kendra Jason, Christy L. Erving
The dramatic growth of older adults’ labor participation over the past 25 years, including women and people of color, is reshaping the American labor force. The current study contributes new knowledge concerning why individuals over age 50 years may be working longer despite negative impacts of deteriorating physical and mental health associated with aging. Inquiries regarding who continues to work
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Does State Allocation of University Funding Moderate Effectively Maintained Inequality? Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-12-02 Christian Michael Smith
According to the theory of Effectively Maintained Inequality (EMI), economically advantaged individuals not only enter each level of education at higher rates than do their less advantaged peers, but also enjoy qualitative advantages at each level that position them more favorably to continue to the next level. Governments may play a role in facilitating or limiting EMI because they allocate appropriations
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Race, Criminal Records, and Discrimination Against Job Seekers: Examining Attitudinal Mechanisms Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-11-03 Megan Denver, Justin T. Pickett
Regardless of why it happens, racial discrimination is damaging and unacceptable. Efforts to reduce discrimination, however, are most successful when we understand the mechanisms that give rise to it. Building on the observation that employers are members of the public, we examine two attitudinal mechanisms that may foster discriminatory employment practices in the context of criminal background checks:
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Clear and Omnipresent Danger: Digital Age Culture Wars and Reactions to Drag Queen Story Hour across Diverse Subreddit Communities Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-10-20 Alyssa J. Davis, Heather Hensman Kettrey
The culture wars, or battle between American conservatives and progressives to define national values, appeared to be in abeyance until they were seemingly reignited by Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” rally cry. Yet, contemporary culture wars are different from those of previous decades because, instead of being driven by political and intellectual elites, they are often fought by populist
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Resources in Relational Packages: Social Capital as a Byproduct of Relational Work Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-10-02 Dustin S. Stoltz, Aaron Z. Pitluck
Social capital theory offers a compelling explanation as to why people are committed to making resources available to others outside of formal institutions. In this article, we build on social capital theory to explain how actors overcome two practical problems endemic to these resource transfers. We present Viviana Zelizer’s relational work theory as a complimentary framework which accounts for when
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Whose Need Matters?: The Local Welfare State, Poverty, and Variation in US Counties’ Social Service Provisioning Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-10-02 Paige Kelly, Linda Lobao
Sociologists have long studied poverty across localities. Yet, little research focuses on local governments and the social services they directly provide to those in-need. Researchers concerned with the US welfare state note that localized administration of social programs creates geographic variability in provisioning and potential for status-based discrimination, such as racism, to influence policy
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A Pathway to Racial Equity: Student Debt Cancellation Policy Designs Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-10-01 Raphaël Charron-Chénier, Louise Seamster, Thomas M. Shapiro, Laura Sullivan
Student debt in the United States has had a disproportionate negative impact on black and Latinx borrowers. We argue that analyses of plans proposing student debt cancellation should therefore foreground their potential impact on racial equity. To do so, we use data from the 2019 Survey of Consumer Finances and model the impact of debt cancellation on four key policy outcomes (reach, impact on the
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“Will America Work? Racial and Economic Equity in a Post-COVID World” Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-09-27 Adia Harvey Wingfield
Due to a variety of structural, political, and economic changes, the US is currently in the midst of record levels of economic inequality. At the same time, the country is rapidly becoming more racially diverse (and dealing with the backlash of these demographic changes). In this article, I use Kalleberg’s (2003) framework of “good jobs” and “bad jobs” in conjunction with several sociological theories
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Capitalism and Sustainability: An Exploratory Content Analysis of Frameworks in Environmental Political Economy Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-09-22 Timothy P. Clark, Andrew R. Smolski, Jason S. Allen, John Hedlund, Heather Sanchez
A critical divide within environmental sociology concerns the relationship between capitalism and the environment. Risk society and ecological modernization scholars advance a concept of reflexive political economy, arguing that capitalism will transition from a dirty, industrial stage to a green, eco-friendly stage. In contrast, critical political economy scholars suggest that the core imperatives
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White Americans’ Opposition to Affirmative Action, Revisited: New Racism, Principled Objections, or Both? Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-09-01 Matthew O. Hunt, Ryan A. Smith
In this short article, we provide an update and extension of Thomas C. Wilson’s study, “Whites’ Opposition to Affirmative Action: Rejection of Group-based Preferences as well as Rejection of Blacks.” Wilson drew on data from the 1996 General Social Survey (GSS) to revisit a long-standing debate in the racial attitudes literature concerning whether anti-black prejudice (e.g., “new racism”) or ostensibly
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Assessing Local “Diversity”: A Nationally Representative Analysis Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-08-16 Neeraj Rajasekar, Evan Stewart, Joseph Gerteis
The meanings and definition of “diversity” can change across different applications and contexts, but many such meanings have implications for racial difference and racial ideology in the United States. We provide a nationally representative analysis of how everyday Americans assess “diversity” in their own communities. We test how county-level racial, religious, economic, and political heterogeneity
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The Expansion of Higher Education and the Education-Health Gradient in the United States Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-08-12 Robert T. Frase, Shawn Bauldry
The United States experienced a period of rapid higher education expansion between the mid-1940s and mid-1970s. Although this expansion likely improved the health of people able to take advantage of new education opportunities, expansion may have also intensified health inequalities between college-educated and non-college-educated people (1) through the compositional change in the relative (dis)advantage
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The Racially Unequal Impacts of Disasters and Federal Recovery Assistance on Local Self-Employment Rates Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-08-12 Asia Bento, James R. Elliott
This study examines racial inequalities in changing self-employment rates associated with natural hazard impacts and federal recovery assistance in ethnoracially diverse metropolitan counties between 2000 and 2010. It advances the viewpoint that such inequalities can stem from hoarded opportunities tied to white privilege in addition to commonly highlighted social vulnerabilities tied to racial inequities
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Financial Stress, Race, and Student Debt During the Great Recession Social Currents Pub Date : 2021-07-23 Elizabeth C. Martin, Rachel E. Dwyer
As the onus of paying for higher education shifted from the state onto students and their families, student indebtedness grew across a wide range of households in the United States in the 2000s, especially among Black and Hispanic households. Holding student debt is a financial risk that may leave households more vulnerable to economic shocks. We study the relationship between household student loan