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This chapter in ‘Monitoring Social Inclusion in Europe’ explores the missing links between employment policy success and inclusion policy failure. The focus is on individuals in the 20 to 59 age cohort and empirical analyses are relying on the EU Labour Force Survey (EU LFS) and the EU Survey on Income and Living Conditions (EU SILC). It updates and complements our earlier work and publications on household employment. The analysis proceeds in two steps. The first step considers the distribution of individual jobs over households, thus establishing a link between individual employment rates and household employment rates. Following the work by Gregg, Scutella and Wadsworth (2008, 2010) a ‘polarization index’ is created to measure the size of unequal distribution of employment over households. Actual changes in household joblessness are decomposed in (i) changes due to changing individual employment rates and changing household structures and (ii) changes in the distribution of jobs over households. The second step in the analysis matches employment at both levels of aggregation with poverty. Therefore, we decompose changes in the at-risk-of-poverty rates on the basis of (i) changes in the poverty risks of jobless households, and (ii) changes in the poverty risks of other (non-jobless) households; (iii) changes in household joblessness due to changes in individual employment rates and changing household structures and (iv) changes in the distribution of employment. The proposed technique does yield interesting insights into the trajectories that individual EU welfare states have followed over the past ten years. The book is available at the Eurostat website, but it can also been completely downloaded here.

Considering the contribution of the distribution of individual wages and earnings to that of household incomes we find two separate literatures that should be brought together, and bring “new institutions” into play. Growing female employment, rising dual-earnership and part-time employment underline its relevance. We discuss the measurement of wage inequality, data sources, and stylized facts of wage dispersion for rich countries. The literature explaining the dispersion of wage rates and the role of institutions is evaluated, from the early 1980s to the recent literature on job polarization and tasks as well as on the minimum wage. Distinguishing between supply-and-demand approaches and institutional ones, we find supply and demand challenged by the empirical measurement of technological change and a risk of ad hoc additions, without realizing their institutional preconditions. The institutional approach faces an abundance of institutions without a clear conceptual delineation of institutions and their interactions. Empirical cross-country analysis of the correlation between institutional measures and wage inequality incorporates unemployment and working hours dynamics, discussing the problems of matching individuals to their relevant institutional framework. Minimum wage legislation and active labor market policies come out negatively correlated to earnings inequality in US and EU countries.

Charitable bequests are a major source of income for charities. But surprisingly little is known in Britain about them. We review the small British and larger US literatures and then consider how best to model the decision to make a charitable bequest. We identify three stages: making a will, including a charity as a potential beneficiary, and bequeathing unconditionally. We then examine the evidence for Britain on each stage provided by data on individual estates. The data cover the population of estates that passed through probate – about a quarter of a million estates from a 12 month period. We focus on the relationship with wealth at death, on geographic differences, and on the different causes to which people bequeath.

Context: The diagnostic value of tests for detecting hypothalamic-pituitary adrenal insufficiency (HPAI) is controversial. Objective: Our objective was to compare standard-dose and low-dose corticotropin tests for diagnosing HPAI. Data Sources: We searched the PubMed database from 1966-2006 for studies reporting diagnostic value of standard-dose or low-dose corticotropin tests, with patient-level data obtained from original investigators. Study Selection: Eligible studies had more than 10 patients. All subjects were evaluated because of suspicion for chronic HPAI, and patient-level data were available. We excluded studies with no accepted reference standard for HPAI (insulin hypoglycemia or metyrapone test) if test subjects were in the intensive care unit or if only normal healthy subjects were used as controls. Data Extraction: We constructed receiver operator characteristic (ROC) curves using patient-level data from each study and then merged results to create summary ROC curves, adjusting for study size and cortisol assay method. Diagnostic value of tests was measured by calculating area under the ROC curve (AUC) and likelihood ratios. Data Synthesis: Patient-level data from 13 of 23 studies (57%; 679 subjects) were included in the metaanalysis. The AUC were as follows: low-dose corticotropin test, 0.92 (95% confidence interval 0.89-0.94), and standard-dose corticotropin test, 0.79 (95% confidence interval 0.74-0.84). Among patients with paired data (seven studies, 254 subjects), diagnostic value of low-dose corticotropin test was superior to standard-dose test (AUC 0.94 and 0.85, respectively; P < 0.001). Conclusions: Low-dose corticotropin test was superior to standard-dose test for diagnosing chronic HPAI, although it has technical limitations. (J Clin Endocrinol Metab 93: 4245-4253, 2008)

Light microscopic studies comparing sperm parameters show little association between diabetes and male fertility. However, with the introduction of new analytical techniques, evidence is now emerging of previously undetectable affects of diabetes on sperm function. Specifically, a recent study has found significantly higher sperm nuclear DNA (nDNA) fragmentation in diabetic men. As advanced glycation end products (AGEs) are important instigators of oxidative stress and cell dysfunction in numerous diabetic complications, we hypothesized that these compounds could also be present in the male reproductive tract. The presence and localization of the most prominent AGE, carboxymethyl-lysine (CML), in the human testis, epididymis and sperm was determined by immunohistochemistry. Parallel ELISA and Western blot analyses were performed to ascertain the amount of CML in seminal plasma and sperm from 13 diabetic and 9 non-diabetic subjects. CML immunoreactivity was found through out the seminiferous epithelium, the nuclei of spermatogonia and spermatocytes, in the basal and principle cells (cytoplasm and nuclei) of the caput epididymis and on most sperm tails, mid pieces and all cytoplasmic droplets. The acrosomal cap, especially the equatorial band, was prominently stained in diabetic samples only. The amount of CML was significantly higher (p = 0.004) in sperm from non diabetic men. Considering the known detrimental actions of AGEs in other organs, the presence, location and quantity of CML, particularly the increased expression found in diabetic men, suggests that these compounds may play a hitherto unrecognized role in male infertility.