Skip to main content
eScholarship
Open Access Publications from the University of California

Scholarly Works (3 results)

  • Thesis
  • Peer Reviewed
UC Berkeley Electronic Theses and Dissertations (2016)

Labor markets have been segmented typically based on skill-levels of workers in the United States and in many other economically advanced countries. Since welfare reform 1996, the welfare system in the United States has increasingly linked labor market participation to the eligibility for public benefits. This development signals a shift in public responsibility for economic security and social protection to the private sector and employers. However, welfare recipients are mostly low-income workers and, as outsiders in the labor market, they often have disadvantages, which include limited employment benefits. Therefore, the relationship between labor market and social protection for low-income workers has continuously increased economic inequality and disparity in social protection in the United States.

This dissertation research draws on the theoretical concepts of dualization embedded in the structures of the labor market and social protection derived from the welfare state. Focusing on economic disparities and social protection for low-income workers, this study analyzes public benefit use by low-income workers and the effects of changes in economic conditions. Specifically, the analyses focus on the extent to which low-income workers use public benefits and the way these choices are related to public and private employment sectors and employer-based private benefits in particular. It also examines how different characteristics of individual, family and household, and other labor market components are associated with public benefit use by low-income workers; the analyses include the differences between household and state levels regarding the public benefit use. Statistical analyses for these inquiries involve cross-sectional and multilevel modeling of large scale data sets.

The findings of this study show that many low-income workers cannot obtain economic security and adequate social protection through employers, given current labor market structure. Also, these findings indicate that the employment conditions and benefits provided through employers are already determined by the low-level segmentation in the labor market, rather than the public and private sectors in which low-income workers are engaged. Thus, the dualization process has increased the inequality between insiders and outsiders, which strengthens the social divide.

    Cover page: Trapped in Dualization: Labor Market and Social Protection for Low-income Workers from the Perspective of Public Benefit Use
    • Article
    • Peer Reviewed
    UCLA Previously Published Works (2023)
    The diagnostic work-up for Sjögrens syndrome is challenging and complex, including testing for serum autoantibodies to SSA/Ro and a labial salivary gland biopsy. Furthermore, the diagnosis is often delayed. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that anti-SSA/Ro autoantibodies are detectable in the saliva of patients with primary Sjögrens syndrome (pSS) because the disease affects the salivary glands, and these autoantibodies display greater discriminatory performance in saliva than in serum. SSA/Ro-52 Ags were used to develop what is, to our knowledge, a novel quantitative electrochemical-based immunoassay: the electric field-induced release and measurement (EFIRM) platform. The clinical utility was determined by measuring salivary anti-SSA/Ro-52 autoantibodies in patients with pSS and sicca (n = 34), patients without pSS with sicca (n = 35), and healthy subjects (n = 41). The statistical analysis of discrimination included the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve. Salivary anti-SSA/Ro-52 autoantibodies were measured in 94% (32 of 34) of patients with pSS with 85% (29 of 34) seropositivity. Four of the five seronegative patients with pSS had EFIRM-measurable anti-SSA/Ro-52 autoantibodies in saliva. Additionally, 60% (21 of 35) of the seronegative patients without pSS who had sicca had EFIRM-detectable SSA/Ro-52 autoantibodies in saliva, indicating the onset of autoimmune disease. Two of the 41 healthy control subjects had EFIRM-detectable SSA/Ro-52 autoantibodies in their saliva. Salivary SSA/Ro-52 autoantibodies significantly discriminated patients with pSS or patients with the initial stage of autoimmune disease from healthy subjects with an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.91. Our findings suggest that the proposed saliva SSA/Ro-52 immunoassay improves early and accurate diagnosis of seronegative patients with pSS and patients with early-onset autoimmune disease.
      Cover page: Immunoassay Detects Salivary Anti-SSA/Ro-52 Autoantibodies in Seronegative Patients with Primary Sjögrens Syndrome.
      • Article
      • Peer Reviewed
      LBL Publications (2024)
      High power conversion efficiency (PCE) and mechanical robustness are prerequisites for wearable applications of organic solar cells (OSCs). However, stretchability of present active systems (i.e., crack-onset strain (COS) < 30%) should be improved. While introducing elastomers into active systems is considered a simple method for improving stretchability, the inclusion of elastomers typically results in a decrease in PCE of the OSC with a limited enhancement in the stretchability due to lack of interconnected electrical and mechanical pathways. In this study, it is developed efficient and intrinsically stretchable (IS)-OSCs with exceptional mechanical robustness, by constructing co-continuous networks of conjugated polymers (D18) and elastomers (SEBS) within active layers. It is demonstrated that the blend film with a specific ratio (40:60 w/w) of D18:SEBS is crucial for forming co-continuous structures, establishing well-connected mechanical and electrical channels. Consequently, D180.4:SEBS0.6/L8-BO OSCs achieve 16-times higher stretchability (COS = 126%) than the OSCs based on D18/L8-BO (COS = 8%), while achieving 4-times higher PCE (12.13%) compared to the OSCs based on SEBS-rich active layers (D180.2:SEBS0.8/L8-BO, PCE = 3.15%). Furthermore, D180.4:SEBS0.6-based IS-OSCs preserve 86 and 90% of original PCEs at 50% strain and after 200 stretching/releasing cycles with 15% strain, respectively, demonstrating the highest mechanical robustness among reported IS-OSCs.
        Cover page: Establishing Co‐Continuous Network of Conjugated Polymers and Elastomers for High‐Performance Polymer Solar Cells with Extreme StretchabilityCreative Commons 'BY' version 4.0 license
        Top