Student loan debt and the career choices of college graduates with majors in the arts.

This study looks to test the impact of student loan debt on the career choices of college graduates with majors in the arts in the USA. As earnings are on average lower and more variable for arts graduates when compared to graduates of many other fields, I hypothesize that student loan debt will decrease the likelihood arts graduates will work in jobs related to their major fields of study. National Survey of College Graduates data is used to test this hypothesis. I find that for arts graduates, owing on student debt decreases the likelihood of working in jobs closely related to their major fields by over 25% and decreases the likelihood they work as artists by over 30%. For all college graduates, the negative impact of student debt on working in closely related jobs to their major fields is only 3%. Student debt may have potential distributional impacts on who works as artists, as Black and Hispanic graduates and those whose parents did not attend college are more likely to have student debt and less likely to be working in jobs closely related to their major field of study. Policies that help to alleviate the debt burden on arts graduates, like debt relief, could help to mitigate these negative distributional impacts.

Arts majors and the Great Recession: a cross-sectional analysis of educational choices and employment outcomes.

This study uses American Community Survey data to examine the impact of the Great Recession on college graduates majoring in the arts. Arts graduates play important roles in an economy, through both artistic creation and in careers outside of the arts. While the Great Recession took a significant toll on the US economy generally, arts majors faced additional vulnerabilities as industries that rely on discretionary spending, like the arts and entertainment, are especially hard hit in times of economic downturn. This paper assesses the impact of graduating during or shortly after the recession relative to graduating shortly before this period on educational choices, including choice of major, double majoring, and completing an advanced degree, and career outcomes, including employment status, type of employment, hours worked, and earnings, for college graduates majoring in the arts. Graduating before or after the recession is found to have a negative impact on the share of graduates majoring in traditional arts fields, but a positive impact on the share majoring in related creative fields. Using a difference-in-difference estimation strategy, relative to non-art college graduates, traditional arts majors graduating during or after the Great Recession are more likely to complete a double major, be self-employed, be unemployed, work longer hours, and earn less income than those graduating prior to the recession. These impacts are likely to have a negative effect on the pipeline of college-educated artists working in the arts into the future.

Arts majors as entrepreneurs and innovators.

This study examines the role of college graduates with degrees in the arts, STEM, and other creative fields as entrepreneurs and innovators in the US economy. As creativity is a trait of art students and is important for those acting as entrepreneurs and innovators in an economy, arts majors have the potential to play an important role in these areas. Using American Community Survey data, we look to identify arts, STEM, and other creative majors who are working in entrepreneurial occupations, those where self-employment is common, and innovative industries, those that are copyright intensive. As it is possible that the nature of arts occupations may be inherently more entrepreneurial and innovative, we compare arts majors to STEM and other creative majors also likely to work in such occupations. Using logistic regression, we find that majoring in a core arts field more than doubles an individual's likelihood of working in an entrepreneurial occupation or an innovative industry relative to non-creative majors. Other creative majors, like communications and STEM majors, are also associated with an increased likelihood of working as entrepreneurs or innovators. Relative to STEM and other creative majors, majoring in a core arts field is associated with the greatest increase in the likelihood of working in an entrepreneurial occupation and third greatest increase in the likelihood of working in an innovative industry. While arts graduates play an important role in artistic creation, this paper highlights a role for these graduates as entrepreneurs and innovators in the US economy.

Patterns of buprenorphine/naloxone prescribing: an analysis of claims data from Massachusetts.

Background: The brand name Suboxone and its generic formulation buprenorphine/naloxone is a medication for treating opioid use disorder. While this medication has been shown to be effective, little research has examined the extent to which it is being prescribed and under what circumstances.Objective: This study examined patterns of prescription claims for buprenorphine/naloxone in terms of volume and associated clinical conditions.Methods: The study was conducted using a statewide database comprising pharmacy and medical claims that were covered by commercial health insurance plans in Massachusetts between 2011 and 2015. Trends in prescription volume for buprenorphine/naloxone were assessed based on the annual number of patients with a prescription for buprenorphine/naloxone. To examine clinical conditions associated with buprenorphine/naloxone prescriptions, patients' pharmacy claims were linked to their medical claims within the prior three months. For patients with common pain-related conditions, the odds they were prescribed buprenorphine/naloxone rather than oxycodone, a widely used opioid for pain management, were also examined.Results: The number of patients with a buprenorphine/naloxone prescription increased substantially during the study period, from approximately 25,000 in 2011 to over 39,000 in 2015. The most common clinical condition associated with buprenorphine/naloxone prescribing was opioid use disorder, but a substantial percentage of prescriptions were preceded by diagnoses that included pain or were for pain alone.Conclusion: A substantial increase in the number of patients with a prescription for buprenorphine/naloxone was observed. While buprenorphine/naloxone is most frequently prescribed for opioid use disorder, clinicians also appear to prescribe it for pain, particularly for patients who may be at elevated risk for opioid use disorder.

Reducing inequality summer by summer: Lessons from an evaluation of the Boston Summer Youth Employment Program.

Many U.S. cities have implemented Summer Youth Employment Programs (SYEPs) with the hope of improving long-term behavioral, academic, and economic outcomes among program participants, particularly inner-city, low-income, and non-white youth. While recent empirical studies show positive impacts for some outcomes, little is known about program mechanisms and the potential to reduce inequality across groups. Using an embedded randomized control trial, this study evaluates improvements in short-term outcomes for the Boston SYEP based on survey data collected for both treatment and control groups during the summers of 2015, 2016, and 2017. Participants reported increases in community engagement and social skills, job readiness skills, and college aspirations that were significantly different from the control group. In most cases, the largest gains were observed for non-white youth suggesting that the program may have the capacity to reduce inequality across groups. Our hope is that this article will serve as a resource for those seeking to understand how summer jobs programs work and for whom, and to use these findings to strengthen and target the SYEP intervention. We also provide practical lessons learned regarding the development and deployment of our survey instrument to both the treatment and control groups among the youth population.

Midterm clinical experience with a complex-shaped detachable platinum coil system for the treatment of cerebral aneurysms: Trufill DCS Orbit detachable coil system registry interim results.

PURPOSE: To report an interim analysis of the registry data and evaluate the performance of Trufill DCS Orbit coils in terms of the stability of initial aneurysmal occlusion. MATERIALS AND METHODS: From May 1, 2004, to February 1, 2006, 291 patients with ruptured or unruptured aneurysms were enrolled in a multiple-center global registry from 37 centers in the United States, Europe, and Latin America to be treated via endovascular embolization with Trufill DCS Orbit detachable platinum coils. Acute and long-term anatomic and clinical data were collected and evaluated. RESULTS: Initially, complete obliteration was reported in 187 of 300 treated aneurysms (62.3%) for which data were available; one treated aneurysm had no initial occlusion data. At follow-up (