Unemployment, religious disintegration and suicide fluctuations in Alberta.

This study looks at the relationship between unemployment, religious disintegration and suicide in Alberta during 1997-2015. Religious disintegration is operationalized as the percentage of population with no religious affiliation. Economic theory predicts suicides increase when unemployment rates are high and decline when unemployment rates are low. Sociological theory calls for suicides to vary inversely with the degree of religious integration in society. Multivariate analysis supports both economic and sociological interpretations. In Alberta, periods of rising unemployment (recessions) produce more suicides, and increased levels of religious disintegration are positively associated with the incidence of voluntary deaths.

Cette étude examine la relation entre le chômage, la désintégration religieuse et le suicide en Alberta entre 1997 et 2015. La désintégration religieuse est opérationnalisée comme le pourcentage de la population sans affiliation religieuse. La théorie économique prévoit que les suicides augmentent lorsque le taux de chômage est élevé et diminuent lorsque le taux de chômage est faible. Selon la théorie sociologique, les suicides varient inversement au degré d'intégration religieuse dans la société. L'analyse multivariée appuie les interprétations économique et sociologique. En Alberta, les périodes de hausse du chômage (récessions) produisent plus de suicides, et les niveaux accrus de désintégration religieuse sont positivement associés à l'incidence des décès volontaires.

Cloud, co-location, on-premises and hybrid disaster recovery solutions: Pros, cons, and a cost comparison.

The hype surrounding cloud-based disaster recovery (DR) continues to gain steam - and with good reason. That said, due to cost, compatibility and/or organisational restrictions, cloud-based DR is not necessarily the best fit for all systems. This paper presents case studies and a structured approach to evaluate the various options, including public/private cloud DR, DR as a service (DRaaS) and hybrid solutions. For example, the pay-per-use model for cloud DR saves money while the cloud environment is dormant, but results in higher run-time costs than co-location or on-premises solutions when DR is executed. Similarly, organisations need to understand the range of DRaaS options to make an informed decision. Where cloud is not a good fit for all systems, a hybrid solution can satisfy conflicting requirements while leveraging the benefits of cloud where appropriate. Finally, organisational constraints can tip the balance away from what may appear to be the best fit on paper.

Sex differences in life expectancy in Canada: immigrant and native-born populations.

A growing body of research often indicates that immigrant populations in Western countries enjoy a lower level of mortality in relation to their native-born host populations. In this literature, sex differences in mortality are often reported but substantive analyses of the differences are generally lacking. The present investigation looks at sex differences in life expectancy with specific reference to immigrant and Canadian-born populations in Canada during 1971 and 2001. For these two populations, sex differences in expectation of life at birth are decomposed into cause-of-death components. Immigrants in Canada have a higher life expectancy than their Canadian-born counterparts. In absolute terms, immigrant females enjoy the highest life expectancy. In relative terms, however, immigrant men show a larger longevity advantage, as their expectation of life at birth exceeds that of Canadian-born men by a wider margin than do foreign-born females in relation to Canadian-born females. It is also found that immigrants have a smaller sex differential in life expectancy as compared with the Canadian born. Decomposition analysis shows this is a function of immigrants having smaller sex differences in death rates from heart disease and cancer. Factors thought to underlie these differentials between immigrants and the Canadian born are discussed and suggestions for further research are given.

From divergence to convergence: the sex differential in life expectancy in Canada, 1971-2000.

Over the 20th century sex differences in life expectancy in the industrialized countries have widened in favour of women. Recently, a reversal in the long-term pattern of this differential has been noted in some countries. In Canada, between 1981 and 2000, this differential narrowed by almost two years. Greater than expected improvements in male death rates with respect to heart disease, lung cancer, accidents and violence (excluding suicide) explain a large part of this phenomenon. Change in male and female smoking prevalence correlates strongly with change in sex differences in mortality from heart disease and cancer. The reasons underlying men's greater mortality improvements in regard to accidents and violence are less clear and need further investigation.

A varied pattern of change of the sex differential in survival in the G7 countries.

Over the course of the 20th century the sex differential in life expectancy at birth in the industrialized countries has widened considerably in favour of women. Starting in the early 1970s, the beginning of a reversal in the long-term pattern of this differential has been noted in some high-income countries. This study documents a sustained pattern of narrowing of this measure into the later part of the 1990s for six of the populations that comprise the G7 countries: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, England and Wales (as representative of the United Kingdom) and USA. For Japan, a persistence of widening sex differences in survival is noted. The sex differences in life expectancy are decomposed over roughly three decades (early 1970s to late 1990s) from the point of view of four major cause-of-death categories: circulatory diseases, cancers, accidents/violence/suicide, and 'other' (residual) causes. In the six countries where the sex gap has narrowed, this has resulted primarily from reduced sex differences in circulatory disease mortality, and secondarily from reduced differences in male and female death rates due to accidents, violence and suicide combined. In some of the countries sex differentials in cancer mortality have been converging lately, and this has also contributed to a narrowing of the difference in life expectancy. In Japan, males have been less successful in reducing their survival disadvantage in relation to Japanese women with regard to circulatory disease and cancer; and in the case of accidents/violence/suicide, male death rates increased during the 1990s. These trends explain the divergent pattern of the sex difference in life expectation in Japan as compared with the other G7 nations.

A divergent pattern of the sex difference in life expectancy: Sweden and Japan, early 1970s-late 1990s.

For most of the 20th century the sex gap in life expectancy in the industrialized countries has widened in favor of women. By the early 1980s a reversal in the long-term pattern of this differential had occurred in some countries, where it reached a maximum and thereafter followed a declining trend. Of particular interest to the present investigation is the anomalous experience of Japan, where unlike other high-income countries the female advantage in life expectancy has been expanding. We contrast the case of Japan with that of Sweden, where, like many other high-income nations, the sex differential in longevity has been narrowing in recent years. We observe that in Sweden, until the early 1980s, the sex gap in life expectancy (female-male) exceeded that of Japan; but this situation reversed in subsequent periods, when the Swedish differential narrowed and that of Japan widened. A decomposition analysis indicates that these divergent patterns since 1980 have resulted mainly from larger than expected reductions in male mortality in Sweden due to heart disease and from accidents and violence, lung cancer and "other" cancers. In Japan, death rates for men and women from heart disease--which is a leading cause of death--have tended to decline more or less at the same pace since the early 1980s; and with regard to lung cancer, and "other" neoplasms, male death rates in Japan have been rising while those of women have either declined or risen more slowly. Moreover, during the 1990s, male and female suicide rates rose in Japan, but the rates for men went up faster. Altogether, the net effect of these divergent mortality trends for men and women in Japan underlie much of the observed widening of its sex differential in longevity in recent years.