DOD Reading Lists
Have you ever checked out the reading lists of the armed forces? Interesting!
- Reading Lists Aim to Promote Personal, Professional Growth, By Donna Miles, American Forces Press Service (Nov. 22, 2011). [P]rofessional reading remains an important part of the military culture. Every service, most professional military schools and an increasing number of geographic and combatant commands offer up reading programs and reading lists as part of their professional development efforts. In fact, many have multiple reading lists, aimed at different groups within the military at different ranks and stages of their careers. "...What I discovered reading Hemingway, Shakespeare, Dostoyevsky, Faulkner, Updike, Forester, McCarthy and countless other authors shaped my world view and honed my understanding of the most complex terrain in the world: the human heart." [Navy Adm. James G. Stavridis, commander of U.S. European Command and NATO’s supreme allied commander for Europe] Hat tip to beSpacific! Continue reading
The best way to preserve digital content…
Here is an interesting article that examines the use of criminal digital forensic tools to discover and repair corrupted digital information in digital archives, but there is another story here as well. Although the title doesn't tell you this, Fox actually looks at two alternatives for digital preservation: digital forensics and what he calls "the buddy system."
- Fox, Robert, Forensics of Digital Librarianship, OCLC Systems & Services, 27 (2011), 264-271
Studies over the last decade have indicated that digital preservation is most successful when the information "is best preserved by replicating it at multiple archives run by autonomous organizations".... These concepts have been in place for almost ten years, but it has only been in the last four-to-five years that libraries have attempted to preserve anything beyond e-journal content using P2P network systems. [emphasis added]Continue reading
Policies for Increasing Economic Growth and Employment
Politics is so tiring. The same old talking points every day. Wouldn't it be nice if someone in Congress would give us a non-partisan objective view of our options? Oh, wait! The Congressional Budget Office does just that! Recent testimony by the CBO director tells us (yet again) what CBO has been telling us: that extending unemployment benefits produces more output and better increase in employment per dollar spent than any other option. Looking for a document (or an agency) to feature on your blog or GovInfo home page? Here you go!
- Policies for Increasing Economic Growth and Employment in 2012 and 2013, Statement of Douglas W. Elmendorf, Director Congressional Budget Office, before the Committee on the Budget United States Senate, Congressional Budget Office (November 15, 2011) [54 pages, PDF].
Comparing the estimated effects of different policy actions shows the following:
- Policies that would have the largest effects on output and employment per dollar of budgetary cost in 2012 and 2013 are ones that would reduce the marginal cost to businesses of adding employees or that would be targeted toward people who would be most likely to spend the additional income. Such policies include reducing employers’ payroll taxes (especially if limited to firms that increase their payroll), increasing aid to the unemployed, and providing additional refundable tax credits in 2012 for lower- and middle-income households.
- Policies that would primarily affect businesses’ cash flow but would have little impact on their marginal incentives to hire or invest would have only small effects. Such policies include reducing business income taxes and reducing tax rates on repatriated foreign earnings.
Studies compare policy and practice of transparency and open government around the world
Our friends at OMBWatch just published an interesting post highlighting several studies that compare and contrast the policy and practice of transparency of the US and other countries based on comparative analysis of FOIA, foreign aid, and budgets and revenues. The post, entitled "Global Studies Highlight U.S. Transparency Strengths, Weaknesses" "...provide[s] useful measures of U.S. openness relative to real-world conditions, in addition to highlighting global best practices and alternative approaches." It also references a group created in September 2011 called the Open Government Partnership (OGP) and highlights the US' role in the group and their joint Open Government Declaration signed by the US and 7 other countries -- with 38 more countries signing in March 2012. Read the rest of the post to find out where the US ranks among the countries of the world in terms of transparency and open government. Here's the list of studies cited by OMBwatch:
- audit of FOIA laws in 105 countries and the European Union by the Associated Press (AP)
- Global Right to Information Rating released by Access Info Europe and the Centre for Law and Democracy
- Quality of Official Development Assistance report, published Nov. 14 by the Brookings Institution and the Center for Global Development
- "The Money Trail: Ranking Donor Transparency in Foreign Aid" by Anirban Ghosh and Homi Kharas, published in the November issue of the journal World Development (available to subscribers only :-( )
- Aid Transparency Index 2011 by the organization Publish What You Fund
Have you looked at the World Factbook… Lately?
The CIA World Factbook is adding new categories of societal data.
- The World Factbook Is Changing, Central Intelligence Agency (Nov 18, 2011). [T]he Factbook is adding new categories of societal data, which--along with other demographic and economic entries--offer additional insight into a country's economic strength, internal stability, and impact on the environment. After a comprehensive search for datasets that are current and regularly updated, nine new fields have been added, with the World Health Organization and the World Bank providing most of the information. Eight of these fields appear in the renamed "People and Society" category: Health expenditures (as percent of GDP), Physicians density (per 1,000 people), Hospital bed density (per 1,000 people), Maternal mortality rate (deaths per 100,000 live births), Drinking water source, Sanitation facility access, Children under the age of five underweight (percent), and Obesity - adult prevalence rate. The ninth new field appears in the Economy category: Unemployment, youth ages 15-24.