Funny Money: Philanthropic Giving and the Money Illusion

2020 ◽  
pp. 089976402094108
Author(s):  
Gregory R. Witkowski
Keyword(s):  
The West ◽  
Money Illusion ◽  
The World ◽  
Currency Reform ◽  
Before And After ◽  
East German ◽  
Real Purchasing ◽  
German Currency ◽  
Value Of Money ◽  
Over Time

This study argues that the size of philanthropic gifts is affected by donors’ perception of the value of their money. The essay examines aggregate giving to Bread for the World in former East Germany before and after two currency reforms and shows that decades of overvaluing the West German Deutschmark led East Germans to give less after the first currency reform while the second currency reform did not lead to such a drop off. The essay employs East German jokes to illustrate popular views of both East and West German currency that developed over time. It indicates that East Germans developed a perceived value of money separate from its real purchasing power, which affected their philanthropic donations. These findings are applicable to small and large philanthropic gifts, especially across currencies, as in international giving.

Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Mark Regnerus
Keyword(s):  
Religious Faith ◽  
The West ◽  
Career Expectations ◽  
The World ◽  
The Future ◽  
Over Time

Marriage has receded dramatically in much of the West; given their historical and theological esteem for matrimony, are Christians faring any better? Not by much. Christian marriage, too, appears to be experiencing a recession. How do modern Christians around the world look for a mate within a religious faith that esteems marriage but a world that increasingly yawns at it? Some of the challenges facing them are mathematical—more women than men in congregations—while others are ideological, such as the penchant for keeping one’s options open. Economic and career expectations counsel delay. Do Christians wait on marriage? Not as long as the irreligious: being active in church predicts marrying earlier in most countries. Over time, this gap in marriage between the more religious and the less religious adds up. The future of marriage is becoming more religious, not less.

scholarly journals Out of Sight: Industrial Espionage, Ocular Authority and East German Communism, 1965–1989

2008 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-71 ◽  
Author(s):  
JONATHAN R. ZATLIN
Keyword(s):  
Navigation System ◽  
Operational Performance ◽  
Considerable Time ◽  
The West ◽  
Intelligence Gathering ◽  
Technological Gap ◽  
Industrial Espionage ◽  
The World ◽  
East German ◽  
Foreign Intelligence

AbstractThe Stasi continues to enjoy a reputation as one of the most effective espionage agencies in the world, especially in the area of foreign intelligence gathering. This article employs the case of Gerhardt Ronneberger, one of East Germany's most capable spies, to challenge assumptions about the Stasi's operational successes, economic relevance and methodological proficiency. In particular, it argues that East German intelligence gathering was undermined by an institutionalisd distinction between sight, or the work of observation, and vision, or the process of signification. In Ronneberger's case, the spy agency wasted considerable time and resources trying to make sense of his operational performance and political reliability. In the end, however, even his most spectacular successes, which included smuggling a laser-guided navigation system into the GDR and acquiring proscribed computer chip and microprocessor designs from Toshiba, did not matter, since they did not change East Germany's inability to narrow the technological gap with the West.

scholarly journals The Biological Standard of Living in the Two Germanies

2003 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. 459-473 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Komlos ◽  
Peter Kriwy
Keyword(s):  
Standard Of Living ◽  
German Population ◽  
The West ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Social Differences ◽  
Biological Standard Of Living ◽  
Before And After ◽  
East German ◽  
Physical Stature ◽  
Biological Standard

Abstract Physical stature is used as a proxy for the biological standard of living in the two Germanies before and after unification in an analysis of a cross-sectional sample (1998) of adult heights, as well as among military recruits of the 1990s. West Germans tended to be taller than East Germans throughout the period under consideration. Contrary to official proclamations of a classless society, there were substantial social differences in physical stature in East Germany. Social differences in height were greater in the East among females, and less among males than in the West. The difficulties experienced by the East German population after 1961 is evident in the increase in social inequality of physical stature thereafter, as well as in the considerable gap relative to the height of the West German population. After unification, however, there is a tendency for East German males, but not of females, to catch up with their West German counterparts.

East Germany: Peking-Pankow Axis?

1960 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
pp. 85-88 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. J. Esslin
Keyword(s):  
East Germany ◽  
Publishing House ◽  
Great Weight ◽  
The West ◽  
Sun Tzu ◽  
Art Of War ◽  
The World ◽  
Communist China ◽  
East German ◽  
National Defence

To the ordinary man in the drab East German street Communist China is a bore: it strikes him that the main use of this remote and shadowy ally is to help inflate the numerical strength of the “socialist camp” by a few useful hundreds of million souls. He realises that this is meant to overcome his feeling of isolation, to convince him that he is allied not only with a collection of uncouth Balkan tribes and formidable but unloved Russians, but also with a nation that can be claimed to be among the oldest civilised countries of the world, that had invented gunpowder long before even a German monk, Berthold Schwarz, invented it for the West. But on the whole the exploitation of the cultural prestige of the Chinese ally is poverty stricken and inept. Reprints of pre-war editions of a few Chinese novels like The Dream of the Red Chamber, an occasional art book of Chinese paintings or an edition by the publishing house of the Ministry of National Defence of an old Chinese Treatise on the Art of War by Sun Tzu, translated from the Russian, hardly carry great weight or conviction.

scholarly journals حضور پاک صلی اللہ علیہ وسلم کی ولادت باسعادت سے پہلے کےإرھاصات ومبشرات اور ان کی حکمتیں

Al-Duhaa ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (01) ◽  
pp. 108-123
Author(s):  
Kh. Awais Ahmed Khawaja ◽  
Bashir Ahmad Malik
Keyword(s):  
The People ◽  
The World ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Over Time ◽  
Social Affairs

Seerah books usually start with the illustration of the beginning, geographical, and changing circumstances and conditions of Arabia over time. In this context, the scenarios and events before and after the birth of Holy Prophet (PBUH) are used to mention in detail. Many articles are mentioned in this regard, which are related to irhaasaat and Mubashirat.This is concerted fact that the resurrection of the Holy Prophet (PBUH) is a great event. It is such a grand event that the history for future would be incomplete without mentioning this event and the affairs related to it. The revival of a leader to bring humanity out of the pit of humiliation was the fortune for the world and its people. Holy Prophet PBUH not only showed the righteous path to strayed humanity but also effected the geographical and social affairs deeply.  In this regard Allah ta'ala started showing good signs of the arrival of Holy Prophet (PBUH) before his birth. These events appearing as greetings contained many wisdoms for the people of that time in particular and for descendants in general, the knowledge of which is necessary to get benefited from the Prophet’s prophecy. In this article after the literal and terminological introduction of the Irhaasaat and Mubashirat happened before the birth of the Holy Prophet (PBUH) and their wisdoms are mentioned.

Values and intergroup perceptions of East Germans and West Germans in 1998 1This research was supported by a grant from the German Research Society (We 1106/3-1).

1999 ◽  
Vol 58 (4) ◽  
pp. 263-272
Author(s):  
Jörg Doll ◽  
Michael Dick
Keyword(s):  
Research Society ◽  
Frame Of Reference ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Perceived Similarity ◽  
The West ◽  
Need For Uniqueness ◽  
German Research ◽  
East German ◽  
Experimental Group ◽  
East West

The studies reported here focus on similarities and dissimilarities between the terminal value hierarchies ( Rokeach, 1973 ) ascribed to different groups ( Schwartz & Struch, 1990 ). In Study 1, n = 65 East Germans and n = 110 West Germans mutually assess the respective ingroup and outgroup. In this intra-German comparison the West Germans, with a mean intraindividual correlation of rho = 0.609, perceive a significantly greater East-West similarity between the group-related value hierarchies than the East Germans, with a mean rho = 0.400. Study 2 gives East German subjects either a Swiss (n = 58) or Polish (n = 59) frame of reference in the comparison between the categories German and East German. Whereas the Swiss frame of reference should arouse a need for uniqueness, the Polish frame of reference should arouse a need for similarity. In accordance with expectations, the Swiss frame of reference significantly reduces the correlative similarity between German and East German from a mean rho = 0.703 in a control group (n = 59) to a mean rho = 0.518 in the experimental group. Contrary to expectations, the Polish frame of reference does not lead to an increase in perceived similarity (mean rho = 0.712).

Prevalence of Suicidal Ideation in Sri Lanka

Crisis ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 30-35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sudath Samaraweera ◽  
Athula Sumathipala ◽  
Sisira Siribaddana ◽  
S. Sivayogan ◽  
Dinesh Bhugra
Keyword(s):  
Suicidal Ideation ◽  
Sri Lanka ◽  
General Population ◽  
Suicide Attempts ◽  
National Average ◽  
The West ◽  
Suicide Methods ◽  
Suicide Rates ◽  
Completed Suicide ◽  
The World

Background: Suicidal ideation can often lead to suicide attempts and completed suicide. Studies have shown that Sri Lanka has one of the highest rates of suicide in the world but so far no studies have looked at prevalence of suicidal ideation in a general population in Sri Lanka. Aims: We wanted to determine the prevalence of suicidal ideation by randomly selecting six Divisional Secretariats (Dss) out of 17 in one district. This district is known to have higher than national average rates of suicide. Methods: 808 participants were interviewed using Sinhala versions of GHQ-30 and Beck’s Scale for Suicidal Ideation. Of these, 387 (48%) were males, and 421 (52%) were female. Results: On Beck’s Scale for Suicidal Ideation, 29 individuals (4%) had active suicidal ideation and 23 (3%) had passive suicidal ideation. The active suicidal ideators were young, physically ill and had higher levels of helplessness and hopelessness. Conclusions: The prevalence of suicidal ideation in Sri Lanka is lower than reported from the West and yet suicide rates are higher. Further work must explore cultural and religious factors.

Weekly Exercise Consistently Reinstates Positive Mood

1998 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
pp. 271-280 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hannah Steinberg ◽  
Briony R. Nicholls ◽  
Elizabeth A. Sykes ◽  
N. LeBoutillier ◽  
Nerina Ramlakhan ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Physical Exercise ◽  
Negative Mood ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Positive Mood ◽  
Field Investigation ◽  
Single Bout ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Exercise Class ◽  
Negative Feelings ◽  
Over Time

Mood improvement immediately after a single bout of exercise is well documented, but less is known about successive and longer term effects. In a “real-life” field investigation, four kinds of exercise class (Beginners, Advanced, Body Funk and Callanetics) met once a week for up to 7 weeks. Before and after each class the members assessed how they felt by completing a questionnaire listing equal numbers of “positive” and “negative” mood words. Subjects who had attended at least five times were included in the analysis, which led to groups consisting of 18, 20, 16, and 16 subjects, respectively. All four kinds of exercise significantly increased positive and decreased negative feelings, and this result was surprisingly consistent in successive weeks. However, exercise seemed to have a much greater effect on positive than on negative moods. The favorable moods induced by each class seemed to have worn off by the following week, to be reinstated by the class itself. In the Callanetics class, positive mood also improved significantly over time. The Callanetics class involved “slower,” more demanding exercises, not always done to music. The Callanetics and Advanced classes also showed significantly greater preexercise negative moods in the first three sessions. However, these differences disappeared following exercise. Possibly, these two groups had become more “tolerant” to the mood-enhancing effects of physical exercise; this may be in part have been due to “exercise addiction.”

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