Socioeconomic inequalities in co-morbidity of overweight, obesity and mental ill-health from adolescence to mid-adulthood in two national birth cohort studies

AimTo examine socioeconomic inequalities in risk of comorbidity between overweight (including obesity) and mental ill-health in two national cohorts. We investigated independent effects of childhood and adulthood socioeconomic disadvantage on comorbidity from childhood to mid-adulthood, and differences by sex and cohort.MethodsData were from 1958 National Child Development Study (NCDS58) and 1970 British Cohort Study (BCS70) [total N=30,868, 51% males] assessed at ages 10, 16, 23, 34 and 42 years. Socioeconomic indicators included childhood and adulthood social class and educational level. Risk for i. having healthy BMI and mental ill-health, ii. overweight and good mental health, and iii. overweight and mental ill-health was analysed using multinomial logistic regression.ResultsSocioeconomic disadvantage was consistently associated with greater risk for overweight-mental ill-health comorbidity at all ages (RRR 1.43, 2.04, 2.38, 1.64 and 1.71 at ages 10, 16, 23, 34 and 42 respectively for unskilled/skilled vs. professional/managerial class). The observed inequalities in co-morbidity were greater than that observed for either condition alone (overweight; RRR 1.39 and 1.25, mental ill-health; 1.36 and 1.22 at ages 16 and 42 respectively, for unskilled/skilled vs. professional/managerial class). In adulthood, childhood and adulthood socioeconomic disadvantage were independently associated with comorbid overweight-mental ill-health, with a clear inverse gradient between educational level and risk for comorbidity; no education, RRR 6.11 (95% CI 4.31-8.65) at age 34 and 4.42 (3.28-5.96) at age 42 compared to university education. There were no differences observed in the extent of inequalities by sex and differences between cohorts were limited.ConclusionsSocioeconomic disadvantage in childhood and adulthood are consistently and independently associated with greater risk for mental ill-health and overweight separately, and even greater inequalities in the risk for comorbidity between both conditions through the lifecourse. These findings are significant given the increasing global prevalence of obesity and mental ill-health, and their implications for lifelong health and mortality.

«Over-production» management in the Soviet economy (1930-1980s)

The article analyzes management, concentrated in the organs of the Communist party, Soviet, and economic bodies. Their place in the organization of economic life is considered, the specifics of the functions of different management segments are defined, and information about their number is provided. The methods of work of “over-production” management, the material status of the highest part of the managerial class are also analyzed.

Babylonian Priesthood during the Third Millennium BCE: Between Sacred and Profane

This article offers an overview of the early Babylonian priesthood, as it was organized and operated during the third millennium BCE. It is emphasized that the priests and priestesses proper, i.e., individuals who were specifically concerned with cultic matters, represented a relatively small segment of the employees of temple households. Much more numerous within these institutions (which might more appropriately be termed “temple communities”) were the individuals whose roles were of either administrative or economic character. Focusing on the administrators of temple households, and identifying them as “Managerial Class,” the article argues that, during Pre-Sargonic times, this social group wielded great economic and political power, which at times even exceeded that of the emerging secular leaders (such as ensiks and lugals). To demonstrate this point, an interaction between these two competing centers of powers (particularly in the city-state of Lagaš) is studied in detail. In memory of Itamar Singer

EARLY-LIFE SOCIOECONOMIC POSITION AND ACCUMULATION OF HEALTH-RELATED DEFICITS IN MIDLIFE

Improved understanding of predictors of frailty is key to delaying its onset. Yet, few studies have examined whether early-life socioeconomic position (SEP) predicts frailty in midlife. In the 1958 British Birth Cohort (n=7601), we examined (i) associations between early-life SEP and frailty at 50y and (ii) whether associations were due to continuities in disadvantage into mid-adulthood. Frailty was measured using an index composed of 37 health-deficits. Associations between early-life SEP and frailty were examined using linear regression. Lower early-life SEP was associated with higher frailty, e.g. compared to professional/managerial class, the frailty index was higher by 3.09% (95% CI:-0.65%, 6.84%) for skilled non-manual, 10.8% (8.20%, 13.4%) for skilled manual and 14.2% (11.1%, 17.2%) for partly skilled/unskilled. After adjustment for adult disadvantage, the trend remained, albeit weaker. Findings suggest that interventions in mid-adulthood targeted to those exposed to early-life disadvantage could reduce the risk of developing frailty when entering later life.

Private study

The rise of the managerial class has effected a fundamental reversal of priorities in the university sector, such that faculty now exist primarily in order to serve the demands of management as such. With managerial jargon in the ascendancy, political argument about the nature of the sector falls into cliché; and cliché precludes the yielding of any knowledge that is based in thinking, because it reduces thought to prejudicial clichéd banalities. Inn this state of affairs, there can be little legitimacy for a critical position that might challenge the supposed primacy of economic rationalisation of all aspects of university life and of knowledge. The result is that the privatisation of knowledge and the attendant commercialisation of information assumes a normative force. The university is complicit with a general political trajectory that leads to the corruption of politics and of intellectual work through the improper insertion of financial rationales for all decision-making. The chapter explores the pre-history of this in Thatcherism and Reaganomics; and it demonstrates that the logic of university privatization is essentially a state-sponsored subsidy for the wealthy, and for the ongoing protection of existing privileges.

Social Mobility in a High-Inequality Regime

Are opportunities to get ahead growing more unequal? Using data from the General Social Survey (GSS), it is possible to provide evidence on this question, evidence that is suggestive but must be carefully interpreted because the samples are relatively small. The GSS data reveal an increase in class reproduction among young and middle-age adults that is driven by the growing advantage of the professional-managerial class relative to all other classes. This trend is largely consistent with our new “top-income hypothesis” that posits that rising income inequality registers its effects on social mobility almost exclusively in the divide between the professional-managerial class and all other classes. We develop a two-factor model in which the foregoing effects of the inequality takeoff are set against the countervailing effects of the expansion of mass education. As the model implies, the trend in intergenerational association takes on a convex shape in the younger age groups, with the change appearing to accelerate in the most recent decade. These results suggest that the takeoff in income inequality may account in part for the decline in mobility.