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Taking motivation from South Africa's ranking of 50 out of 50 countries who participated in the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study of Grade four learners in 2016, this paper examines the social and economic outcomes of literacy in South Africa.

Using unemployment, income and crime rates as proxies for social and economic outcomes, the effect of literacy is examined by employing the fixed- and random-effects techniques to estimate a panel data covering nine provinces in South Africa from 2008 to 2017.

The results show that literacy rate worsens unemployment but improves crime rate and income per capita across South African provinces.

Policymakers need to consider an expanded view of literacy by extending investments to cover financial and technology literacy in addition to functional literacy to fully maximise the benefits of education.

To the authors’ best knowledge, this is the first empirical assessment of literacy outcomes in South Africa.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate whether low financial literacy is associated with the use of risky mortgages and delinquency.

A probit analysis is used to analyze the results of a survey of US homeowners.

It was found that borrowers with low financial literacy are more likely to have a risky mortgage and be delinquent in their mortgage payments.

The results indicate that many risky loan borrowers may be unable to evaluate the risks inherent in the mortgage, which contributes to high delinquency rates. These results suggest the need for education and caution in the use of risky mortgages.

The purpose of this paper is to compare the new Census 2011 results with the results of the previous Censuses and assess the progress in trends of population growth, literacy rate, and sex ratio imbalance and also to highlight the critical socioeconomic issues based on short‐term trends and patterns.

The paper is structured in a “commentary and perspective” format. The paper assesses key demographic and socioeconomic features of India's population using 2011 Census data, and compares progress in population and social trends with the results of previous Censuses. The paper also uses data from the National Family Health Survey (2005‐2006) and the United Nations World Population Prospects (2008) to complement Census results and understand the underlying reasons for the progress or deterioration in critical demographic and socioeconomic indicators.

The provisional results of the 2011 Census data reveal a mixed bag of insights. On the positive side, there has been steady progress in population stabilization and a swift ascent in female literacy since 1991. These encouraging trends, among others, represent major driving forces of demographic and economic returns for India in the coming decades. However, on the negative side, the 2011 Census reveals a deplorable deterioration in the female‐male ratio of the child population aged 0‐6 years, despite India's enforcement of targeted policy measures following the 2001 Census. The country needs to take careful stock of this issue, as its advancing demographic transition and changing socioeconomic circumstances are rapidly translating into an adverse trend of girl child discrimination.

This study compares India's most recent two Censuses and provides original analytical insights into India's progress in population stabilization and development, and the setbacks it faces in terms of gender inequalities. Region and state‐wise analyses are additional contributions based on disaggregated state level data from the recent two Censuses.

The paper intends to identify the factors that determine the variations in the gender pay gap and female workforce participation at low-skill manufacturing job across Indian states over the time period 2006–2014.

Gender pay gap is measured in two ways: one is scale insensitive and second one is scale sensitive. To construct scale-sensitive gender pay gap measure wage discrimination index is used. For main analysis, a panel framework is used. Fixed effect model and random effect model are estimated along with all relevant diagnostic tests.

Empirical analysis elucidates that male literacy rate, female literacy rate and gender parity index are important factors in explaining the variation in gender pay gap and women workforce participation at sub-national level in India. Female literacy rate significantly reduces the crude pay gap; however, it has insignificant effect on scale-sensitive gender pay gap in low-skill manufacturing sector. Educational enrolment widens up the crude wage gap but narrows down the other one. In case of workforce participation educational attainment and school enrolment both reduce women workforce participation in low-skill manufacturing job.

The present research suffers from two major limitations. Due to lack of information, the paper is unable to study the impacts of female representation in trade unions, availability of supporting infrastructure like day-care facilities for working mothers, etc. in explaining the variation in gender pay gap and women workforce participation. The second limitation is that the research fails to address the issue related to selection into employment. The present paper uses the macro-level state-specific statistics instead of micro-level data; hence the imputed wage for unemployed but potential workers cannot be calculated.

The paper is unique in the sense that it highlights gender pay gap and female workforce participation issue in low-skill manufacturing sector at Indian sub-national level. There are no such papers that highlight these issues in the context of Indian manufacturing sector. Another contribution is that the present paper considers the scale-sensitive gender pay gap, whose determinants are different than crude gender pay gap.

Acquiring economic literacy is not only important so that citizens may hold politicians accountable, ensuring a vibrant and effective democratic system, it is also necessary for business managers in order to attain effective organizational performance and compete in the complex global markets. Using a sample of 494 students, this study assesses the economic literacy of Indian MBA students. Several areas of alarming deficiencies are observed. Factors that influence the level of economic literacy are also investigated.

This paper uses data from 2010 to 2016 across 32 states and union territories to investigate the determinants of crime in India. Results indicate the significance of macroeconomic, demographic, socioeconomic and deterrence factors in accounting for various categories of crime.

Due to the evidence of heteroskedasticity and cross-sectional dependence, linear regression with panel-corrected standard errors is implemented.

It has been found that among the macroeconomic factors, only GSDP per capita was found relevant in explaining total crime rates. However, the unemployment rate and price level are crucial in explaining some categories of crime. The demographic factor, that is, population density, socioeconomic factors, that is, income inequality, poverty rate, literacy rate exhibit important and significant relationship with crime rates in India. Further, out of the four deterrence factors, charge-sheeting rate, conviction rate, pendency in police cases are important in explaining various categories of crime rates in India.

While implications of some socioeconomic variables are consistent with those found in previous studies, literacy rates and deterrence variables were found to have a positive association with crime. In particular, in a developing country such as India, white-collar crimes tend to increase as literacy rates increase. This calls for implementing policies that lead to greater employment opportunities for the educated masses. This paper also sheds light on the relationship between deterrence factors and crime rates in India. Deficiencies in the legal and judicial system have been detrimental to the nation's ability to curb crime rates.

This paper presents recently published resources on library instruction and information literacy. It provides an introductory overview and a selected annotated bibliography of publications covering various library types, study populations and research contexts. The selected bibliography is useful to efficiently keep up with trends in library instruction for busy practitioners, library science students and those wishing to learn about information literacy in other contexts.

This article annotates 424 English-language periodical articles, monographs, dissertations, theses and reports on library instruction and information literacy published in 2021. The sources were selected from the EBSCO platform for Library, Information Science, and Technology Abstracts (LISTA), Education Resources Information Center (ERIC), Scopus, ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, and WorldCat, published in 2021 that included the terms “information literacy,” “library instruction,” or “information fluency” in the title, abstract or keywords. The sources were organized in Zotero. Annotations summarize the source, focusing on the findings or implications. Each source was categorized into one of seven pre-determined categories: K-12 Education, Children and Adolescents; Academic and Professional Programs; Everyday Life, Community, and the Workplace; Libraries and Health Information Literacy; Multiple Library Types; and Other Information Literacy Research and Theory.

The paper provides a brief description of 424 sources and highlights sources that contain unique or significant scholarly contributions.

The information may be used by librarians, researchers and anyone interested as a quick and comprehensive reference to literature on library instruction and information literacy within 2021.

This chapter will provide an analysis of current educational conditions of Black males within our K-12 school system and the ongoing instructional implications for school leaders working to address literacy leadership and practice. It will provide insight and motivation for school leaders as they navigate political, social, and policy systems that surround the current educational climate and instructional expectations. Readers will engage in a reflective, collaborative, and constructive learning process related to how successful school leaders enhance teaching and learning on their school campuses for Black males and what behaviors are critical to supporting teachers and students through the process. Specifically at the elementary level where foundational decoding, fluency, and comprehension skills are developed and cultivated for early learners we must be intentional with all aspects of the learning process and our instructional pedagogy. This chapter will work to expand the body of knowledge surrounding Black males as we commit to deconstructing existing and reconstructing inclusive, equitable, and just learning environments. Implications for research, policy and practice, including recommendations to support ongoing formal and informal professional learning opportunities for educators to openly discuss their understanding of Black males, challenges they face, and strategies that they have found to be successful will be disclosed.

This paper presents recently published resources on library instruction and information literacy, providing an introductory overview and a selected annotated bibliography of publications covering various library types, study populations and research contexts.

This paper introduces and annotates English-language periodical articles, monographs, dissertations, reports and other materials on library instruction and information literacy published in 2020.

The paper provides a brief description of all 440 sources and highlights sources that contain unique or significant scholarly contributions.

The information may be used by librarians, researchers and anyone interested in a quick and comprehensive reference to literature on library instruction and information literacy.

The purpose of this paper is to find the factors that affect the “performance” of microfinancing institutions (MFIs) around the world and to further analyse the interaction and higher order effects of these factors on the performance. Although MFIs can have various objectives from a commercial focus to a social focus when performing their operations, this study analyses the factors that contribute to “performance” of MFIs in relation to their ability to “alleviate poverty in a sustainable manner”.

Based on the data relating to 234 MFIs across 63 countries, this study analyses eight factors that can affect performance of MFIs (as defined in this study) and their higher order and interaction effects using multiple regression models.

The results show that gender (female), literacy level of the borrowers, operational efficiency, offering only loans (not diversifying), age and emphasis on profitability have a significant effect on the performance. Analysis of higher order effects shows that the relationship of age with performance is a downward concave curve and that with operational efficiency is an upward concave curve. The interaction effects of gender and literacy, age and emphasis on female borrowers, and also age and emphasis on profitability were found to be significant.k

The findings contribute to understanding the factors that affect the performance of MFIs to alleviate poverty in a sustainable manner and help the policy makers and managers of MFIs to improve their performance in this area. Considering the hundreds of millions of dollars injected into microfinancing, improvement in performance as a result of these findings can lead to savings in millions of dollars.