This book contains the Agreements on Social Security between the United States and Iceland, Uruguay and the Republic of Slovenia. The Agreements are similar in objective and content to the social security totalization agreements already in force with other leading economic partners in Europe and elsewhere, including Australia, Canada, Chile, Japan, Norway, the Republic of Korea, and Switzerland. Such bilateral agreements provide for limited coordination between the United States and foreign social security systems to eliminate dual social security coverage and taxation and to help prevent the loss of benefit protection that can occur when workers divide their careers between two countries.

Navigate the extensive jurisdiction and powers of the Court of Protection. The Court of Protection affects an ever increasing number of people, among whom are some of the most vulnerable members of society. They need the best support and protection that the law and legal profession can provide. A Practitioner's Guide to the Court of Protection is written by practitioners whose individual and combined experience provide an invaluable guide to the law and practical application. The new Fourth Edition covers both the property and affairs and the welfare parts of the Court's jurisdiction, with new and expanded chapters covering: - The Court of Protection Rules 2017 - Case management pathways - Welfare and Deprivation of Liberty - Private international law - The practical application of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 - Lasting and Enduring Powers of Attorney - Case law, practice and procedure of the Court of Protection - Latest guidance and practice notes from the Office of the Public Guardian It is essential reading for anyone involved in Court of Protection practice including private client practitioners, mental health practitioners, family law practitioners, deputies, local authorities, accountants, Independent Mental Capacity Advocates, Welfare Accredited Legal Representatives, and advocates.

Social Security (comprising Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) and Disability Insurance (DI)) is the largest single program in the federal governments budget. In 2010, annual outlays for the program exceeded annual revenues (excluding interest) credited to the combined trust funds. A gap between those amounts has persisted since then, and in fiscal year 2015 outlays exceeded tax revenues by almost 9 percent. As the baby-boom generation retires over the next 10 years, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects, the gap will widen between amounts credited to the trust funds and payments to beneficiaries. This book considers 36 policy options that are among those commonly proposed by policymakers and analysts as a means of restoring financial security to the Social Security program. Furthermore, this book presents additional information about CBOs long-term projections for Social Security in the form of 15 exhibits that illustrate the programs finances and the distribution of benefits paid to and payroll taxes collected from various groups of people.

The last decade has presented major challenges for many Americans economic security. The most severe recession since the 1930s significantly impacted the national economy and household budgets. With high unemployment and a slow recovery, many Americans sought income from various sources, including unemployment and disability benefits, and some claimed Social Security retirement benefits earlier than they had planned. Through all of this, Social Security has remained the bedrock of retirement security, providing benefits to tens of millions of older Americans, while also providing benefits to survivors and other dependents, as well as workers with disabilities and their families. Social Security has helped reduce poverty among older Americans and people with disabilities; many beneficiaries rely on Social Security for the majority of their income. However, demographic shifts associated with the aging baby boom generation, along with the effects of the 2007 to 2009 recession, have strained Social Securitys finances. This book is intended to describe, in a concise and easy-to-understand way, the complexities of Social Security, the challenges the programs face, and the options available to address these challenges.

Congressional interest in the laws and processes involved in conditioning U.S. assistance to foreign security forces on human rights grounds has grown in recent years, especially as U.S. Administrations have increased emphasis on expanding U.S. partnerships and building partnership capacity with foreign military and other security forces. Congress has played an especially prominent role in initiating, amending, supporting with resources, and overseeing implementation of long-standing laws on human rights provisions affecting U.S. security assistance. This book provides background on the Leahy laws, including a brief history of their legislative development; an overview guide to the standards and processes used to "vet"that is, review and clearforeign military and other security forces for gross violations of human rights; and a brief review of salient issues regarding the provisions of the laws and their implementation. It also examines the extent to which State and DOD provide guidance to their personnel to address the Leahy laws; how the State monitors whether U.S. embassies have developed procedures to address the requirements of the Leahy laws; how the state provides training to personnel who conduct human rights vetting; assesses the extent to which DOD and State safeguard U.S. military technologies sold or exported to the Gulf countries; provide similar or differing levels of protection for the same military technologies; and vet recipients of U.S.-funded military training and equipment for potential human rights violations.

Approximately half of the total UK population is in receipt of one or more welfare benefits, giving rise to the largest single area of government expenditure. The law and structures of social security are highly complex, made more so by constant adjustments as the government pursues its often conflicting economic, political, and social policy objectives. This complexity is highly problematic. It contributes to errors in decision making and to increased administrative costs, and is seen as disempowering for citizens, thereby weakening enjoyment of a key social right. Current and previous UK administrations have had a commitment to simplify the benefits system. It is a specific objective underlying the introduction via the Welfare Reform Act 2012 of Universal Credit in place of diverse benefits, although it is not clear that the reformed system will be legally less complex and better for citizens to access. The book explains how and why complexity in modern welfare systems has grown. It identifies the different ways in which legal and associated administrative arrangements are classifiable as 'complex, ' and it discusses the effects of complexity on the system's administration and its wider implications for rights and the citizen/state relationship. The book also considers the role that the law can play in the simplification of schemes of welfare. It makes reference not only to the UK welfare system, but also relevant policies and experiences in various other States. Law in a Complex State is an interesting and topical study for all those interested in welfare law

In March 2010, the 111th Congress passed health reform legislation, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA). ACA increases access to health insurance coverage, expands federal private health insurance market requirements, and requires the creation of health insurance exchanges to provide individuals and small employers with access to insurance. It also expands Medicaid coverage. The costs to the federal government of expanding health insurance and Medicaid coverage are projected to be offset by increased taxes and revenues and reduced spending on Medicare and other federal health programs. This book provides an overview of major ACA provisions, implementation and oversight activities.

Over the last three decades, welfare policies have been informed by popular beliefs that welfare fraud is rampant. As a result, welfare policies have become more punitive and the boundaries between the welfare system and the criminal justice system have blurred--so much so that in some locales prosecution caseloads for welfare fraud exceed welfare caseloads. In reality, some recipients manipulate the welfare system for their own ends, others are gravely hurt by punitive policies, and still others fall somewhere in between.

In "Cheating Welfare," Kaaryn S. Gustafson endeavors to clear up these gray areas by providing insights into the history, social construction, and lived experience of welfare. She shows why cheating is all but inevitable--not because poor people are immoral, but because ordinary individuals navigating complex systems of rules are likely to become entangled despite their best efforts. Through an examination of the construction of the crime we know as welfare fraud, which she bases on in-depth interviews with welfare recipients in Northern California, Gustafson challenges readers to question their assumptions about welfare policies, welfare recipients, and crime control in the United States.

Extensive welfare, law, and policy reforms characterized the making and unmaking of Keynesian states in the 20th century. This collection highlights the gendered nature of these regulatory shifts and, specifically, the roles played by women - as reformers, welfare workers, and welfare recipients - in the historical development of welfare states. The contributors are leading feminist socio-legal scholars from a range of disciplines in the US, Canada, and Israel. Collectively, their analyses of women, law, and poverty speak to long-standing and ongoing feminist concerns: the importance of historically informed research, the relevance of women's agency and resistance to the experience of inequality and injustice, the specificity of the experience of poor women and poor mothers, the implications of changes to social policy, and the possibilities for social change. Such analyses are particularly timely as the devastation of neo-liberalism becomes increasingly obvious. The current world crisis of capitalism is a defining moment for liberal states - a global catastrophe that concomitantly creates a window of opportunity for critical scholars and activists to reframe debates about social welfare, work, and equality, and to reinsert the discourse of social justice into the public consciousness and political agenda of liberal democracies. (Series: Onati International Series in Law and Society)

An exploration of the ways in which ancient theories of empire can inform our understanding of present-day international relations, Enduring Empire engages in a serious discussion of empire as it relates to American foreign policy and global politics.

The imperial power dynamics of ancient Athens and Rome provided fertile ground for the deliberations of many classical thinkers who wrote on the nature of empire: contemplating political sovereignty, autonomy, and citizenship as well as war, peace, and civilization in a world where political boundaries were strained and contested. The contributors to this collection prompt similar questions with their essays and promote a serious contemporary consideration of empire in light of the predominance of the United States and of the doctrine of liberal democracy.

Featuring essays from some of the leading thinkers in the fields of political science, philosophy, history, and classics, Enduring Empire illustrates how lessons gleaned from the Athenian and Roman empires can help us to understand the imperial trajectory of global politics today.

The Home Health Care Answer Book will help new and existing home healt h agencies quickly find answers to specific legal questions. It compre hensively addresses all legal aspects of home health care in an easy-t o-use, question-and-answer format, organized by topic.

This book deals with European labour law and industrial relations. It covers legislation concerning relations between employers and employees, collective agreements and the case law of the Court of Justice, as well as the structure an strategies of social actors. The book consists of three parts; a general section devoted to individual labour law and a section that deals with collective labour law. The tenth edition is a revised and all the latest developments are covered.

Everybody uses the term 'social security,' but definitions vary widely. This unique book may be conceived as a wide-ranging definition, although in fact, it emphasizes only part of the concept: that administrative function that grants cash benefits to offset or compensate for such 'social risks' as old age, disability, unemployment, costs of health care, and other instances occasioning the lack of means necessary for a decent existence. In an earlier form (1993), this book proved itself as a much-sought-after introduction to the field, for governments as much as for law students. In this completely revised and updated work, Professor Pieters again offers, this time to a new generation of scholars and policymakers, a common language and structure with which to talk and think about social security. The presentation is both abstract (theory of social security) and concise (structure of social security systems). In taking into account the diversity of ways in which social security has been shaped by priorities of place and time, Dr. Pieters delineates the distinct alternatives that can be adhered to in establishing a social security system. He builds a frame in which these various concepts, principles, options, and techniques can be put into perspective. Although this approach hints at a 'common law' of social security, Dr Pieters goes no further in that direction than a brief general survey (in his last chapter) of the possible features of a comparative social security law. "Social Security: An Introduction to the Basic Principles" is sure to find a welcome among many sectors of the legal and policy communities. Full of insight and information, and eminently readable, the book may be seen in a number of different ways: as a road map explaining the social security systems of various states; as an overview of the various options available for building a social security system; as an exploration of the possibilities of rethinking or reforming an existing system; as the first tentative step toward a scientific discipline of comparative social security law; and much else besides.

The law of dependent work relations in contemporary Hellas combines a number of historical trends, including a unique communal and mercantile collectivism that has flourished for many centuries and survived the Turkish occupation. The country's venerable democratic traditions have ensured its early adoption of such international developments as trade unions, collective bargaining, social insurance, ILO conventions and EC labour directives. This text provides a survey of the subject that is both usefully brief and sufficiently detailed to answer most questions likely to arise in any legal setting pertaining to labour and industrial relations in Hellas. The reader should find clear and concise discussion of such topics as: social security; deregulation; the individual employment contract; government agencies affecting labour; significant jurisprudence; competitive examinations; the right to non-performance; duties of the employer; privacy and harassment; leave of absence; forms of remuneration; termination of employment; employers'associations; and strikes and lock-outs.

Taken in conjunction with the European Works Council Directive and the European Company Statute, the EC directive on information and consultation rights of employees aims to strengthen a growing spirit of co-operation between employees and employers. This book offers in-depth analysis, legislative history, and documentation of the interwoven genesis of these three crucially important labour law initiatives and their impact on industrial relations and HRM. Questions central to both the legislative debate and to this book include: how will the information and consultation rights be organised?; what can be learned from the experience of the European Works Council Directive (1994), now that more than 600 EWCs have been established by agreements between management and labour?; what is the role of trade unions and collective bargaining?; what role can employees play in the exercise of managerial prerogative?; what will be the impact on the employability of the employees?; how does the European Works Council relate to the European Company Statute?; how will the presence of employees' representatives in the supervisory board of the companies be organised?; how will the Directive be implemented in the EU member states? ; and how much room is there for national employment systems in implementing the directives? In his analysis, Professor Blanpain shows that European law-makers are now answering these questions, aiming at clarity and coherence in their definitions (especially in the European Company Statute) of such terms as "involvement," "consultation," "information," and "participation," although they are careful to leave the notion of managerial prerogative intact. The legal texts and penetrating commentary in the book galvanize the notions and concepts that surround this important issue.

A number of practices in the "wired" workplace threaten several fundamental rights. More and more, employees are expected to curtail their right to communicate and their right to access to information. Their right to privacy may also be breached by monitoring of their e-mail and Internet activity. Although employers have legitimate reasons for such restrictive or invasive measures and clearly have their own right to supervise the use of company property it can no longer be denied that the legal and even moral issues that arise from the reality of work in the information society demand serious and detailed consideration if labour law's role as a vital component of the employment relationship is to survive. The Conference, held in Brussels in November 2000, was co-sponsored by the Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Science and the Arts, Union Network International, UNI-Europa, and the Euro-Japan Institute for Law and Business. Participants analyzed trends and the possibilities and opportunities to communicate, monitoring included, in order to clarify such issues as the following: "on-line rights" and the form they should take in the workplace; employer liability for damage to third parties caused by e-mail or Internet activity; sexual harassment via e-mail or Internet activity; protection against hackers and other security measures; safeguarding confidentiality, both employer's and employee's; and the right to personal use of the company's communications technology.

This valuable symposium addresses such provocative questions as:
- To what extent can sexual harassment claims be meaningfully addressed by existing laws such as the National Labor Relations Act and state and federal anti-discrimination statutes?
- Are employer sexual harassment policy initiatives on a collision course with the First Amendment?
- What rights do accused employees have?
- When are employers liable for sexual harassment?
- Can investigations of sexual harassment claims be conducted meaningfully without violating legitimate confidentiality privileges?

Originally published as a special issue of the European Journal of Social Security, issue 4, Volume 2, this book aims to review and discuss the disability policies that have developed in six Western countries in recent years. What have been the major changes? Have the disability policies of these countries become more similar in the course of the 1990s? If so, is is possible to identify a closer relationship between the emerging EU Disability Strategy and national policy developments in this area? The countries discussed - Sweden, Denmark, The Netherlands, The United Kingdom, Ireland and Spain - are all represented in an academic network on vocational rehabilitation of disabled people that seeks to understand and compare policy developments in the field. All articules include detailed information on recent changes in disability policies in the respective countries.

Substantial progress has been made in the last 15 years in the areas of European economic, social and monetary integration, aided by social dialogue on employment and industrial relations at the international level. To be truly effective, the social dialogue has to be underpinned by an awareness of the different national industrial relations systems. This two-volume series sets out to provide information on the varied systems found across the EU, describing and analysing the key elements and concepts of industrial relations in the different Member States, from a comparative perspective. The contributions focus on three principal aspects of comparative industrial relations: an analysis of the strikingly similar pressures for industrial relations in each country; the degree to which the institutional arrangements have retained their national identities despite such pressures; and the evolution of industrial relations within this context. Countries covered in this volume are: Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Italy, The Netherlands, Portugal, Spain.

The role of state or the function of labour law during industrialization in Asian countries is of utmost importance when examining how Asian labour laws differ from European or American labour law models and whether or not any common characteristics exist in Asian labour law. The seven national reports (Australia, China, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan) included in this volume provide an overview of the regulation of union organization, collective bargaining, and industrial disputes. These reports also analyze the role of government in industrial relations in the course of economic development. In regulations on formation of labour unions, some countries, such as Japan, have the least government intervention whereas other countries, for example Korea and Taiwan, have experienced more direct government control through imposition of certain forms of labour unions or registration requirements and procedures. The same applies to regulations on collective bargaining and industrial disputes. For instance, in Korea, Taiwan and Malaysia violation of collective agreements is not only sanctioned by civil liability but is also criminally punished. A review of the national reports reveals that while diversity in labour laws exists in the Asian countries represented, the significant role of government in labour relations is widely recognized. Whether the government's significant role in industrial relations in Asian countries is a transitional phenomena which takes place during economic development and maturity of democracy, or whether Asian labour law is heading for a new labour law model which differs from the western model, should be further examined. The national papers in this volume provide fundamental information on current labour laws in Asian countries and on comparable characteristics in western labour law models.

The system of representation where children and young people are provided with both a social work guardian ad litem and a specialist solicitor is widely regarded as a model of excellence. However, until now, information about the system and its advantages has tended to neglect the views and experiences of the children concerned. Based on a unique research study, Out of Hearing investigates the representation service from the child s perspective. Observations of representatives meetings with their child clients and separate interviews with the children and their representatives paint a disturbing picture of the isolation of children at a time of immense stress and upheaval. Feedback from children about what they considered helpful or unhelpful in the actions of their representatives; their views about reading, or not seeing, court reports about themselves; and their feelings about going to court, or being excluded from its proceedings, convey powerful messages to the professionals and practitioners seeking to help them. Drawing on these experiences, the authors offer recommendations for practice and policy to enable children s views to be heard more effectively. Providing fresh insight into the representation service, Out of Hearing is essential reading for solicitors, guardians ad litem, social workers, judges, magistrates, policy makers, and academics. It will also be of interest to children s rights organisations, young people and charities.
"Whatever one may make of the conclusions of the report, what it undeniably does is paint a very graphic picture indeed of the impact of the process of care proceedings upon children. For this reason (if for no other) it should be read by all childcare law practitioners." Philip Thomson Head of Legal Services, Essex County Council
"The views and aspirations of the children really do shine through; their concerns and their agendas are set out clearly and illuminated vividly." Anna Faulkner Formerly Panel Manager, Inner and North London GALRO Panel

Covering significant European legislation passed in the late-1990s, this text starts with the European Works Council Directive of 22nd December 1994 and ends with the Treaty of Amsterdam presented in June 1997. The bulk of the text focuses upon the European Works Council Directive, which is currently in force throughout all EU Member States and the EEA countries, except the UK. The discussion centres on the implementation process in the Member States, with national reports presented in alphabetical order by country, and additional reports from EEA countries, North America and Japan. Further topics presented and examined in this book include: Article 13 pre-directive agreements; progress toward negotiating Article 6 agreements; Fundamental Social Rights and their treatment at the Intergovernmental Conference of June 1997; and developments on working time regulations within the EU.