Category: UW Experts in the News

An economist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison says other states could soon follow California’s and New York’s lead to raise the minimum wage .The two states voted Monday to gradually raise their minimum wages over the next four years to eventually reach $15 per hour. “It’s actually a pretty significant move,” said Steve Deller, a professor of agricultural and economics at UW-Madison. “Because it kind of lays the foundation for other states to start to follow-up and do the same thing.”

Noted: “This really has become a delegate fight on both sides for Democrats and Republicans,” said Barry Burden, a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “These processes are really what’s going to drive the race going forward, and I think Wisconsin is going to drive the race in that regard.”

Quoted: “It’s just this island of an event, sitting by itself, and it has such symbolic value,” said Barry Burden, a University of Wisconsin-Madison political science professor.

A life surrounded by and living in crap has its benefits—if you’re a dung beetle. That life is also a boon to livestock, us, and our planet. “By simply digging through, or tunneling through, cow patties, dung beetles aerate them and reduce methane,” said UW-Madison entomologist P.J. Liesch.

University of Wisconsin-Madison finance professor Jim Johannes, who testified in favor of the bill, said in an interview that the new law “provides clarity for the courts.”

Noted: The details about Luang Poh Yaai’s early life are sketchy. According to an account by Ian G Baird, from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, as a child she claimed to remember her past lives and communicated with spirits. Later, she married and had two children, but abandoned by her husband, she lived in a Bangkok slum and became an alcoholic.

Quoted: Also, older patients, who are increasingly likely to have a directive, often get treatment from varied sources — surgeons, hospitals, nursing homes, primary physicians. That increases the odds of unaligned systems, said Dr. Irene Hamrick, who directs geriatric services in family medicine at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Quoted: Retired University of Wisconsin, Madison, archaeologist Doug Price analyzed strontium, oxygen, and carbon isotopes in 20 teeth from Tollense. Just a few showed values typical of the northern European plain, which sprawls from Holland to Poland. The other teeth came from farther afield, although Price can’t yet pin down exactly where. “The range of isotope values is really large,” he says. “We can make a good argument that the dead came from a lot of different places.”

Quoted: Mike Wagner, an associate professor in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said it’s very unusual for a presidential frontrunner to be short on endorsements in any given state. He said he thinks the lack of endorsements for Trump in Wisconsin could be chalked up to the state’s ties to the “upper echelons” of national Republican politics, where Trump isn’t very popular.

Quoted: Barry Burden, a UW-Madison political science professor, agrees that Madison is key to Sanders’ chances here. “Sanders managed to turn out thousands of people for a rally in Madison last summer,” he says, referring to Sanders’ appearance last July at the Veterans Memorial Coliseum. “His supporters in the area are already organizing to turn out progressives on primary day. He will need to run especially well in the district if he is going to win the statewide vote.”

Noted: The relationship between city police and area social services agencies is hardly new. But there was a time “when if a police officer showed up at the mental health clinic, they were the enemy,” says Ronald Diamond, a University of Wisconsin–Madison professor of psychiatry and former medical director of Journey (then called the Mental Health Center of Dane County).

Quoted: Also, older patients, who are increasingly likely to have a directive, often get treatment from varied sources — surgeons, hospitals, nursing homes, primary physicians. That increases the odds of unaligned systems, said Dr. Irene Hamrick, who directs geriatric services in family medicine at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Quoted: Pamela Oliver, a University of Wisconsin sociologist who studies social movements, agrees that if Trump becomes the GOP’s nominee this fall, it will further galvanize minority voters and civil-rights activists. But she warns that the racially tinged conflicts at Trump rallies have a dark side that could backfire on protesters. When majorities whip up racial animus, she says, “it often ends very badly for minorities.” If the skirmishes, violence, and clashes with law enforcement continue, Trump’s campaign could also end badly for some legally vulnerable police officers.

Quoted: “Previous attempts to put a price tag on invasive species impacts haven’t come close to the true cost,” says study author Jake Walsh of the University of Wisconsin, Madison, who thinks the price tag justifies spending more money on eradicating the flea.

Quoted: The death caps arrived in California from Europe as early as the 1930s and ’40s, says Anne Pringle, a biologist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. She discovered this timeline through genetic testing of death cap samples collected in California during this era. She says death caps likely sneaked into California from Europe attached to the roots of imported plants — and they got really comfortable, spreading all over the state.

Quoted: “You could look at the history of program evaluation and performance measurement as a cautionary tale of two children who were brought up in the same house but were raised by different tribes and aren’t so friendly with one another,” says Don Moynihan, a professor at the La Follette School of Public Affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “The [split has become] institutionalized in government.”

Noted: The shift is natural, and University of Wisconsin-Madison professor Kenneth Mayer said he expects more changes. “One would expect Rubio supporters to recalibrate,” he said. “It’s going to be interesting to see. “Mayer said it’s unclear exactly how that reshuffling of support among Wisconsin Republicans will play out before Election Day, but he said he expects it to start happening soon.