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environdemography.bsky.social
Yue Sun
@environdemography.bsky.social
990 followers 380 following 58 posts
Postdoctoral Associate @CU Boulder | PhD @Syracuse University | Rural Demographer and Medical Sociologist | Health, Environment, and Geography
https://sites.google.com/view/ysun27/home
Posts Replies Media Videos
Reposted by Yue Sun
itsafronomics.bsky.social
Why should you 🫵🏿 care about SNAP? SNAP recipients saw:

- Improved life expectancy
- Lower chance of incarceration
- Lowers chance of poverty
- Lived in better neighborhoods
- Higher human capital

SNAP keeps our neighbors fed, communities safer, and kids educated. Also people are HUNGRY. DUH!
Is the Social Safety Net a Long-Term Investment? Large-Scale Evidence from the Food Stamps Program Martha J. Bailey, Hilary W. Hoynes, Maya Rossin-Slater & Reed Walker X LinkedIn Facebook Bluesky Threads Email Link Working Paper 26942 DOI 10.3386/w26942 Issue Date April 2020 We use novel, large-scale data on 43 million Americans from the 2000 Census and the 2001 to 2013 American Communities Survey linked to the Social Security Administration’s NUMIDENT to study how a policy-driven increase in economic resources for families affects children’s long-term outcomes. Using variation from the county-level roll-out of the Food Stamps program between 1961 and 1975, we find that children with access to greater economic resources before age five experience an increase of 6 percent of a standard deviation in their adult human capital, 3 percent of a standard deviation in their adult economic self-sufficiency, 8 percent of a standard deviation in the quality of their adult neighborhoods, 0.4 percentage-point increase in longevity, and a 0.5 percentage-point decrease in likelihood of being incarcerated. Based on these estimates, we conclude that Food Stamps’ transfer of resources to families is a highly cost-effective investment into young children, yielding a marginal value of public funds of approximately 56.
October 31, 2025 at 11:12 AM
Reposted by Yue Sun
agwaterdesk.bsky.social
Climate Central has brought back the U.S. Billion Dollar Weather and Climate Disasters database, tracking the nation’s costliest storms, floods, and fires. In the first six months of 2025, there were 14 events totaling $101 billion in losses.

Read more from Desk reporter Hêctor Alejandro Arzate.
A tool tracking billion dollar disasters is active again after being retired by Trump administration - VernonReporter
It shows that in 2025, approximately $40 billion in damage was caused by severestorms and tornadoes that struck states like Illinois, Missouri, Tennessee, and others. Oct. 28, 2025 Byline: Héctor Alej...
vernonreporter.com
October 28, 2025 at 6:12 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
paulgp.com
Appendix A7 most striking graph for me:
October 26, 2025 at 5:52 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
spattersearch.bsky.social
Check out this interview with Shu Xu where she discusses her recent Innovation in Aging article on vision loss and falls that uses @nhats-nsoc.bsky.social data:

eyeonvision.blogspot.com/2025/09/visi...
Vision Loss and Falls Leading To Greater Mortality Risk And Female Sex Hormones Affect On RP In Mice
Dr. Shu Xu (University of Michigan Institute For Social Research - Ann Arbor, MI) Dr. Katherine Wert (University of Texas - Southwestern - D...
eyeonvision.blogspot.com
October 17, 2025 at 12:29 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
ybytata.bsky.social
A must read on Data Centers
www.distilled.earth/p/these-data...
These Data Centers Are Getting Really, Really Big
Gigawatt-sized data centers are becoming the new normal
www.distilled.earth
October 16, 2025 at 7:35 PM
environdemography.bsky.social
I wonder how many people will attend the 2026 PAA. I submitted my abstract this afternoon (one day before the due), and my submission was numbered ~ 1,600. Last year, I submitted my abstract three days before the deadline and was numbered ~ 4,300. For real?
October 5, 2025 at 1:49 AM
Reposted by Yue Sun
virginiagewin.bsky.social
Such an amazing life and legacy. RIP.
Jane Goodall, renowned chimpanzee researcher and animal advocate, dies at 91
"Dr. Goodall's discoveries as an ethologist revolutionized science, and she was a tireless advocate for the protection and restoration of our natural world," the Jane Goodall Institute said in a Wedne...
www.nbcnews.com
October 1, 2025 at 6:18 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
dremmazang.bsky.social
New in American Journal of Epidemiology! doi.org/10.1093/aje/...
Validate User
doi.org
October 1, 2025 at 2:51 AM
Reposted by Yue Sun
moreperfectunion.bsky.social
Today, 33% of all the electricity used in Oregon is attributed to data centers.

In Virginia, it’s 37%.

www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
AI Data Centers Use a Lot of Energy. You May Be Paying for It
AI data centers are pushing up energy costs all over the US. On today’s Big Take podcast: an investigation into who's footing the bill.
www.bloomberg.com
September 30, 2025 at 7:54 PM
environdemography.bsky.social
I am a sociologist living with cows
conradhackett.bsky.social Conrad Hackett @conradhackett.bsky.social · Sep 15
Below is a clever visualization of the distribution of how land is used in the US. Cows roam over a lot of land!

But this is not a map - for example, the 100 largest landowning families aren't confined to Florida.
This is a cartogram depicting the share of land associated with various purposes in the United States. From https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-us-land-use/#xj4y7vzkg
September 15, 2025 at 8:49 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
davidho.bsky.social
Check out this Interview with @aripeskoe.bsky.social to hear about how ratepayers are covering the costs of the infrastructure needed to support the surge in AI and data centers.
How AI infrastructure is driving a sharp rise in electricity bills
Electricity bills are climbing nationwide, rising faster than inflation in many places. The explosive growth of AI and the massive data centers behind it are driving demand and straining the grid. To ...
www.pbs.org
September 8, 2025 at 9:22 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
pengzell.bsky.social
WE ARE HIRING! 2 Lecturers in Quantitative Social Science. Want a friendly interdisciplinary department in one of the world's most vibrant cities? This just might be for you.

Apply by: 10 Oct

www.ucl.ac.uk/work-at-ucl/...
September 1, 2025 at 1:59 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
ruettenauer.bsky.social
Do people have less #Kids because of the #ClimateCrisis? 🌍👶

In our preprint, @katyaoivanova.bsky.social and I find that environmentalists are less likely to have kids in their 20s and 30s... But by their early 40s, the gap closes.

Maybe it's rather about #Postponement? 🕰️

🔗 doi.org/10.31235/osf...
September 1, 2025 at 1:59 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
evanrobertsnz.bsky.social
Not to be the bearer of bad news, but in North America the university semester is starting ... This table of different types of classes has been useful for me in explaining to students* the structure of the class that I'm teaching
* and to myself ... see next post
drive.google.com/file/d/1-hKG...
August 25, 2025 at 6:59 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
ploya.bsky.social
🚨 OUT NOW! Our new @science.org study led by @kohrathefog.bsky.social is the first to comprehensively quantify the health impacts of and inequities in outdoor air pollution exposure across all stages of the US oil and gas lifecycle: extraction ➡️ transport/storage ➡️ refining/processing ➡️ end-use. 🧵
August 24, 2025 at 10:30 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
dingdingpeng.the100.ci
Ever stared at a table of regression coefficients & wondered what you're doing with your life?

Very excited to share this gentle introduction to another way of making sense of statistical models (w @vincentab.bsky.social)
Preprint: doi.org/10.31234/osf...
Website: j-rohrer.github.io/marginal-psy...
Models as Prediction Machines: How to Convert Confusing Coefficients into Clear Quantities Abstract Psychological researchers usually make sense of regression models by interpreting coefficient estimates directly. This works well enough for simple linear models, but is more challenging for more complex models with, for example, categorical variables, interactions, non-linearities, and hierarchical structures. Here, we introduce an alternative approach to making sense of statistical models. The central idea is to abstract away from the mechanics of estimation, and to treat models as “counterfactual prediction machines,” which are subsequently queried to estimate quantities and conduct tests that matter substantively. This workflow is model-agnostic; it can be applied in a consistent fashion to draw causal or descriptive inference from a wide range of models. We illustrate how to implement this workflow with the marginaleffects package, which supports over 100 different classes of models in R and Python, and present two worked examples. These examples show how the workflow can be applied across designs (e.g., observational study, randomized experiment) to answer different research questions (e.g., associations, causal effects, effect heterogeneity) while facing various challenges (e.g., controlling for confounders in a flexible manner, modelling ordinal outcomes, and interpreting non-linear models). Figure illustrating model predictions. On the X-axis the predictor, annual gross income in Euro. On the Y-axis the outcome, predicted life satisfaction. A solid line marks the curve of predictions on which individual data points are marked as model-implied outcomes at incomes of interest. Comparing two such predictions gives us a comparison. We can also fit a tangent to the line of predictions, which illustrates the slope at any given point of the curve. A figure illustrating various ways to include age as a predictor in a model. On the x-axis age (predictor), on the y-axis the outcome (model-implied importance of friends, including confidence intervals). Illustrated are 1. age as a categorical predictor, resultings in the predictions bouncing around a lot with wide confidence intervals 2. age as a linear predictor, which forces a straight line through the data points that has a very tight confidence band and 3. age splines, which lies somewhere in between as it smoothly follows the data but has more uncertainty than the straight line.
August 25, 2025 at 11:49 AM
Reposted by Yue Sun
pengzell.bsky.social
Good to see growing support for abduction or 'inference to the best explanation', recently by Spirling and Stewart in @thejop.bsky.social. This is...

www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10....
August 21, 2025 at 7:35 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
asociologist.bsky.social
I am a huge fan of "what is this kind of argument and how can you do it right?" papers. I collect them and I've tried to write a couple, and think they can be tremendously useful especially for teaching. A new, useful addition to this set just arrived from @sociologicalsci.bsky.social:
How to Make a Functionalist Argument
Article: How to Make a Functionalist Argument | Sociological Science | Posted August 14, 2025
sociologicalscience.com
August 20, 2025 at 4:27 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
jeremylevine.bsky.social
I...did not care for the argument, no. Outside of this case, the journal has been publishing some odd pieces, e.g., link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Should PhD students drink more? - Theory and Society
This essay examines the declining alcohol consumption among PhD students and its implications for academic social life. Drawing on Slingerland’s (2021) evolutionary framework, I suggest that moderate ...
link.springer.com
August 15, 2025 at 5:47 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
readdemography.bsky.social
“Female Advantages in Education & Union Formation”: @danielaurbinaj.bsky.social uses DHS & Colombia census data to assess changes in union entry & assortative mating in a middle-income setting where women are, overall, better educated. @uscsociology.bsky.social read.dukeupress.edu/demography/a...
August 13, 2025 at 1:36 PM
environdemography.bsky.social
When I need it for an RR, ArcMap is retired.
RIP ArcMap
August 7, 2025 at 6:13 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
michaeldgreen.phd
I grew up hearing relatives describe feeling brushed off in clinics and spoken to like their concerns were a nuisance. Those stories pushed me toward a PhD in Population Health Sciences and my 1st project on discrimination in healthcare. @journalgim.bsky.social

link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Factors Associated with Perceived Discrimination in Healthcare Among United States Middle-aged and Older Adults - Journal of General Internal Medicine
Background Discrimination in healthcare settings impedes quality care, leading to poorer health outcomes. Objective To examine racial differences in perceived discrimination in healthcare settings acr...
link.springer.com
August 5, 2025 at 9:36 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
emilyparker.bsky.social
📣 Hot off the press 📣
We document tremendous growth in U.S. federal place-based funding, show it has disproportionately gone to areas with more nonprofits & stronger housing markets, and find a pattern of cumulative advantage in funding among high-poverty neighborhoods.

doi.org/10.1093/sf/s...
Federal place-based policy and the geography of inequality in the United States, 1990–2019
Abstract. This paper assesses the growth and spatial distribution of federal place-based policies in the United States. Using a novel dataset of federal pl
doi.org
July 29, 2025 at 9:00 PM
Reposted by Yue Sun
leafiaye.bsky.social
🚨 Job alert: The Department of Sociology at the University of Toronto is hiring an Assistant Professor in the Sociology of Race and Ethnicity.
jobs.utoronto.ca/job/Toronto-...

I'll be at ASA and would be happy to chat with interested candidates. Please share widely! #Socsky
A picture of the toronto skyline
July 16, 2025 at 6:10 PM