National Institute for Public Policy

Contemporary U.S. plans for the modernization of nuclear forces are an approximately 15-year-old legacy of the Obama Administration. They were not established in anticipation of the dramatic changes in the security environment since 2010—when it was assumed that a one-for-one replacement for the legacy nuclear delivery systems and the New START Treaty limit on nuclear weapon numbers would be more than adequate. Rather, the existing U.S. nuclear modernization program was established at a time when many U.S. officials continued to believe that U.S. relations with Russia and China were benign and would remain so, or improve further. How the contemporary nuclear program, largely inherited from the Obama Administration, fares over the next few years, and how the new presidential administration entering office in 2025 decides to adapt the U.S. nuclear posture for the much more dynamic and dangerous contemporary threat environment, will affect the US strategic and non-strategic nuclear posture for decades, and, correspondingly, U.S. deterrence strategies and options. Given the past four decades of deep U.S. strategic and non-strategic force reductions and the atrophying of the U.S. nuclear production infrastructure, the United States has a limited near-term capacity to strengthen its nuclear force posture in response to an unprecedentedly threatening security environment. Whatever may be the preferred future U.S. nuclear force posture and characteristics for deterrence and allied assurance purposes, the reality is that U.S. options for adjustment are largely limited through the early 2030s to uploading the existing Triad of nuclear forces. Doing so is the only near-term option to strengthen U.S. deterrence force numbers to meet looming threats.

For years, some of the highest ranking members of the U.S. military have warned about the growing Chinese nuclear threat. The annual DoD Chinese military power reports are the most authoritative assessment available but they have a poor track record assessing Chinese nuclear weapons. DoD estimates that China possessed 500+ warheads in May 2023, and will possess 1,000+ warheads in 2030 and about 1,500 in 2035 are almost certainly low. Indeed, 500+ in 2023 is mathematically impossible even with extremely unrealistic assumptions (e.g., no MIRVing). The Defense Department is assessing fewer warheads on the new Chinese MIRVed missiles than other open sources including the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force. Even if the DoD’s warhead projections are correct, China will achieve rough numerical parity with the United States in the mid-2030s. If the Defense Department is wrong, China could achieve superiority—­possessing several thousand nuclear weapons—within a few years.

This article investigates how Malaysia’s construction industry’s dependency on irregular foreign workers stems from recruitment frameworks that intertwine with exploitative industry practices. It examines current practices in the foreign workers’ recruitment in the construction sector by selected construction companies and the major factors in the recruitment policies that contribute to the reliance on and irregularity of foreign workers in the construction industry. This research uses a single-case study design involving G3 and G7 classified contractors, in-depth interviews with selected companies and utilizes the migration industry theory, deepened by the idea of bureaucratic informality. The current practices reveal challenges in recruitment method, high recruitment cost and lack of redress system. The results suggest high recruitment costs, bureaucratic challenges, and exploitative subcontracting practices contribute to the reliance on and irregularity of foreign workers in the construction industry. This research recommends comprehensive irregular foreign workers’ policy reforms to improve labour rights and exploitative industry practices.

Il paper, utilizzando più dataset, esamina le transizioni occupazionali e il ruolo che le competenze hanno nella transizione verde e nella mobilità occupazionale in Italia. A partire da studi passati, identifichiamo 28 General Green Skills (GGS), che comprendono principalmente competenze analitiche, tecniche e di monitoraggio, le quali si sovrappongono in modo significativo con le General Brown Skills (GBS), poiché 13 su 18 GBS sono presenti anche tra le GGS. L’articolo discute, inoltre, le diverse metodologie che possono essere adottate per costruire delle misure di distanza tra le competenze, valutando diverse alternative. La misura scelta, ottenuta dalla combinazione dell’analisi fattoriale con una distanza di Manhattan (non ponderata), risulta essere negativamente correlata con la mobilità occupazionale: la transizione verso occupazioni green attenua l'influenza della distanza delle competenze, mentre le competenze sembrano non avere un ruolo nelle transizioni tra le occupazioni brown.