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Millions of Americans forego medical care due to a lack of non-emergency transportation, particularly minorities, older adults, and those who have disabilities or chronic conditions. Our study investigates the potential for using timebanks—community-based voluntary services that encourage exchanges of services for “time dollars” rather than money—in interventions to address healthcare transportation barriers to seed design implications for a future affordable ridesharing platform. In partnership with a timebank and a federally qualified healthcare center (FQHC), 30 participants completed activity packets and 29 of them attended online workshop sessions. Our findings suggest that promoting trust between drivers and riders requires systems that prioritize safety and reliability; yet, there were discrepancies in the ability of the timebank and FQHC to moderate trust. We also found that timebank supports reciprocity, but healthcare transportation requires additional support to ensure balanced reciprocity. We explain these findings drawing from network closure and trust literature. Finally, we contribute design implications for systems that promote trust and facilitate relational over transactional interactions, which help to promote reciprocity and reflect participants’ values. 

Abstract Nonemployment is often posited as a worker’s outside option in wage-setting models such as bargaining and wage posting. The value of nonemployment is therefore a key determinant of wages. We measure the wage effect of changes in the value of nonemployment among initially employed workers. Our quasi-experimental variation in the value of nonemployment arises from four large reforms of unemployment insurance (UI) benefit levels in Austria. We document that wages are insensitive to UI benefit changes: point estimates imply a wage response of less than $0.01 per $1.00 UI benefit increase, and we can reject sensitivities larger than $0.03. The insensitivity holds even among workers with low wages and high predicted unemployment duration, and among job switchers hired out of unemployment. The insensitivity of wages to the nonemployment value presents a puzzle to the widely used Nash bargaining model, which predicts a sensitivity of $0.24–$0.48. Our evidence supports wage-setting models that insulate wages from the value of nonemployment. 

Abstract Necroptosis is a lytic, inflammatory form of cell death that not only contributes to pathogen clearance but can also lead to disease pathogenesis. Necroptosis is triggered by RIPK3-mediated phosphorylation of MLKL, which is thought to initiate MLKL oligomerisation, membrane translocation and membrane rupture, although the precise mechanism is incompletely understood. Here, we show that K63-linked ubiquitin chains are attached to MLKL during necroptosis and that ubiquitylation of MLKL at K219 significantly contributes to the cytotoxic potential of phosphorylated MLKL. The K219R MLKL mutation protects animals from necroptosis-induced skin damage and renders cells resistant to pathogen-induced necroptosis. Mechanistically, we show that ubiquitylation of MLKL at K219 is required for higher-order assembly of MLKL at membranes, facilitating its rupture and necroptosis. We demonstrate that K219 ubiquitylation licenses MLKL activity to induce lytic cell death, suggesting that necroptotic clearance of pathogens as well as MLKL-dependent pathologies are influenced by the ubiquitin-signalling system.