Women and plant closings: Unemployment,re-employment,and job training enrollment following dislocation

Major changes in the U.S. economy are leaving blue collar women vulnerable to extended unemployment, permanent job loss, or re-employment at lower wage and benefit levels. Consequently, retraining for other jobs may be a virtual necessity. Information about factors associated with women's employment status after job loss may be useful to policy makers and program planners providing assistance or training to dislocated women. This study of women workers, who are dislocated from jobs in textile and apparel plants in Georgia, identifies the differences between women who are unemployed, re-employed, or enrolled in job training programs following job loss. Findings suggest that stage of the family life cycle and the demands of combining production work and family responsibilities contribute to women's experience of unemployment and their labor market participation.     

The effect of education on unemployment duration

Exploiting the variation in education induced by a reform that compelled individuals to obtain additional schooling in Turkey, and using administrative unemployment insurance (UI) records, we show that high-educated unemployed workers, compared to their low-educated counterparts, use unemployment benefits longer, and they are less likely to find employment before their benefit periods expire. This suggests education increases one's selectiveness over jobs. We also show benefit generosity impacts the high- versus low-educated differentially. Extended benefits increase low-educated workers' probability of finding employment more than the high-educated. Our findings highlight the importance of considering worker attributes when designing the UI system.     

Unemployment classifications and subjective well-being

Further research on the impact of unemployment on workers and their families requires greater refinement and more precise measurement of the concept. While previous studies have indicated the effects of unemployment on a wide range of variables, such as health and well-being, many of these studies suffer from imprecision by conceptualizing unemployment too narrowly and by using too strict a dichotomy between currently employed and currently unemployed workers. This research effort attempts to broaden and refine the concept of unemployment by defining it in terms of two job dimensions: current employment status and previous job loss. Using this conceptualization, the authors find that current unemployment after other job losses may have more devastating effects on well-being than losing one's job for the first time. Similarly, among the currently employed, those who have lost jobs in the past may experience more emotional difficulties than those who have never lost their jobs.     

EU-Mediterranean youths in the crisis: substitution vs. income effect

The economic crisis that erupted in 2008 has had particularly adverse effects on the youth labour market outcomes in the European Union Mediterranean economies. So far little evidence is available on the reaction of the young to the adverse conditions their household members faced due to the crisis. Youths could have decided to prolong or stay in education instead of participating on the labour market (substitution effect) or they could have decided to increase their participation (income effect). By using the EU Labour Force Survey data, we explore the probability of young adults changing their labour market status from (i) inactivity to employment, (ii) inactivity to unemployment, (iii) employment to education, and (iv) unemployment to education in response to labour market outcome changes in their households: (i) both parents losing the job; (ii) one of the parents losing the job, (iii) both parents becoming inactive, (iv) one of the parents becoming inactive, and (v) both parents remaining unemployed. Estimated probit models include seven EU Mediterranean countries during the 2006–2015 period. Results support both income and substitution effect, without clear identification of the dominance of one effect over the other.     

School-to-work transition: the case of Spanish NEETs

The school-to-work transition in Spain has become much more difficult and extended than before, with many young people today experiencing long periods of temporary employment, unemployment or inactivity. This article investigates the main socio-demographic characteristics of Spanish young people not in education, employment or training (NEETs). It also aims to compare them with their non-NEET counterparts in terms of social capital and family background. Analyses were based on a representative sample, corresponding to the year 2016, of Spanish young individuals ages 18–35 years (n?=?1.826). All analyses were stratified by gender and age group. Overall, the Spanish NEETs had lower educational levels, were mainly unemployed and married, except for NEETs between 18 and 24 years, who were rather inactive and single. They also experienced previous unemployment, had more unemployed friends, and were coming from poorer family backgrounds in comparison with their non-NEET counterparts.     

The Effect of Unemployment Insurance on Temporary Help Services Employment

A model with fixed effects and controls for state-specific linear time trends is developed to analyze the influence of state unemployment insurance taxes on temporary help services employment using state level panel data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages. Prior research has shown that imperfect experience rating of unemployment insurance taxes increases temporary layoffs and that, conversely, more extensive experience rating leads to a decrease in temporary layoffs. The current analysis demonstrates that more extensive experience rating increases temporary help services agency-intermediated temporary employment. To the extent that the increase in temporary help services employment represents a substitution of temporary help services jobs for traditional direct hire jobs, it implies a negative effect on job quality. Steps to address low unemployment insurance recipiency rates by temporary help services workers may alleviate the impact of unemployment insurance tax structures on temporary help services employment.     

Befristete Beschäftigung: Chance oder Risiko?

The paper investigates whether increased labor market flexibility leads to a reinforcement of the existing segmentation of the labor market or whether it is dismantling the barriers in the labor market. Using spell data (employment and unemployment periods) from the German Socio-economic Panel (GSOEP, time period: 1984–1999) both determinants of fixed-term contracts and their consequences (renewed temporary employment, unemployment) are investigated with the help of random-effects logit-models. The results show that respondents’ characteristics (amount and type of human capital, formerly experienced periods of unemployment), structural variables (branch, firm size), and occupational characteristics (position, marginal employment) are influencing the risk of getting a temporary job. Furthermore it becomes evident that fixed-term contracts are increasing the risk of getting a temporary job again or of becoming unemployed after termination of the temporary job. These results show that fixed-term contracts above all are part of the secondary labor market, and that they especially have negative consequences for the employees in this segment. On the other hand fixed-term contracts can be seen as a chance in the way that they offer at least an alternative to unemployment. Hence, a too narrow evaluation of temporary employment would be too simplistic.     

Replication: Emotional well-being and unemployment – Evidence from the American time-use survey

We use data from the well-being module of the American Time-Use Survey (ATUS) 2010–2013 to reexamine the relationship between unemployment and emotional well-being. We replicate two previous studies (Krueger & Mueller, 2012; Dolan, Kudrna, & Stone, 2017) which have produced differing findings on this relationship, and analyze what factors cause the differences in their outcomes. We find that the results critically depend on the definition of employment statuses and the choice of well-being measure. The unemployed appear sadder and more in pain than the employed, but no other emotion queried in the ATUS has worse values for the unemployed than for the employed. Aggregate emotional well-being measures suggest that unemployment is not negatively related to emotional well-being. Applying a wider instead of narrow definition of unemployment tends to result in better emotional well-being scores for the unemployed, mainly because job leavers and new or re-entrants into the labor market report better emotions than the group of people who are unemployed due to an involuntary job loss.     

The use of alternative work arrangements by the jobless: Evidence from the CAEAS/CPS

Alternative work arrangements (AWAs), such as contracting, consulting, and temporary work, have been criticized as providing only atypical, even precarious, employment. Yet they may also allow workers to locate suitable job matches. Exploiting data from four Contingent and Alternative Employment Arrangement Supplements to the Current Population Survey, we investigate the initial job-finding strategies pursued by the unemployed. Within the narrow window offered by the data, we find that unemployed workers who become reemployed are more likely to find work in AWAs than in regular, open-ended employment. When we evaluate the use of AWAs against unemployment, there is also evidence that the jobless are entering AWAs as pathways out of their initial labor market state.     

Unemployment duration and personality

This paper focuses on the role personality traits play in determining individual unemployment duration. We argue that a worker’s job search intensity is decisively driven by her personality traits, reflected in her propensity to motivate and control herself while searching for a job. Moreover, personality traits, in as far as they can be signaled to a potential employer, may also enhance the probability of receiving and accepting a job offer.For our econometric duration analysis, we use the well-accepted taxonomy “Big Five” to classify personality traits. Based on individual unemployment data taken from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) our empirical findings reveal that the personality traits Conscientiousness and Neuroticism have a strong impact on the instantaneous probability of finding a job, where the former has a positive effect and the latter has a negative effect. The direction of the effect on the subsequent employment duration is the opposite. We do not find any significant effects of the personality traits Extraversion and Agreeableness on the duration of unemployment. The personality trait Openness eases finding a job only for female unemployed workers and workers with migration background.     

Reducing unemployment: Lay beliefs about how to reduce current unemployment

Whereas most psychological work on unemployment has concerned how people react to being unemployed, considerably less has concerned peoples' explanations for and attitudes towards unemployment. This study was concerned with lay peoples' perceived cures for current unemployment. It was argued that these perceptions both influence and are influenced by current economic policy options. A quasi-representative sample of nearly 450 people answered one open-ended and six closed questions. The results showed a wide variety of perceived ways of reducing unemployment ranging from stimulating the economy to provide more jobs to redistributing existing jobs. However, the ratings of the six specific questions revealed that there was little agreement between the subjects with regard to job sharing, reducing working hours and women giving up their jobs. Further, there were some interesting and predictable sex, age and employment history differences in the subjects' response. The results are discussed in terms of the role of lay beliefs in the economy, the literature on unemployment and possibilities for future research.     

Regional unemployment,gender, and time allocation of the unemployed

This paper analyzes the relationship between time allocation decisions of the unemployed, gender, and regional unemployment rates. Using two cross-sections from the 2002–2003 and 2009–2010 Spanish Time Use Surveys, we find that higher regional unemployment rates are associated with increases in the time devoted to study by men. Regional unemployment rates are also associated with more time devoted to household production, particularly for unemployed men and women living in a couple, and to less time devoted to leisure, particularly for unemployed men with a working partner and unemployed women not living in a couple. We interpret our findings as evidence favoring consumption smoothing. Higher regional unemployment rates imply a lower availability of jobs for the unemployed, it reduces individual expectations of finding a job, and thus households may try to increase their time spent on household production to reduce market expenditures and thus maintain their consumption constant. Increases in the time devoted to household production during business cycles need to be considered in the analysis of the wellbeing of the unemployed. Consumption smoothing may imply increased wellbeing, but more time devoted to household production is associated with lower experienced utility of individuals throughout the day.     

An alternative look at temporary workers, their choices, and the growth in temporary employment

We examine temporary workers (temps), their choices, and growth in temporary employment. We find that some people choose a temporary job because they desire greater schedule flexibility, particularly students and women with children. For most, however, weaker permanent job opportunities drive them into temporary positions. Using the 1995 and 1997 Current Population Surveys (CPS) we find that both the percentage of the work force in temporary jobs and the absolute number of temps declined when applying a new CPS-based measure of temporary. This is in stark contrast to the rising percentage found in several previous studies when looking only at workers in personnel supply services and clearly questions prior claims and concerns about growth in the temporary work force. The authors thank Petra Todd for her help and valuable suggestions and comments. We are also grateful to Richard Rogerson for his comments. All remaining mistakes are ours.     

Temporary employment experiences of women on welfare

Females with recent participation in public welfare are a disproportionate and growing share of temporary help services firm employees. Research documenting low earnings, frequent job transitions, and low benefit rates among temporary workers has raised concerns that welfare recipients taking these jobs might have poorer labor market outcomes than those entering permanent positions. My findings show that a majority of welfare recipients working in temporary jobs were satisfied with their pay and working conditions and did not earn much less than those in other jobs. They did report, however, high levels of dissatisfaction with the lack of employment benefits received, and their annual earnings were still very low, reflecting chronic job instability that is endemic to the welfare population.     

Labour market turnover in Latin America: How intensive is it and to what extent does it differ across countries?

The study of labour market turnover is particularly significant in Latin America, which is characterized by marked economic cycles and limited social protection coverage. This article estimates the intensity of transitions from employment in six countries in Latin America in the new millennium and decomposes the differences observed, furthermore evaluating the employment destinations of workers making such transitions. The countries under analysis show very different turnover rates, which are mostly explained by a dissimilar incidence of informal and temporary employment. In all cases, a large share of job exits imply transitions to precarious jobs or unemployment.     

The social consequences of unemployment in hungary—a household perspective

In this article the following hypotheses are tested using the Hungarian Household Panel Survey and the SOCO data: (a) Poverty is more likely to be felt by ‘unemployed’ households (i.e. households in which one or more members are unemployed) than by ‘non‐unemployment’ households (i.e. households in which none of the members are unemployed); and (b) A household is more likely to be poor if the head of the household becomes unemployed rather than if the spouse or one of the elder children do. The analysis shows that unemployment is closely related to all aspects of poverty (e.g. income, expenditure, and subjective‐poverty), but this association is especially strong in the case of income. It also demonstrates that poverty is more likely when the head of the household, rather than any other member of the household, becomes unemployed. After controlling for all variables we see that when the head of the household becomes unemployed the probability of being poor increases only with regard to income‐ and subjective‐poverty. Wealth‐ and housing‐poverty are not influenced by unemployment in the household. By comparison, in the other Central European countries, when the head of the household becomes unemployed, the probability of being poor increases in all aspects of poverty. This finding suggests that unemployment in Hungary seems to be less devastating than in other post‐socialist countries.     

Is Any Job Better than No Job? Life Satisfaction and Re-employment

Using data for West Germany from the German Socio-Economic Panel, we analyse the impact of transitions from unemployment to full-time employment on life satisfaction, with special focus on the influence of job quality. We apply various indicators of job quality (self-reported job satisfaction, wages, type of contract, and indicators of the fit between the worker and job requirements). We control for the influence of income changes and other factors affecting life satisfaction, using a conditional logit estimator. Results suggest that job quality only matters to some extent, and often people in bad jobs are still better off than those who remain unemployed. This effect is statistically significant for most indicators of job quality, except for workers with low job satisfaction and for those whose new job is much worse than their pre-unemployment job.     

Is Starting a Business a Sustainable way out of Unemployment? Treatment Effects of the Swedish Start-up Subsidy

In this paper, we evaluate the Swedish self-employment start-up program based on a matching approach using data from administrative records. In addition to information of labor market history, traditional human capital and socio-economic variables, the data at hand also include information on the self-employment history of participants and nonparticipants as well as that of their parents. Our results indicate that the start-up subsidy program for unemployed persons is a successful program regarding the integration of the unemployed into the mainstream of the labor market. We find that, relative to members of control groups, participants, on average, have an increased probability of unsubsidized employment. Our analysis of different educational backgrounds presents the strongest employment effects for the low educated unemployed.     

Neighborhood effects of high unemployment rates: Welfare implications among different social groups

This study analyzes spillover effects of high unemployment rates on well-being using cross-sectional data for Germany. Context effects among the employed arise due to the informational character of high unemployment rates. Using data on job security perceptions as well as regional unemployment rates the paper shows that high unemployment rates cause negative externalities among the employed. In addition, subjective perceptions of job security depend on local labor market conditions indicating the informational value of employment data. For unemployed persons we cannot find any welfare gains owing to a social norm effect. Thus, the existence of a public bad is not more enjoyable the more people suffer from the public bad.     

Lessons for microenterprise programs from a fresh look at the unemployment insurance self-employment demonstration

Microenterprise programs aim to foster self-employment among the poor, those on welfare, and the unemployed. The only experimental test of their impact is the Unemployment Insurance Self-Employment Demonstration (UISED). UISED did shorten unemployment spells, but most other impacts were small and the most disadvantaged did not choose to participate. Although UISED provides some weak evidence that long-term income support, long-term work-search waivers, and on-call advice may increase total employment (but perhaps not self-employment) more than capital infusions and up-front classes, UISED does not reveal the best design for microenterprise programs or whether such programs are good social investments.