Economic Benefits of Self‐Employment for Canadian Immigrants

This paper evaluates the economic benefits of self‐employment in Canada for 12 groups of ethno‐racial immigrants. It tests whether or not their self‐employment earnings are higher or lower than similar groups in wage and salary employment, whether ethnic minorities earn more or less from self‐employment compared to White immigrants, and whether self‐employment earnings of immigrant groups vary by their industrial sectors of employment. Using the Canadian Census 2006, I show that self‐employed ethno‐racial immigrants earn less than White immigrants. I also show that the economic benefits of self‐employment depend on the ethno‐racial groups and the industrial mix of their self‐employment. Cet article évalue les avantages économiques du travail indépendant au Canada pour 12 groupes d'immigrés ethnoraciaux. Il teste si les revenus du travail indépendant sont supérieurs ou inférieurs aux groupes similaires au sujet de salaire et de travail avec le salaire annuel, si les minorités ethniques gagnent plus ou moins de travail indépendant par rapport aux immigrés blancs, et si les revenus du travail indépendant des groupes immigrés varient par leurs secteurs industriels de travail. En utilisant le Recensement du Canada de 2006, je montre que les immigrés ethnoraciaux qui sont indépendants gagnent moins que les immigrés blancs. Je montre aussi que les avantages économiques dépendent des groupes ethnoraciaux et du mélange industriel de leur travail indépendant.     

Dimensions of Precariousness in an Emerging Sector of Self‐Employment: A Study of Self‐Employed Nurses

Changing economic ideologies and a new emphasis on entrepreneurial opportunities have led to a rise in self‐employment in Canada, especially among women. Although some people benefit from self‐employment, it is considered to be a precarious form of employment. Despite a growing body of literature on gender and self‐employment, there is more to learn about its precarious nature across industries and types of entrepreneurs. This ethnographic study examines the experiences of self‐employed nurses in order to better understand self‐employment in professional caring work. In some ways, these nurses' experiences fit with what is known about female self‐employment but this specific sector highlights how precariousness can take different forms across different areas of work. In particular, this study reveals new insights about the complexity and ambiguity of precariousness.     

Self‐Employment among Same‐Sex and Opposite‐Sex Couples in Canada

This study presents novel evidence on the relationship between sexual orientation and self‐employment. Using data from the 2001 and 2006 Census of Canada and the 2011 Canadian National Household Survey, we explore the propensity for self‐employment among same‐ and opposite‐sex couples. We examine the demographic, human capital, and family characteristics of coupled gay men and lesbians relative to their coupled heterosexual counterparts to offer potential mechanisms generating differences in rates of self‐employment. Our analysis further considers occupational variability in the likelihood of self‐employment. We find that gay men are less likely and lesbians more likely than heterosexuals to be self‐employed; however, there is significant variation across occupations. Gay men are more likely to be self‐employed in arts and culture, sales and service, and natural and applied sciences, but less likely in business, finance, and health‐related occupations. Lesbians are much more likely to be self‐employed in health‐related occupations, natural and applied sciences, and arts and culture. Marriage and having children are significant predictors of self‐employment for coupled heterosexual women but not lesbians. Cette étude présente des évidences empiriques concernant la relation entre l'orientation sexuelle et le travail indépendant. Utilisant des données provenant du Recensement du Canada de 2001 et de 2006, ainsi que l'Enquête nationale auprès des ménages (ENM) de 2011, nous explorons la tendance du travail indépendant parmi les couples de même sexe et ceux de sexe opposé. Ainsi, nous examinons les caractéristiques démographiques, du capital humain et familiales des couples gais et lesbiens par rapport à leurs homologues hétérosexuels, afin de démontrer une corrélation entre l'orientation sexuelle et la probabilité d’être travailleur indépendant – une causation qui nous semble évident et que nous analysons plus en profondeur. Nous concluons d'ailleurs que les hommes gais sont moins probables – et les lesbiennes plus probables – d’être travailleurs indépendants que les hétérosexuels. Cependant, il existe des variantes significatives entre les différentes occupations. Les hommes homosexuels tendent plutôt à être travailleurs indépendants dans les domaines des arts et de la culture, la vente et les services, ainsi que les sciences pures et les sciences naturelles. Par contre, ils le sont moins dans les domaines des affaires, de la finance et des domaines reliés à la santé. De leur côté, les femmes homosexuelles tendent plutôt à être travailleuses indépendantes dans les domaines reliés à la santé, aux sciences pures et aux sciences naturelles, ainsi qu'aux arts et la culture. Finalement, le fait d’être marié et d'avoir des enfants sont des indicateurs significatifs du travail indépendant pour les femmes en couples hétérosexuels, mais pas pour les lesbiennes.     

The Business of Caring: Women's Self‐Employment and the Marketization of Care

Our goal in this article is to contribute to a differentiated analysis of paid caring work by considering whether and how women's experiences of such work is shaped by their employment status (for example, self‐employed versus employee) and the nature of care provided (direct or indirect). Self‐employed care workers have not been widely studied compared with other types of care workers, such as employees providing domestic or childcare in private firms or private homes. Yet their experiences may be quite distinct. Existing research suggests that self‐employed workers earn less than employees and are often excluded from employment protection. Nonetheless, they often report greater autonomy and job satisfaction in their day‐to‐day work. Understanding more about the experiences of self‐employed caregivers is thus important for enriching existing theory, research and policy on the marketization of care. Addressing this gap, our article explores the working conditions, pay and levels of satisfaction of care workers who are self‐employed. We draw on interviews from a small‐scale study of Canadian women engaged in providing direct care (for example, childcare) and indirect care (for example, cleaning).     

Contextualizing the Education Effect on Women's Employment: A Cross‐National Comparative Analysis

The authors examine how and why the effect of education on women's employment varies cross‐nationally. First, they present a theoretical model that (a) outlines the micro‐level mechanisms underlying education effects on women's employment in the couple context and (b) proposes contextual moderators at the country level. Second, they test the theoretical model against survey data from the United Nations' Generations and Gender Programme for 5 European countries (Austria, France, Germany, Hungary, and Norway). The data comprise 10,048 educationally homogamous heterosexual couples involving a woman age 20–45. The results indicate that more highly educated couples are more likely to have dual‐earner arrangements in each country, yet the strength of education effects varied substantially between countries and across the family life cycle. In contrast to prior work, the authors find that education effects are not generally smaller in countries that are supportive of women's employment. This relation holds only for later child‐rearing phases.     

Career Decision Self‐Efficacy of Asian American Students: The Role of Curiosity and Ethnic Identity

This study examined the role of curiosity and ethnic identity in career decision self‐efficacy among Asian American college students. Given that curiosity can promote the process of exploring one’s possible future self, opportunities, and career goals, the authors hypothesized that curiosity would be associated with career decision self‐efficacy, directly or indirectly, through a sense of ethnic identity. Results based on data from 425 Asian American incoming first‐year college students suggest that students with high curiosity tend to present a stronger sense of competence in completing career decision‐related tasks. These findings also confirmed a hypothesis that ethnic identity mediates the association between curiosity and career decision self‐efficacy. Implications for future research and career counseling with Asian American college students are discussed.     

The Development of Body Self‐Awareness

Two experiments examined toddlers' performance on a new task designed to examine the development of body self‐awareness. The new task was conceived from observations by Piaget (1953/1977) and theoretical work from Povinelli and Cant (1995) and involved a toy shopping cart to the back of which a small mat had been attached. Children were asked to push the cart to their mothers but in attempting to do so they had to step on the mat and in consequence, their body weight prevented the cart from moving. In the first experiment, performance on the shopping cart task was examined in children of 16 and 21 months both when the self was the obstacle and when a heavy weight was the obstacle. Results showed significant improvement with age in performance for the self‐version of the task that was not matched by similar age differences in the weight task. In the second experiment, children's performance on both the self‐version of the shopping cart and on a standard mirror self‐recognition task was assessed. Results showed a significant correlation independent of age for these 2 tasks. These findings provide further evidence for the notion that toddlers develop an objective awareness of the self during the 2nd year. They are also consistent with the idea that body self‐awareness is heightened in situations requiring self‐monitoring during movement.     

Ethnic Enclaves,Networks and Self‐Employment among Middle Eastern Immigrants in Sweden

The proportion of immigrants from countries in the Middle East living in Sweden has increased since the 1970s, and it is a well‐known fact that immigrants from the Middle East suffer from low earnings and high rates of unemployment on the Swedish labour market. There are often great hopes that self‐employment will enable immigrants to improve their labour market situation. Further, in Sweden as in many other countries, the question of whether the existence of ethnic enclaves are good or bad for immigrants’ earnings and employment opportunities has also been widely debated. This paper presents a study of the extent to which Middle Eastern ethnic enclaves and networks in Sweden enhance or hinder immigrants’ self‐employment. The results show that the presence of ethnic enclaves increases the propensity for self‐employment. Thus, immigrants in ethnic enclaves provide their co‐ethnics with goods and services that Swedish natives are not able to provide. The results also show that ethnic networks seem to be an obstacle to immigrant self‐employment. One explanation is that an increase in network size implies increased competition for customers among self‐employed immigrants. The question of whether ethnic enclaves are good or bad for the integration of immigrants into the labour market has been widely debated. The results of this paper provide us with information about the integration puzzle. Ethnic enclaves seem to enhance self‐employment propensities among Middle Eastern immigrants in Sweden.     

Racialized Incorporation: The Effects of Race and Generational Status on Self‐Employment and Industry‐Sector Prestige in the United States

This study examines how race and generational status shape self‐employment propensities and industry‐sector prestige among the self‐employed in the U.S. It draws on theories of assimilation, racialization, and a combined framework, racialized incorporation, to guide the analysis and interpret the results. It uses data from the U.S. March Current Population Survey (2000–2010) offering the first nationally representative examination of second‐generation self‐employment in the U.S. This study investigates three questions. First, do the odds of being self‐employed decline in the second and third generations? Second, do generational patterns in self‐employment propensities vary by race? And finally, do race and generational status affect the odds of being self‐employed in low‐, medium‐, and high‐prestige industry sectors? Results offer some support for the assimilation perspective: Immigrants are generally more likely than third‐generation groups to be self‐employed with the exception of Asians, where second‐generation Asians have the greatest odds of being self‐employed. However, results also reveal that generational patterns in self‐employment propensities vary by race and industry‐sector prestige. Accordingly, first‐ and second‐generation whites have the greatest odds of being self‐employed (across all levels of industry‐sector prestige), and third‐generation whites are more likely than all generations of blacks and Hispanics to be engaged in high‐prestige self‐employment. These findings suggest that immigrants, their offspring, and native‐born groups undergo a racialized incorporation in which self‐employment is organized along hierarchical and racial lines associated with uneven levels of prestige.     

Pushed or Pulled? Women's Entry into Self‐Employment and Small Business Ownership

Over the past two decades the economies of Canada and many other industrialized countries have seen significant restructuring, bringing with it steadily rising levels of self‐employment and small business ownership. Women have been at the forefront of this change. Of the many questions raised by women's entrance into self‐employment, a central one concerns the factors fuelling its growth. While some argue that women have been pulled into self‐employment by the promise of independence, flexibility and the opportunity to escape barriers in paid employment, others argue that women have been pushed into it as restructuring and downsizing has eroded the availability of once secure jobs in the public and private sector. To date, existing research on the ‘push–pull’ debate has not fully answered; these questions, with survey and labour force data suggesting only general and sometimes contradictory, trends. This article examines this issue in greater detail, drawing on in‐depth interviews with 61 self‐employed women in Canada. Overall their experiences shed further light on the expansion of women's self‐employment in the 1990s, suggesting push factors have been underestimated and challenging the current contours of the ‘push–pull’ debate.     

The Self as Self‐Fulfilling Prophecy

Using a combination of psychoanalytic and symbolic interactionist ideas, this article portrays the development of the self as a self‐fulfilling prophecy (SFP). A prominent psychoanalytic version of this idea is presented by Lacan's two mirror theories of the self. A prominent and more familiar symbolic interactionist account of the self as self‐fulfilling prophecy is the formulation by William I. Thomas and Dorothy Thomas, which suggests that once situations are defined as real, they are real in their consequences. The aim of this article is to show that these two perspectives can be reconciled in interesting ways, because both recognize that emotions are part of the world “out there” of external goals and the world “in here” of the person's inner life. Emotions are therefore “bilevel.” The SFP creates a fault line in the self and a consequent emotional vulnerability when that line is engaged or disturbed. This article explains how this self‐fulfilling prophecy works and explores the weaknesses it inflicts on the self.     

The Development of Multiple Self‐Concept Dimensions During Adolescence

The purpose of this research was to analyze the development of self‐concept during adolescence. Participants included 484 teenagers (226 boys and 258 girls) from middle‐class families in the Basque Country region of Spain (M_age = 14.99, SD = 1.81 in Time 1 and M_age = 15.64, SD = 1.80 in Time 2). Longitudinal analysis found differences in the general school dimension. Six dimensions (math, verbal, general school, physical abilities, parent relationships and same‐sex relationships) reported a linear trend with a decreasing monotonic pattern; self‐esteem fit a cubic trend and physical appearance a quadratic trend line. Males showed higher means in self‐esteem, math, physical abilities, physical appearance, emotional stability and parent relationships; and females had higher values in verbal and general school.     

Self‐Employment as a Response to the Double Day for Women and Men in Canada*

Malgré une augmentation récente de la participation masculine aux tâches de la maison, les femmes assurent encore la plus grande partie de ce travail, que ce soit les soins apportés aux enfants, le nettoyage, la cuisine, les courses, la gestion financière, l'éducation ou les conseils personnels. Toutefois, de nombreuses femmes mènent une activité professionnelle rémunérée, qui vient s'ajouter à leurs responsabilités au sein du foyer. Cet article pose la question de savoir si les femmes choisissent le travail autonome comme un moyen d'alléger quelque peu les pressions rigides que leur impose leur «double travail». Alors que les femmes semblent effectivement se tourner vers le travail autonome pour cause de conflits entre travail et vie de famille, les hommes ne semblent pas guidés par les mêmes raisons. Despite recent increases in the amount of work done in the home by men, most of this work is still performed by women. These duties range from child care, cleaning, and cooking to shopping, financial management and domestic discipline and counselling. Yet many women also hold down paid jobs in addition to their domestic responsibilities. This paper investigates whether women turn to self‐employment as a way of introducing some flexibility into the rigid pressures from both sides of this “double day.” While women do appear to turn to self‐employment as one way of coping with conflicting family and work pressures, the same is not true for men.     

The Native‐Immigrant Income Gap among the Self‐Employed in Sweden

During recent years we have observed that non‐western immigrants are overrepresented among the self‐employed in Sweden. A reason for this might be the difficulties faced by immigrants in the labour market. The unemployment rate among non‐western immigrants in Sweden is higher than among natives with similar human capital characteristics. While this is a well‐established result, we do not know much about how self‐employed immigrants perform economically compared to their native counterparts. The purpose of this paper is to describe and analyse the incomes of self‐employed immigrants and natives in Sweden. We will also discuss possible explanations for the income gap we find. We use Swedish register data for the period 1998 to 2002 and the population studied consists of individuals who have been continuously self‐employed during this period. By performing the analysis on this group of self‐employed we get a measure of the difference among the long‐term self‐employed. The outcome of interest is the average income over the period. Income regressions are estimated using both OLS and quantile regressions. We find that self‐employed immigrants receive significantly lower incomes than their native counterparts when controlling for individual characteristics, industry and start‐up year of the firm. The income gap is larger for non‐western immigrants than for western immigrants. Quantile regressions show that the native‐immigrant income gap is smaller at the top than at the bottom of the income distribution. Several possible explanations for the native‐immigrant income gap are discussed. One possible explanation is that immigrants have a lower reservation wage and accepts staying in business receiving a lower income than comparable natives. Another explanation might be that there is discrimination against self‐employed immigrants that will lead to lower incomes. There can be consumer discrimination or discrimination from banks and real estate owners.     

Parental Involvement Promotes Rural African American Youths’ Self‐Pride and Sexual Self‐Concepts

This study, an evaluation of the Strong African American Families Program, was designed to determine whether intervention‐induced changes in targeted parenting behaviors were associated with young adolescents’ development of racial pride, self‐esteem, and sexual identity. Participants were 332 African American mothers and their 11‐year‐old children in 9 rural Georgia counties. Families were randomly assigned to a control group or an intervention group. Unlike those in the control families, mothers in the intervention group reported increases in targeted parenting behaviors, which promoted self‐esteem, positive racial identity, and positive sexual self‐concepts among their children. These findings expand the study of African American youths’ identity development by including broader domains of identity and parenting processes other than racial socialization.