scholarly journals Avowing Unemployment: Confessional Jobseeker Interviews and Professional CVs

2021 ◽  
pp. 29-53
Author(s):  
Tom Boland
Keyword(s):  
Labour Market ◽  
The Self ◽  
Job Seeking ◽  
Street Level ◽  
Pastoral Power ◽  
Economic Theology ◽  
Laws And Regulations

While contemporary welfare processes have widely been analysed through the concepts of governmentality and pastoral power, this article diagnoses the dimension of confession or avowal within unemployment, job seeking and CV writing. This argument draws together the threads of Foucault’s work on confession within disciplinary institutions, around sexuality and genealogies of monasticism, adding the insights of writers in ‘economic theology’. Empirically the focus is on UK JobCentrePlus, whose governmentality is traced from laws and regulations, street-level forms, websites and CV advice. From the requirement of avowals of unemployment as a personal fault in interviews to professions of faith in oneself and the labour market, a distinctly confessional practice emerges – with the welfare officer as ‘pastor’ but with the market as the ultimate ‘test’ of worth. Furthermore, the pressure to transform the self through ‘telling the truth’ about oneself is taken as a normalising pressure which extends from the institutions of welfare across the labour market as a whole. In conclusion, the demand for self-transformation and the insistence on tests within modernity is problematised.

scholarly journals Why do Young People Give up Their Job Search?

2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sami Ylistö
Keyword(s):  
Content Analysis ◽  
Young People ◽  
Labour Market ◽  
Job Search ◽  
Individual Choice ◽  
Search Behaviour ◽  
Job Seeking ◽  
Labour Market Position ◽  
Unemployed Youth

The decision to search or not to search for work is usually considered a purely individual choice. However, this is a simplistic view, which ignores important structural and situational aspects of job search behaviour. This article discusses the reasons why long-term unemployed youth in Finland give up their search for work or a student place. The data comprise 28 life course interviews that were analysed by means of content analysis. The data show that young people’s job seeking behaviour is greatly influenced by how they view their labour market position and prospects. Job search abandonment is often temporary and young people soon resume their search because of the expectations of the society around them and their willingness to find work. The young people interviewed provided rational, emotional and life value reasons for their decision to suspend their job search. The article offers a deeper understanding of youths’ job search behaviour.

Micro-Firms and the Margins of Entrepreneurship

2007 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 281-292 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dieter Bögenhold ◽  
Uwe Fachinger
Keyword(s):  
Labour Market ◽  
Social Stratification ◽  
Integrated Approach ◽  
Small Business Owners ◽  
Wide Field ◽  
Job Seeking ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Experimental Market ◽  
Key Issues ◽  
The One

This paper deals with the margins of entrepreneurship at which small business owners are working almost on their own with no or very few employees, and where some work for low returns and run firms that lack stability and/or prosperous dynamics. However, even the area of ‘entrepreneurship at the margins’ is a wide field, embracing not only the broad margins of entrepreneurship but also the fluid borders between entrepreneurship and the informal sector on the one side and the labour market system on the other. New firms – even those that are ultimately very successful – may be more or less created in an experimental market and product testing phase, in which business founders are still employed or registered as unemployed before becoming self-employed. In such cases, the practical starting-point of an entrepreneurial existence is part of a fluent continuum of different activities closely connected to the entrepreneur's sphere of dependent work as an employee or job-seeking during a period of unemployment. The paper addresses this area of entrepreneurship within an integrated framework, which combines entrepreneurship analysis with labour market research and studies on social stratification and social mobility. It contributes to the debate on entrepreneurship at the margins by combining selected empirical information on the case of Germany with conceptual ideas of a labour market perspective. The integrated approach highlights some key issues and raises further questions about the field of entrepreneurship.

De ontmythologisering van de zzp-trend

2011 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ronald Dekker ◽  
Lian Kösters
Keyword(s):  
Multivariate Analysis ◽  
Educational Attainment ◽  
Labour Market ◽  
Individual Characteristics ◽  
The Self ◽  
Policy Options ◽  
Relative Probability ◽  
Labour Relation ◽  
Self Employment ◽  
Employment Security

The demythologization of the self-employment trend The demythologization of the self-employment trend In this article we investigate which factors contribute to the growth of the number of self-employed workers and which factors cause a decrease in that number. On the basis of this analysis we make inferences about the probability of continued growth. The factors that contribute to growth and decrease are derived from the available literature and are put into practice in a multivariate analysis, in which a comprehensive set of individual characteristics is used to explain the relative probability of becoming a self-employed worker. From the analysis we can conclude that the relative probability to become a self-employed worker is influenced primarily by age, gender and educational attainment. On the basis of the analysis and the literature we conclude that the growth in the number of self-employed workers is likely to continue, though not to the extent where self-employment is the standard labour relation on the Dutch labour market. However, the growth in self-employment does mean that an increasing number of workers are facing lower levels of income and employment security. A number of policy options to deal with these problems is discussed.

Staying in or switching between permanent, temporary and self-employment during 2008–2010: Associations with changing job characteristics and emotional exhaustion

2018 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 215-237 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudia Bernhard-Oettel ◽  
Constanze Leineweber ◽  
Hugo Westerlund
Keyword(s):  
Labour Market ◽  
Life Quality ◽  
Strain Differences ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Job Characteristics ◽  
The Self ◽  
Temporary Workers ◽  
Self Employment ◽  
Economic Downturns ◽  
Before And After

Labour market segmentation theories suggest that permanent and temporary workers are exposed to economic risks to different degrees, and differ in their working life quality and well-being. However, few studies have tested these ideas during times of economic crisis. Also, little is known about how the self-employed compare to permanent and temporary workers and are affected by economic downturns. This study investigated Swedish workers in different labour market segments before and after the financial crisis (2008 and 2010). More specifically, it looked at job characteristics and strain differences between permanent, temporary and self-employed workers. Data ( N = 6335) came from SLOSH, a longitudinal representative cohort study of the Swedish workforce. Contradicting segmentation theories, differences between permanent and temporary workers were small. The self-employed stood out with favourable job characteristics, but comparable strain levels. During the crisis, work demands and strain declined for many of the workers studied here.

scholarly journals Labour Market Trajectories of the Self-employed in the Netherlands

De Economist ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 168 (1) ◽  
pp. 109-146
Author(s):  
Elisabeth Beusch ◽  
Arthur van Soest
Keyword(s):  
The Netherlands ◽  
Labour Market ◽  
The Self

scholarly journals The situation of Polish higher education graduates on the labour market in the first year after graduation

2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (4 (31)) ◽  
pp. 87-99
Author(s):  
Adam Damrath
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Labour Market ◽  
Master's Degree ◽  
Education Level ◽  
First Year ◽  
Job Seeking ◽  
Fields Of Study ◽  
Master’S Degree ◽  
Polish Higher Education

The literature highlights the present-day problem of misalignment between skills possessed by graduates and employer expectations. This has been shown to considerably affect the length of time spent by graduates on job seeking and – consequently – their earnings. It is particularly interesting to compare the situation of graduates of various levels and fields of study in Poland among those surveyed by the MNiSW (Ministry of Science and Higher Education) – 2016. The study provides interesting conclusions confirming the thesis that an increase in the education level leads to increased income. Thus, those graduating with a Master’s degree find work more easily and earn higher salaries. The article analyses the MNiSW, OECD, EU, GUS databases. The work is analytical and descriptive.

Gender, Age and Attitudes to Retirement in Mid-Life

1996 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-55 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jay Ginn ◽  
Sara Arber
Keyword(s):  
Gender Differences ◽  
Labour Market ◽  
Economic Life ◽  
Pension Policy ◽  
Early Exit ◽  
Job Seeking ◽  
Age Related ◽  
The Social ◽  
Barriers To Employment ◽  
British Research

ABSTRACTBritish research on exit from the labour market has been mainly concerned with men, but US research shows retirement for women is equally salient. Gender differences in attitudes to employment and reasons for early exit are relevant to employment and pension policy.In this paper, we use data from the Social Change and Economic Life Initiative survey to examine gender differences in attitudes to employment among over 2,500 British women and men aged 40 to 59. A key concern was to discover whether the decline in mid-life women's employment through their fifties could be explained by a change in attitudes with age, or was more likely to be due to age-related barriers in the labour market.Analysis shows that among mid-life people who were not employed, financial considerations were the predominant influence on men's job-seeking whereas for women psychosocial aspects of having a job were also important. Mid-life women showed no decline in their motivation towards employment with age, indicating that women's early exit cannot be explained by reduced desire for employment with age. However, there was evidence of perceived age barriers to employment or promotion which were likely to have affected behaviour and attitudes.

Job Finding in Australia

1994 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 51-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
James Athanasou
Keyword(s):  
Labour Market ◽  
Prior Knowledge ◽  
Job Search ◽  
Labour Force ◽  
Australian Bureau ◽  
Labour Force Survey ◽  
Job Seeking ◽  
Informal Labour ◽  
Australian Bureau Of Statistics ◽  
Job Finding

Although studies of the labour market have concentrated on employment and unemployment, there have been few Australian studies of job-search experiences. This report documents the methods used by people to obtain jobs in 1982, 1986 and 1990. It considers the proposition that informal job-seeking methods are more likely to lead to employment and that most jobs are obtained without prior knowledge of the vacancy. The data for this report were derived from the Australian Bureau of Statistics monthly labour force survey of households (published and unpublished data) in 1982, 1986 and 1990. Around 1.8 million individuals had started in a new job and at least 35 per cent of jobs resulted from approaches made without prior knowledge that the job was available. Friends and relatives accounted for some 17 per cent of placements and in 25 per cent of cases, the employer approached the job seeker, bringing the proportion of informal methods to at least 77 per cent. Results confirm the views of experienced career counsellors that there is a large and informal labour market.

The ‘Employability Gap’: Long-Term Unemployment and Barriers to Work in Buoyant Labour Markets

10.1068/c22m ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 613-628 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ronald W McQuaid ◽  
Colin Lindsay
Keyword(s):  
Labour Market ◽  
Personal Characteristics ◽  
Analytical Framework ◽  
Local Economy ◽  
Policy Framework ◽  
Demand Side ◽  
Job Seekers ◽  
Job Seeking ◽  
Local Labour

We analyse the main barriers limiting the employability of long-term unemployed job seekers within a local labour market characterised by generally high levels of demand. We use four key elements of employability (employability assets, the deployment of assets, the presentation of assets, and context) as an analytical framework in order to analyse the manner in which job seekers' personal characteristics, social and family circumstances, and perceptions of the labour market affect their ability to pursue employment opportunities. The results of interviews carried out with 115 long-term unemployed job seekers show that individual and family circumstances and attitudes towards work and job seeking are likely to be increasingly important barriers given the context of a relative lack of demand-side problems and the availability of lower-skilled jobs in expanding industries. In particular, many long-term unemployed job seekers were reluctant to seek jobs in the expanding service sectors of the local economy. Although the concept of employability provides a useful theoretical and policy framework for analysing long-term unemployment issues, models based upon an employability framework should be expanded to incorporate the role of employers and so integrate supply-side and demand-side perspectives.

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