The impact of occupational structures on ethnic and gendered employment gaps: An event history analysis using social security register data

Ethnic and gendered employment gaps are mainly explained by individual characteristics, while less attention is paid to occupational structures. Drawing on administrative data, this article analyses the impact of occupational characteristics on top of individual attributes in the urban labour market of Vienna. Both set of variables can explain observed employment gaps to a large extent, but persistent gaps remain, in particular among females. The article’s main finding is that the occupational structure appears to have gendered effects. While men tend to benefit from ethnic segregation, women face difficulties when looking for jobs with high shares of immigrant workers. Looking for jobs in occupations that recruit from relatively few educational backgrounds (credentials) is beneficial for both sexes at the outset unemployment, but among females this competitive advantage diminishes over time. The article concludes by discussing potential strategies to avoid the traps of occupational segregation.

Income, Vulnerability and Empowerment of Women Street Vendors in Haflong Town of Assam

Street vending constitutes an important segment of urban labour market for a temporary source of subsistence self employment in India since time immemorial. The benefit of street vending is that, employment can be created without adequate government intervention except some regulatory mechanism like municipal board or parking fee etc. But, the income generated from such employment cannot be sustainable in most of the hilly areas of North Eastern States (NES) as it can provide only a bare minimum amount of income especially in the lower circuit of urban informal sector. In addition, women in such employment are really vulnerable when they are mostly engaged in vegetable vending like occupations in small hill towns. The present study seeks to understand the income and employment pattern of women engaged in vegetable vending in Haflong town of Assam. Haflong town is located in erstwhile North Cachar Hills (presently Dima Hasao district) of Assam. The survey has been conducted with pre tested schedule among thirty women vegetable vendors in the town to understand the income, vulnerability and empowerment pattern of the sample respondents. It is found that vulnerability and livelihood situation of the sample women vegetable sellers are not in a decent condition. By using basic statistical tools, from the discussion, it can be deduced that there is urgent need for facilitating access to suitable and adequate space, institutional credit, social security and skills to the urban vegetable women vendors.

Self-Deprecation or Self-Sufficient? Discrimination and Income Aspirations in Urban Labour Market Sustainable Development

This research contributes to previous studies through exploring the association between individual psychological aspirations and hukou discrimination in the Chinese urban labour market. Applying data from the 2010 China General Social Survey, we divided the sample into local hukou residents and non-local migrants (includes urban-urban migrants and rural-urban migrants). We then examined the relationship between these sub-categories with different hukou status and their income aspirations (i.e., expected wage levels). The estimated results suggest that, in comparison with urban-urban migrants, rural-urban migrants are more likely to self-deprecate. Discrimination against rural-urban migrants significantly restricts their income aspirations. These findings imply that it is urgent to eliminate these negative impacts caused by hukou discrimination in the Chinese urban labour market, and understanding the structure of labour force quality such as psychological condition appears to be important in determining the long-term sustainable development of labour market. Theoretical and empirical implications, limitations and further research directions are also discussed.