Deviating from the standard: effects on labor continuity and career patterns

Abstract

Deviating from a standard career path is increasingly becoming an option for individuals to combine paid labor with other important life domains. These career detours emerge in diverse labor forms such as part-time jobs, temporary working hour reductions, and labor force time-outs, used to alleviate conflicting time demands throughout careers, especially during the rush hour of working life. Policy makers in various EU countries are constructing life course facilities to accommodate households while optimizing the labor participation of all possible contributors, particularly women and older workers. Yet surprisingly little is known of their possible effects on the careers of individuals over the longer-term. This thesis focuses directly on this information deficit and aims at answering the vital question: How do deviations from a standard career path affect individual careers? The foundation for the theoretical framework of this thesis is human capital theory, built upon further with theories incorporating the meso-level of organizations using statistical discrimination theory and tournament models. This thesis comprises three empirical studies covering four types of career path detours: part-time work, nonparticipation (voluntary and unemployment) and institutionalized career breaks. It establishes longer-term effects of career deviations on individual careers, using a range of social and economic indicators to cover diverse career aspects such as labor participation and continuity, the level of socio-economic status and its change over time, the function level, and wage and wage growth. The first empirical study concerns the effects of part-time work and the second study examines nonparticipation (voluntary and unemployment). Both studies use the 1990-2001 waves from the Dutch socio-economic panel (SEP). The third empirical study examines the Belgian career break system using three data sets: (1992-2002) from the Panel Study on Belgian Households (PSBH), the PSBH Career Module, and the Panel Mobility of Working Age Population (PMWP 1998-2002). The multivariate analyses show that part-time work is not conducive to climbing career ladders. This applies to men and women based on the negative effects observed on both socio-economic status and the function level. Part-time jobs are not compatible with higher status and function levels. The findings demonstrate further that the negative effects of labor force exits on women's wages and socio-economic status are resilient even three years after returning to work. Voluntary exits are not without serious repercussions. The Belgian career break system however, adds up to a positive balance. Men experience positive effects on wage and wage growth after temporary hour reductions (part-time breaks), which bring them back up to the wage level prior to the break before dissipating. Women experience a positive effect on their wage and wage growth after using a full-time career break and this effect persists over time. This life course labor market instrument has a positive effect on individual careers. The purpose of this thesis was to make evident the longer-term effects of career deviations on individual careers in terms of labor continuity and job-related indicators. If it is the intention to make deviating from standard careers a viable option for individuals during their working lives, the negative longer-term individual effects as observed and described in this research will first need to be addressed.