The perceived value of work placements and part-time work and its diminution with time

an article by Gbolahan Gbadamosi, Mitchell Hickman and Hannah Rudley (Bournemouth University, UK), Carl Evans (University of the West of England, Bristol, UK) and Katherine Jones (Royal Agricultural University, Cirencester, UK) published in Journal of Education and Work Volume 32 Issue 2 (2019)

Abstract

This paper explores the perceptions of degree students at two UK universities regarding their work placement and part-time working activities, to assess if the two activities converge.

The research comprises three stages:

• interviews for preliminary exploration of students’ perceptions towards work placement and part-time work;
• interviews to examine how placement opportunities link with career aspirations;
• a survey of students who had completed a placement, and those currently on placement.

Students acknowledged part-time working helped their placement activity, providing transferable skills beneficial to both study and career aspirations. A significant finding was with respect to time: the closer to the placement activity the data was collected, the stronger the impact of appreciating the value of placement.

The paper therefore highlights the value of timing in the assessment of work placement. It also offers value for universities’ by providing insight into students’ perceptions regarding embedded external work activities that can enhance graduate employability and career prospects.

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Does everyone really need a job? Why we should question full employment

a post by Scotty Hendricks for the Big Think blog


Photo by Mike Kononov and Solomon Hsu on Unsplash

The idea that diligence is a virtue and that a person who doesn’t work full time is morally suspect is a common one. Phrases like “idle hands are the tools of the devil” suggest to us that work is inherently good and that if we don't work full-time then we have somehow failed. For many people, unemployment is as much something to be ashamed of as it is an economic problem.

It is no surprise then that we rarely ask – “do we all need to work?”
Think about it. The advance of technology over the last century and the increasing threat of automation have made many jobs obsolete. We have more wealth than at any other point in human history, we've created machines by which we can be more productive than any other point in human history, and have more things to do in our spare time than ever before. Why should we all work full-time jobs if we can afford to work part-time for the same economic output?

This is the question Andrew Taggart has asked for years. Taggart, a practical philosopher, understands that people have a need to contribute and often find meaning in work, but questions if our society can offer jobs that fulfill these needs to everybody. He points out that full employment schemes have historically focused on short-term, unskilled and labor-intensive employment that often fail to satisfy our need to contribute meaningfully to the world.

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A systematic literature review of the relationship between work hours and sickness absence

an article by Vilde Hoff Bernstrøm (Oslo and Akershus University College of Applied Sciences, Oslo, Norway) and Inge Houkes (Maastricht University, The Netherlands) published in Work & Stress: An International Journal of Work, Health & Organisations Volume 32 Issue 1 2018

Abstract

The aim of this study was to determine the relationship between work hours and sickness absence: is a higher number of work hours associated with better or with adverse health?

A systematic literature review was performed by searching Medline, PsychInfo, and Web of Science. All abstracts were screened to identify papers that empirically investigated the relationship between work hours and sickness absence in a working population.

A total of 1072 papers were identified, and 70 papers were included in this review.

A simple measure of the strength of effects was applied, and the findings are summarised in narrative form. Evidence supporting a relationship between sickness absence and working part-time or work hours as a continuous variable was inconclusive.

These inconclusive findings might be due to heterogeneity in the operationalisation of key variables or to publication bias. Support for a negative relationship between long work hours and sickness absence was moderately strong.

Possible explanations for this include the healthy worker selection effect, differences in job characteristics, and differences in job motivation. Empirical testing of these explanations, however, has been limited. Our findings indicate that employers should monitor employee health in times of high work pressure, even if sickness absence is low.

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Does temporal and locational flexibility of work increase the supply of working hours? Evidence from the Netherlands

an article by Daniel Possenriede and Wolter H.J. Hassink (Utrecht University School of Economics and IZA) and Janneke Plantenga (Utrecht University School of Economics) published in IZA Journal of Labor Policy Volume 5 2016 Article 16

Abstract

In recent years, many employees have gained more control over temporal and locational aspects of their work via a variety of flexible work arrangements, such as flexi-time and telehomework. This temporal and locational flexibility of work (TLF) is often seen as a means to facilitate the combination of work and private life.

As such it has been recommended as a policy to increase the average number of working hours of part-time workers. To the best of our knowledge, the effectiveness of this policy instrument has not been tested empirically yet.

We therefore analyse whether flexi-time and telehomework arrangements increase the number of actual, contracted, and preferred working hours. Based on Dutch household panel data, our results indicate that the link between TLF and working hours is quite weak.

Telehomework is associated with moderate increases in actual hours, but not in contracted or preferred hours. Flexi-time generally does not seem to be associated with an increase in hours worked. Despite positive effects on job satisfaction and working time fit, we do not find any convincing evidence of a positive effect of TLF on labour supply.

JEL classification: J22, J32, M52, M54

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How do occupational norms shape mothers’ career and caring options?

an article by Tanya Carney and Anne Junor (University of New South Wales, Australia) published in JIR: The Journal of Industrial Relations Volume 56 Nuber 4 (September 2014)

Abstract

Occupationally-differentiated patterns of paid work arrangements help shape the extent to which mothers of children under the age of 16 have access to both career and caring security (stable paid jobs with career prospects that also guarantee the ongoing capacity to provide and arrange high-quality care for children). Five sets of conditions critical to mothers’ work and caring security are:

• contracts providing two-way mobility between full-time and part-time work;
• actual hours worked;
• work scheduling; 
• work location; and 
• contractual security.

Occupations can be clustered into ‘shapes’, based on the relative mother-friendliness of different ways in which they combine these conditions. Some shapes provide both employment security and caring security; others involve types of flexibility focusing a trade-off between the two types of security.

Data for 64 occupations, taken from early waves of the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics of Australia (HILDA) Survey, were used to identify statistical norms for key aspects of each employment condition, and also the strength of these norms – that is, how flexible they were, for better or worse. These occupational norms and strengths were assumed to reflect regulatory standards or commonly accepted organisational practices. The 64 occupations could be grouped into five shapes that were associated with different concentrations of mothers.

Occupational ‘shapes’ may thus act as barriers or enablers to mothers’ labour market transitions. They may tend to exclude mothers by denying caring security; allow employment maintenance based on a trade between caring and career security; or enable full occupational integration by providing both forms of security.

The concept of shapes aids theoretical understanding of the mechanisms of occupational segregation and labour market segmentation, and may aid the targeting of regulatory interventions to improve mothers’ access to both career and caring security.

Discourses of ambition, gender and part-time work

an article by Yvonne Benschop, Marieke van den Brink, Hans Doorewaard and Joke Leenders (Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands) published in Human Relations Volume 66 Number 5 (May 2013)

Abstract

The aim of this article is to unravel the gendered practices in ambition and challenge the hegemonic masculinity within it.

Our findings are based on a qualitative study using focus groups in which Dutch men and women, full-timers and part-timers, constructed different meanings of ambition. The men and women in our study used three manifest discourses of ambition in the workplace, regarding individual development, mastery of the task, and upward career mobility.

A critical analysis of these three discourses indicates how cultural and organisational norms on gender and working hours affect these constructions of ambition. We argue that a fourth discourse, ‘ambition as a resource’, is a major driving force of inequality.

‘Ambition as a resource’ is the dominant hegemonic discourse in organisations, and its power effects mitigate the impact of other discourses on ambition, revealing the potential for change when different discourses of ambition are valued.

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The Temporary Work Revolution: The Shift from Jobs that Solve Poverty to Jobs that Make Poverty

an article by David G. Van Arsdale (no affiliation(s) provided) published in WorkingUSA: The Journal of Labor & Society Volume 16 Issue 1 (March 2013)

Abstract

The creation of new jobs will not fix the problem of growing poverty in this era, now at record highs according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Today, nearly half of all jobs created are the source of poverty, the consequence of a shift to temporary employment standards, a trend beginning in the early 1970s and growing exponentially since the 2008 recession. In the immediate years following the recession, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that over 90 percent of all work created was temporary, increasing the scope, revenue, and capital investments in the U.S. staffing industry.

Numerous studies have shown the jobs of this industry to be insecure by design and primarily low-wage (Dietz ; Theodore and Peck ; Van Arsdale ). This article explains just how significant the shift to temporary work has been and why temporary staffing, a form of outsourcing labour by the staffing industry, is producing poverty for millions and stagnating wages for everyone, especially in this post-recession reconstruction.

The temporary work revolution marks a radical shift away from the post-World War II logic that dedication to a job can and should solve poverty.

Today, unfortunately, for most workers in the U.S., dedication to one’s job cannot resolve one’s economic woes. Most new jobs are simply too temporary, part-time, and low paying.

Hazel’s comment:
OK, this is all about the USA but …

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Part-time working by students: is it a policy issue, and for whom?

an article by Erica Smith (University of Ballarat, Australia) and Wendy Patton (Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia) published in Journal of Education and Work Volume 26 Issue 1 (2013)

Abstract

This paper uses data from interviews with representatives of national and state organisations that have a policy interest in student-working in Australia.

The interviewees included representatives from employer bodies and trade unions as well as government organisations. The data are used to discuss these stakeholders’ perceptions of the main advantages and disadvantages of working by young full-time students and the ways in which organisations in the business and educational sectors have adapted their policies and practices for student-working.

The analysis is then used to inform a discussion about whether this is a legitimate area for public policy formulation and if so, what principles might underpin such policy and what some policies might look like.

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The only way is up? The employment aspirations of single parents

a research paper published by Gingerbread – the charity for single parents

Introduction: Background

One in four UK families with dependent children is headed by a single parent. They account for just under 2 million families, containing 3 million children¹. These families face particular disadvantage, with 41 per cent of children in single parent households living in poverty, compared to 23 per cent of children in couple households². For at least the past 15 years there has been a strong political consensus that work is one of the best routes out of poverty, and a concomitant drive to increase levelsof single parent employment as part of a broad government strategy to reduce child poverty³.

In this context, over recent years there has been a number of policy initiatives aimed at increasing employment amongst single parents. These have included the New Deal for Lone Parents (NDLP), a voluntary scheme to help improve job readiness and employment opportunities for single parents; additional in-work financial support, specifically through the introduction of working tax credits, and included support for childcare costs; and the introduction of Lone Parent Obligations (LPO), which has applied conditionality for benefit receipt to successive groups of single parents – according to the age of their youngest child – and actively required them to seek work.

From November 2008 most single parents with a youngest child aged 12 or over were no longer eligible for Income Support⁴. Instead those able to work could claim Jobseeker’s Allowance and were expected to look for suitable work in return for personalised help and support. Further changes have been introduced in three phases: for those with a youngest child aged ten or over from October 2009; for those with a youngest child aged seven or over from October 2010; and for those with a youngest child aged 5 or over from May 2012.

This focus on increasing the level of employment amongst single parents – and in particular the impact of tax credits and the support offered through NDLP⁵ – has achieved a degree of success: by 2012 59 per cent of all single parents were in work⁶, an increase of 14 percentage points from the rate in the mid-1990s. It is worth highlighting that the employment rate for single parents does vary depending on the age of their youngest child, and once children are aged 12 or over, single parents’ employment rate is similar to the employment rate for mothers in couples: 71 per cent of single parents whose child is aged 12-15 are in work⁷, the same as the employment rate for all couple mothers⁸.

Although the single parent employment rate has increased substantially over the last decade and a half, work is not yet a guaranteed route out of poverty; the poverty rate for single parent families where the parent works part-time is around 1 in 4 (23 per cent), and around 1 in 5 (18 per cent) where the parent works full-time⁹.

There have long been – and there remain – significant concerns about the quality of part-time work that is available, which is of particular relevance given that the UK has one of the highest levels of part-time working in Europe, and many women with young children work part-time in order to combine work and caring responsibilities. Nearly half (45 per cent) of working women and 13 per cent of working men are currently in part-time employment, and there has been a steady and consistent rise in the proportion of women working part-time, according to the number of children aged under 16 within the household¹⁰.

Part-time work is a particularly important source of employment for single parents, with three-quarters of single parents entering work on a part-time basis¹¹. However, a shortage of high quality part-time work across sectors and occupations in the UK means that many women are being crowded into a narrow range of low paid, part-time jobs which do not fully utilise their skills¹². Though the availability and take up of flexible working practices is increasing, some forms of flexible working – especially part-time work – are still concentrated in low-paid and low-skilled jobs, where opportunities for progression may be limited. Indeed, research has shown that less than three per cent of part-time vacancies were for roles with salaries starting at £20,000 FTE, compared with the majority of full-time vacancies which pay over £20,000¹³.

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 ¹ Office for National Statistics (2012) Lone parents with dependent children
² DWP (2012) Households Below Average Income: An analysis of the income distribution 1994/95 – 2010/11
³ E.g. HMT (2004) Child Poverty Review; Department for Education (2011) A new approach to child poverty: tackling the causes of disadvantage and transforming families’ lives
⁴ Exceptions exist for those whose children receive the middle or higher rate care component of Disability Living Allowance, those in receipt of Carer’s Allowance, and those who are registered as foster carers
⁵ Finn, D and Gloster, R (2010) Research Report No. 632 Lone Parent Obligations: A Review of recent evidence on the work-related requirements within the benefit systems of different countries, DWP
⁶ ONS (2012) Working and Workless households: ONS Statistical Bulletin
⁷ Analysis of Labour Force Survey data from April-June2009 produced for Gingerbread, in Peacey V (2009) Signing on and stepping up? Single parents’ experience of welfare reform
⁸ ONS (2011) Working and workless households 2011 – Statistical Bulletin
⁹ DWP (2012) Households Below Average Income: An analysis of the income distribution 1994/95 – 2010/11
¹⁰ ONS (2009) Labour Force Survey data
¹¹ Sissons, P (2012) Quantitative background paper on the introduction of LPO for single parents, Work Foundation (unpublished)
¹² The Women and Work Commission (2006) Shaping a Fairer Future
¹³ Stewart, E et al. (2012) Building a sustainable quality part-time recruitment market, Joseph Rowntree Foundation

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Trends and social divisions in maternal employment patterns following matern...

an article by Colette Fagan and Helen Norman (University of Manchester) published in International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy Volume 32 Issue 9/10 (2012)

Abstract

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine whether the social divisions in maternal employment patterns post-childbirth, recorded by earlier studies, have persisted for a later cohort of mothers that had a pregnancy in the early 2000s, in the context of an expansion of childcare and other improvements in reconciliation measures.
Design/methodology/approach
Longitudinal data from the UK’s Millennium Cohort Study are analysed using logistic regression.
Findings
It was found that mothers are more likely to be employed, and employed full-time, when their child is aged three if they were employed during the pregnancy and resumed employment within nine months of the birth. The mothers’ occupational class, ethnicity, household composition and the working hours of a partner also have independent associations with the probability of maternal employment once the child is aged three.
Research limitations/implications
The authors would expect these results to be modified – but not overturned – in a different national setting, for example where childcare services are more extensive or part-time employment is less common.
Originality/value
These new longitudinal survey results for a recent cohort of mothers in the UK demonstrate that resumption of employment following maternity leave is pivotal for women’s subsequent employment integration. Yet maternal employment trajectories remain shaped by social inequalities. Both results are important for informing debates about reconciliation policy for the pre-school years, including monitoring the impact of the recession on the employment integration of women following childbirth.

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Involuntary part-time workers in Britain: evidence from the labour force survey

an article by Surhan Cam (School of Social Sciences, Cardiff University) published in Industrial Relations Journal Volume 43 Issue 3 (May 2012)

Abstract

Part-time employment is widely considered functional for the economy, with both benign and detrimental implications for employees. However, specific analyses of involuntary part-time work in Britain are surprisingly absent from the flexibility debate, and workers in such positions remain largely under-researched.

This article explores involuntary part-time employment in relation to socio-economic circumstances.

We analyse Labour Force Survey data, using logistic regression modelling to identify the segments of workers filling part-time jobs involuntarily. The results suggest that involuntariness for part-time jobs is affected by a range of demographic and work-related characteristics considered.

Being a couple with dependent children, for example, reduces the likelihood of involuntariness among female part-time employees whereas lower educational and occupational levels imply a higher involuntariness across both sexes.

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Life after Burberry: shifting experiences of work and non-work life following redundancy

an article by Paul Blyton and Jean Jenkins (Cardiff University) published in Work, Employment and Society Volume 26 Number 1 (February 2012)

Abstract

This article sheds new light on neglected areas of recent ‘work-life’ discussions. Drawing on a study of a largely female workforce made redundant by factory relocation, the majority subsequently finding alternative employment in a variety of work settings, the results illustrate aspects of both positive and negative spillover from work to non-work life.

In addition, the findings add to the growing number of studies that highlight the conditions under which part-time working detracts from, rather than contributes to, successful work-life balance. The conclusion discusses the need for a more multi-dimensional approach to work-life issues.

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The full story behind the increase in part-time workers

Resa Galgut, writing in HR Mrmagazine, provides an insight into the figures produced by the Office of National Statistics which show that part-time work has reached the highest level since ONS began its employment series records in 1992.

8 million people are now working less than full-time hours. That accounts for 27% of those in employment in the UK, and represents an increase of 6% since the start of the recession.

Written from the viewpoint of a part-time recruitment agency –Women Like Us – this short article may aid employment advisers.

Read in full here

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