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This study examined changes in work precarity (i.e., job insecurity and income insecurity) and involuntary job loss following the start of the Great Recession in 2007 among people with and without disabilities. Using five waves of nationally representative data from the Americans' Changing Lives (ACL) panel study, the findings demonstrated that people with disabilities who had early experiences of income insecurity were more likely to experience later income insecurity than people without disabilities. Those who had a functional disability and experienced job insecurity and income insecurity at W1, in 1986, were also significantly more likely to experience involuntary job loss following the start of the Great Recession. These findings highlight the disproportionate impact of early work precarity for people with disabilities and are discussed as an application of the life-course concept of cumulative disadvantage.

The purpose of this chapter is to reconsider the five principles of Elder et al.'s (2003) life course theory while centering disability status as an axis of inequality. We use existing research from the fields of the sociology of disability, disability studies, and aging and the life course to reflect on ways in which each life course principle can better attend to the experiences of disabled people. We start with the principle of time and place and discuss how cohort and period effects facilitate a deeper understanding of disabled people's experiences historically. Next, we analyze the principle of timing with an emphasis on cumulative dis/advantage to establish how disability status is an axis of inequality that contributes to the accumulation of social disadvantage and intersects with other axes of inequality (e.g., race, class, and gender). Then, we discuss the two principles of agency and linked lives and employ the concept of “bounded agency” to describe how ableism limits the agency of disabled people. Finally, we examine the principle of life-span development and discuss how adaptation and resilience are contextual and an ordinary part of human experiences. We conclude by offering recommendations for both life course and disability scholars to consider in hopes of broadening our theoretical and empirical knowledge about the lives of disabled people at every stage of the life course and the mechanisms by which resources are stratified by disability and age.

Existing research tends to conceptualize age- and gender-based discrimination as distinct and unrelated social phenomena. A growing body of scholarship, however, highlights the importance of conceptualizing ageism as potentially gendered, and gender discrimination as inherently shaped by age. Using an intersectional theoretical perspective, this chapter examines how gender and age combine to shape women’s and men’s experiences of workplace mistreatment.

The data are obtained from the U.S. General Social Survey. The analysis begins with descriptive statistics, showing how rates of perceived age and gender mistreatment vary for men and women of different age groups. Multivariate logistic regressions follow.

Experiences of workplace mistreatment are significantly shaped by both gender and age. Among both men and women, workers in their 30s and 40s report relatively low levels of perceived age-based discrimination, compared to older or younger workers. It is precisely during this interval of relatively low rates of perceived age-based discrimination that women’s (but not men’s) perceptions of gender-based mistreatment rises dramatically. At all ages, women are significantly more likely to face either gender- or age-based discrimination than men, but the gap is especially large among workers in their 40s.

Women tend to perceive age- and gender-based mistreatment at different times of life, but a concurrent examination of gender- and age-based mistreatment reveals that women’s working lives are characterized by high rates of mistreatment throughout their careers, in a way that men’s are not. The results highlight the importance of conceptualizing gender and age as intersecting systems of inequality.

Women’s health is considered a big public health issue, impacting personal well-being, family reproduction, and society’s development. Since the foundation of the People’s Republic of China, major improvements in women’s social status and health have been made. However, far less has been achieved with respect to gender equality and women still face health disparities. The purpose of this paper is to provide a better understanding of health and health care disparities among women and their determinants in China today.

This paper used the Statistical Yearbook of Health and Family Planning 2014, the 2010 Women’s Social Status Survey and 2010 census data from the National Bureau of Statistics to give an overall description of disparity in health care and health outcome facing women.

Progress in health is not equally shared by the female population, and the differences in women’s health by region and in urban and rural areas are considerable. The existing health disparities are still faced by women in terms of life expectancy, hazardous working environment, and health care services. As to gender differences among the elderly aged 60+, men have better health status compared to women. In addition, women are more financially dependent on other family members for the main source of daily living, reflecting their economic disadvantages.

This study gives a comprehensive and the latest overview of trends of women’s health progress, disparities in health care, and health outcomes both in female population and between genders by using three data sources.

This paper intervenes in existing literature on entrepreneurship and inequalities by proposing a novel reframing of intersectionality as a threshold concept, an important idea that enables us to deepen and progress the understanding of complex subjectivities.

Drawing from education studies, intersectionality is explored through the five key features of threshold concepts: (1) transformative, (2) irreversible, (3) integrative, (4) bounded and (5) troublesome. We offer a set of reflection questions for what we call “doing intersectionality.”

We develop a metacritique of the way in which the concept of intersectionality has thus far been treated in feminist theory and applied in entrepreneurship studies – namely, as the culmination of thinking about difference and inequality, decoupled from its roots in collectivist analysis and Black and anti-racist feminism. The paper invites scholars of entrepreneurial inequalities to both engage and look beyond an intersectional lens to better elucidate the range of historically emergent social hierarchies and systems of power that shape their phenomena of interest.

Through reframing intersectionality as a threshold concept, this paper challenges entrepreneurship researchers to view intersectionality as a foundational starting point for the conceptualisation of complex interactions of social structures, and the structural inequality and power relationships present within their research, rather than a destination.

This article reconstructs the conditions under which displaced persons are integrated into their workplaces with their hosts. It identifies the characteristics of this pathway and provides guidance on the support that should be provided to these people. This support is part of social responsibility. Theories on professional integration/labour market integration (LMI) have been categorised and then arranged in a logical order to determine the stages of this integration. Theories on professional integration support for refugees were also reviewed and examined in relation to this categorisation. Six stages characterise professional integration: getting a job, its sustainability and its wage adequacy, its security and sustainability, career continuity and employability, the fact of being a full and equal participant and being an integrated part of the workforce and the meaningfulness of that job. The level of professional integration marks the quality of this integration. Each level encompasses the previous levels. Displaced persons should be supported throughout their careers to go beyond technical and behavioural skills and take a more holistic view of their tasks to find meaning in their work. While most research focuses on getting a job as a characteristic of occupational integration, this study found five other characteristics that were ordered. It also links vocational integration with social responsibility and provides guidance on how to help displaced people reach the final stage of this integration.

Although superannuation planning has been examined within the context of individual choice, life course and cumulative advantage perspectives, little research has been contained within the theories of consumer behavior. This paper, therefore, aims to examine this important issue by delving into the perceptions of retirement planning from the perspectives of both male and female consumers.

A qualitative research design was adopted to gather in‐depth information within a real‐life context in order to build theory. In total, 21 exploratory semi‐structured interviews, to assist in identifying and describing the variety of thoughts and feelings that female and male consumers hold towards financial retirement planning, were conducted.

The findings from the in‐depth interviews indicate that males and females adopt different perspectives when it comes to retirement planning. Males tend to adopt an individual choice perspective, whereby it is assumed that retirement will be another stage in life which will provide for a lifestyle conducive with their current standard of living. Women, on the other hand, adopt very much a life course perspective, which makes no assumptions or predictions about future life stages, but one that views outcomes as contingent on the circumstances of one's life.

The value of this research lies in its methodology and analysis. Perceptions of males and females in relation to retirement planning have not before been mapped and, as such, the perpetual maps developed in the paper contribute new knowledge in relation to attitudes and behavior towards retirement financial planning.

Using data from the 2000 Program for International Student Assessment, we examined determinants of children’s participation in highbrow cultural activities and its relationship with academic achievement in Hong Kong. We found that family socioeconomic status (SES) and home possessions related to high-status culture were important determinants of children’s participation in highbrow cultural activities. Yet, we found no significant relationship between children’s participation in highbrow cultural activities and academic achievement when controlling for other variables. We highlighted several characteristics of Hong Kong society and its educational system, including the British colonial experience, extreme focus on test preparation, and extensive shadow education, all of which may combine to explain the role of cultural resources in this East Asian society.

This study aimed to (1) systematically identify evaluation studies of U.S. active labor market programs (ALMPs) focusing on postsecondary education and job skills training for low-income individuals with employment barriers (hereinafter, Human Capital Development [HCD] programs) since the U.S. federal welfare reform of 1996, and (2) provide a synthesis of common strategies used by programs that reported post-program earnings higher than poverty thresholds.

Using Population, Intervention, Comparison, and Outcomes (PICO) criteria endorsed by the Cochrane Collaboration, we identified evaluation studies of HCD programs from seven electronic databases and experts' suggestions. Using data (e.g., post-program earnings, main types of services) extracted from the included studies, we describe common strategies used by the programs reporting earnings above the poverty level.

Of 877 studies identified from an initial search, 10 studies met our inclusion/exclusion criteria and thus were included in the final sample. Findings showed that HCD programs reporting earnings above the poverty level for a family of three were characterized by (1) curriculums targeting specific job sectors and occupations, (2) local employers' involvement in developing curriulums and providing work opportunities and (3) post-program job retention and career advancement services.

The present study used a systematic review approach to fill gaps in research regarding HCD-focused ALMPs in the U.S. post-welfare reform era by identifying common strategies the effective programs used to help participants obtain employment and exit poverty. Findings may inform the design and implementation of employment programs that will help low-income individuals with employment barriers acquire marketable knowledge and job skills, and thus increase their economic self-sufficiency via improved employment outcomes.

There is growing evidence to suggest that childhood deprivation is linked to social inequalities and has important consequences for health in later life. Past studies tend to focus on the influence of cumulative deprivation on the risk of developing a particular disease. This study adds to the literature by exploring how deprivation in childhood may be linked to how people (who already have a disease) self-manage their condition in later life. Questionnaires and focus groups were analysed to explore this relationship (n=91) among coronary heart disease patients living in a deprived urban area of Northern England. The results suggest that childhood deprivation may influence health behaviours and lifestyle in later life especially with regard to diet, health locus of control and doctor visits.