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Economic stressors such as job insecurity, job loss, unemployment, and underemployment cause severe difficulties for the workers affected, their families, organizations, and societies overall. Consequently, most past research has taken a thoroughly negative perspective on economic stress, addressing its diverse negative consequences and the ways that people try to cope with them. And even when following the advice provided by the scientific literature, people affected by economic stress will usually end up being off worse than they were before the onset of the stressor.

The current chapter pays credit to this perspective yet also tries to counterbalance it with an alternative one. While acknowledging the vast amount of literature outlining the negative consequences of economic stress on peoples’ well-being and careers, some literature also points at opportunities for a more positive perspective. More specifically, we argue that affected people can use a wide repertoire of behaviors for handling their current situation. Of particular promise in this regard is the concept of career adaptability, generally defined as the ability to change to fit into new career-related circumstances. Indeed, studies show that under certain conditions, career adaptability can facilitate people's search for not just any job but for a qualitatively better job, thus breaking through the spiral of losses usually associated with economic stress.

For the purpose of this argument, we link career adaptability to the concept of proactive coping, analyzing how and under which conditions career adaptability may present a contextualized form of proactive coping. We then address known personal and situational antecedents of career adaptability and show how career adaptability may be fostered and trained among different types of job seekers. We end this chapter with a discussion of open questions as well as directions for future research.

I examine changes in the incidence and consequences of job loss between 1981 and 2001 using data from the Displaced Workers Surveys (DWS) from 1984 to 2002. The overall rate of job loss has a strong counter-cyclical component, but the job-loss rate was higher than might have been expected during the mid-1990’s given the strong labor market during that period. While the job-loss rate of more-educated workers increased, less-educated workers continue to have the highest rates of job loss overall. Displaced workers have a substantially reduced probability of employment and an increased probability of part-time employment subsequent to job loss. The more educated have higher post-displacement employment rates and are more likely to be employed full-time. The probabilities of employment and full-time employment among those reemployed subsequent to job loss increased substantially in the late 1990s, suggesting that the strong labor market eased the transition of displaced workers. Reemployment rates dropped sharply in the recession of 2001. Those re-employed, even full-time and regardless of education level, suffer significant earnings declines relative to what they earned before they were displaced. Additionally, foregone earnings growth (the growth in earnings that would have occurred had the workers not been displaced), is an important part of the cost of job loss for re-employed full-time job losers. There is no evidence of a decline during the tight labor market of the 1990s in the earnings loss of displaced workers who were reemployed full-time. In fact, earnings losses of displaced workers have been increasing since the mid 1990s.

This paper tests whether employers responded particularly negatively to African American job applicants during the deep U.S. recession that began in 2007. Theories of labor queuing and social closure posit that members of privileged groups will act to minimize labor market competition in times of economic turbulence, which could advantage Whites relative to African Americans. Although social closure should be weakest in the less desirable, low-wage job market, it may extend downward during recessions, pushing minority groups further down the labor queue and exacerbating racial inequalities in hiring. We consider two complementary data sources: (1) a field experiment with a randomized block design and (2) the nationally representative NLSY97 sample. Contrary to expectations, both analyses reveal a comparable recession-based decline in job prospects for White and African American male applicants, implying that hiring managers did not adapt new forms of social closure and demonstrating the durability of inequality even in times of structural change. Despite this proportionate drop, however, the recession left African Americans in an extremely disadvantaged position. Whites during the recession obtained favorable responses from employers at rates similar to African Americans prior to the recession. The combination of experimental methods and nationally representative longitudinal data yields strong evidence on how race and recession affect job prospects in the low-wage labor market.

Using a sample of 214 US metropolitan areas, we examine the connection between the Great Recession and bad jobs, taking into consideration the macro-level determinants of the troubled economy. Our measure of bad jobs is derived from Kalleberg, Reskin, and Hudson’s (2000) conceptualization as those that have low pay, lack health insurance, and lack pension plans. We find that the Great Recession increased the prevalence of bad jobs, consistently for men and selectively for women. Among the macro-level processes, the decline of the manufacturing base, union membership, and public sector employment are sources of increasing bad jobs, especially for men. Those macro-level processes which are growing in influence such as casualization, globalization and financialization show no signs of reversing the negative trends in bad jobs. Human capital variables in the labor market such as educational and age variability consistently suggest more adverse effects on bad jobs for men than women. Our findings contribute to the further understanding of the nature of precarious work in a troubled economy.

This paper uses data on over 4,600 layoff announcements in the U.S., covering each firm that ever existed in the Fortune 500 between 1970 and 2000, along with 40 interviews of senior managers in 2001 and 2002 to describe layoffs in large U.S. firms over this period. In order to motivate further work in the area, I investigate six main issues related to layoffs: timing of layoffs, reasons for layoffs, the actual execution of layoffs, international workers, labor unions, and the types of workers by occupation and compensation categories. The paper draws on literature from many fields to help further understand these issues.

Multidimensional fit (MDF) has been coined as “elusive” and relevant to an individual’s social identity and self-concept, unfolding over time as individuals assess their fit relative to Person-Organization, Person-Vocation, Person-Job, and Person-Team Fit. In this chapter, the literature as it relates to the refugee employment journey, MDF, and HRM practices that facilitate or inhibit MDF is reviewed. Furthermore, in this study, the process-oriented view of the refuge path highlights the complexity of their experience, noting an array of antecedents as they relate to country, host country and individual differences, interventions through NGOs, refugee resettlement agencies, and organizations, as well as the less explored entrepreneurial path. These diverse paths and the process of finding fit, and the obstacles refugees face, are viewed through the lens of shocks and reassessment of MDF throughout their journey. Finally, the study’s outcomes illustrate individual wellbeing factors, organizational level benefits, as well as community level benefits to MDF.

Purpose – This research presents results concerning the impact of family financial stress on adolescent substance use.

Design/methodology/approach – Drawing a sample of 18,614 adolescent males (9,459) and females (9,155) ages 12–17 years from the 2010 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, this work utilizes stepwise logistic regression and ordinary least squares to determine whether family poverty measures are associated with adolescent high-risk behaviors of smoking cigarettes, drinking alcohol, and using marijuana.

Findings – This study found limited support for adolescent substance use within families who are experiencing economic distress. Adolescents from families who had moved at least once in the prior year were more likely to have used cigarettes, alcohol, and marijuana. Furthermore, males and females who disapprove of peers’ substance using behaviors are less likely to use those substances.

Research limitations/implications – This study may not explain adolescent substance using behavior outside of the United States. Further research into socioeconomic factors should be addressed in subsequent work as should the intermediary variables pertaining to the parent–child relationship.

Practical implications – Understanding contributing factors to adolescent substance use will assist in developing social policy that will support families.

Originality/value – This study provides insight into the consequences of family characteristics both socioeconomic and psychosocial which influence adolescent substance using behaviors.

Amid the multitude of economic effects emanating from impositions of COVID-19, workers in the tourism sector are potentially experiencing significant psychosocial impacts. These effects are compounded by the uncertainty of pathways for positive change and the precariousness of adjustments to life and livelihoods. Their attitudes to the newly imposed circumstances are possibly conditioned by a sense of hope which may have implications for their adaptations in the face of sudden or slow change. In this chapter, we argue that one’s sense of hope represents an important component of psychosocial well-being and may even be visualized as a necessary component of adaptation. Hope is conceptualized as a cognitive process that entails thinking and planning in order to achieve proposed goals (Snyder, Irving, & Anderson, 1991; Snyder, Lopez, Shorey, Rand, & Feldman, 2003) and can be operationalized into three core components: goals, pathways, and agency. Based on in-depth interviews and a questionnaire survey administered to former accommodation workers in the Negril tourism industry, this chapter examines expressions of hope(lessness) existing among workers displaced by COVID-19. It potentially provides nuanced understandings of hope as a necessary raw material for adaptation initiatives and explores ways in which a sense of hope could be harnessed in the face of disasters and despair.