Search results
1 – 10 of over 5000Purpose – The connections between religious factors and stratification outcomes were long ignored in the sociological literature, yet a growing number of studies show that…
Abstract
Purpose – The connections between religious factors and stratification outcomes were long ignored in the sociological literature, yet a growing number of studies show that religion remains important for determining the life chances of individuals. I add to this literature by examining how religious affiliation is associated with the structure of occupational attainment in the United States.
Methodology – I analyze data from the 1972–2008 General Social Surveys to show how religious affiliation is related to occupational attainment and occupational mobility by gender and race.
Findings – I find that sectarian Protestants occupy the lower rungs of the occupational structure, even relative to their low rates of educational attainment. In contrast, Jews and nonidentifying respondents show considerable occupational advantage. Catholics also have specific patterns of occupational attainment that hint at their growing wealth parity with mainline Protestants. I also show that religious influences hold across racial and gender groupings, and across cohorts.
Social implications – Religion continues to significantly influence the occupational structure in the United States, and sectarian religion serves as an important anchor hindering occupational attainment.
Details
Keywords
This study seeks to examine aspects of social class associated with British public accountancy immigrants to the USA prior to the First World War. The study's specific purpose is…
Abstract
Purpose
This study seeks to examine aspects of social class associated with British public accountancy immigrants to the USA prior to the First World War. The study's specific purpose is to investigate the social mobility and fluidity associated with these élite immigrants in the early history of US public accountancy.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper is informed by previous studies of both social class and élite immigration and uses biographical data describing 395 British chartered and incorporated accountancy immigrants entering the USA between 1875 and 1914. Data analyses describe social mobility and fluidity based on the recorded occupations of these élite immigrants.
Findings
Despite their élite status, the immigrants experienced inter‐generational downward mobility immediately post‐migration. The evidence also indicates inter‐generational and intra‐generational upward mobility for immigrants settling in the USA and for those who did not settle there. The study further reveals evidence of social fluidity associated with both settlers and non‐settlers.
Practical implications
The study suggests that immigration to the USA did not immediately improve the occupational status of British public accountants who settled there. Nor, compared to those who did not settle in the USA, was it necessarily a more advantageous career path to improved occupational status. The study adds to existing knowledge of British accountants in the early US public accountancy profession and, more generally, to that of social mobility associated with immigration of the period.
Originality/value
The study is significant because it provides knowledge of social mobility and fluidity associated with élite immigrants and contributes to the social history of British accountants in the early development of US public accountancy.
Details
Keywords
Richard N.S. Robinson, Anna Kralj, David J. Solnet, Edmund Goh and Victor J. Callan
The purpose of this study is to identify across a number of workplace variables the similarities and differences in attitudes between three key frontline hotel worker groups…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to identify across a number of workplace variables the similarities and differences in attitudes between three key frontline hotel worker groups: housekeepers, front office employees and food and beverage front-of-house staff.
Design/methodology/approach
A qualitative study was conducted using 25 semi-structured interviews with frontline workers employed in full-service hotels across Eastern Australia. Analysis was augmented through the Leximancer® software package to develop relational themes in the aggregation and disaggregation of the occupations.
Findings
Although work/life balance was a common theme across the three occupations, several distinct attitudinal differences emerged, in particular regarding perceptions of one occupational group towards another.
Practical implications
This study highlights the importance of hotel managers being cognisant of occupational differences and collecting data capable of assisting in the identification of these differences. Several practitioner relevant recommendations are made.
Originality/value
This exploratory study challenges assumptions regarding a “pan-industrial” hospitality occupational community and applies an emerging qualitative software package to highlight occupational differences and relational perceptions.
Details
Keywords
Sonia Pereira, Erik Snel and Margrietha ‘t Hart
To identify the trajectories of occupational mobility among non-EU immigrant workers in Europe and to test empirical data against neoclassical human capital theory that predicts…
Abstract
Purpose
To identify the trajectories of occupational mobility among non-EU immigrant workers in Europe and to test empirical data against neoclassical human capital theory that predicts upward occupational mobility and labor market segmentation theories proposing immigrant confinement to secondary segments.
Methodology/approach
Data from survey and semi-structured interviews (2,859 and 357, respectively) with immigrants from Brazil, Ukraine, and Morocco in the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Portugal, and Norway. Multinomial regression analysis to test the likelihood of moving downward, upward, or stability and identify explanatory factors, complemented with qualitative evidence.
Findings
We found support for the thesis of segmented labor market theories of limited upward occupational mobility following migration. However, immigrants with longer residence in the destination country have higher chances of upward mobility compared to stability and downward mobility, giving also support for the neoclassical human capital theory. Frail legal status impacts negatively on upward mobility chances and men more often experience upward mobility after migration than women.
Research limitations/implications
Findings reflect the specific situation of immigrants from three origin countries in four destination areas and cannot be taken as representative. In the multinomial regression we cannot distinguish between cohort effects and duration of stay.
Social implications
Education obtained in the destination country is very important for migrants’ upward occupational mobility, bearing important policy implications with regards to migrants’ integration.
Originality/value of paper
Its focus on trajectories of mobility through migration looking at two important transitions: (1) from last occupation in the origin country to first occupation at destination and (2) from first occupation to current occupation and offers a wide cross-country comparison both in terms of origin and destination countries in Europe.
Details
Keywords
Jaan Masso, Raul Eamets and Pille Mõtsmees
– The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of temporary migration on the upward occupational mobility by using a novel database from Estonia.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of temporary migration on the upward occupational mobility by using a novel database from Estonia.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors use a unique data set of the online job search portal of Estonia that includes thousands of employees with foreign work experience. The authors study whether the presence of temporary migration in ones working career is associated with upward movement in the occupational ladder, defined either in terms of wages or required human capital.
Findings
The authors did not find any positive effect of temporary migration on upward occupational mobility and in case of females the effect was negative. The results could be related to the short-term nature of migration and the occupational downshifting abroad as well as the functioning of home country labour market.
Research limitations/implications
While the uniqueness of the data set is of value, one needs to acknowledge its weaknesses: the job-seekers work histories are self-reported and the authors do not know what information was left out as undesired by applicant.
Practical implications
The findings imply that the benefits of temporary migration from Eastern to Western Europe on the sending country via the returnees’ labour market performance might be limited, yet it does not exclude the benefits of return migration through other mechanism.
Originality/value
The literature on return migration is not big and there are only a few papers dealing with occupational change or mobility of the return migrants. Compared to earlier studies we have looked at wider set of occupations ranked by different ladders. Using the unique data set the authors have included in the study ca 7,500 return migrants while earlier studies have been based on rather small samples.
Details
Keywords
The relationship between gender and managerial mobility is explored by examining distinct structural elements unique to industrialized nations that have been overlooked in prior…
Abstract
The relationship between gender and managerial mobility is explored by examining distinct structural elements unique to industrialized nations that have been overlooked in prior occupational opportunity research. Using country specific files of the database, “Comparative project on class structure and class consciousness” the analysis provides a multicultural comparison of female managerial attainment in the UK, Sweden, and the USA. By examining managerial attainment by gender, the findings suggest that the combined associational effects of gender and labor force participation patterns by nation better assess the severity of occupational barriers to managerial mobility experienced by women, than when examining gender participation patterns alone. The data indicate that barriers for female occupational mobility are not merely limited to decision making at the interpersonal level, but provide empirical evidence to suggest that impediments are more institutionally ingrained and culturally distinct than previously imagined.
Details
Keywords
This study develops a social psychological model to account for women’s gender‐typed occupational mobility. The model delineates that occupational gender composition affects…
Abstract
This study develops a social psychological model to account for women’s gender‐typed occupational mobility. The model delineates that occupational gender composition affects women’s psychological experience (experience of sex discrimination, self‐efficacy, and gender role ideology), and that this psychological experience, in turn, contributes to their mobility between male‐dominated and female‐dominated occupations. Using the National Longitudinal Surveys (NLS) of Young Women data, the study finds that occupational gender composition affects women’s report of experience of sex discrimination but not self‐efficacy or gender role ideology. Self‐efficacy contributes to women’s gender‐typed occupational mobility, but experience of sex discrimination and gender role ideology do not. The direction for future research is discussed.
Details
Keywords
The German institutional setting of skill formation is supposed to enable young people smooth and structured transitions into the labor market. For decades, the large majority of…
Abstract
The German institutional setting of skill formation is supposed to enable young people smooth and structured transitions into the labor market. For decades, the large majority of graduates of the “dual system” of vocational education experienced good chances to immediately access appropriate job positions. However, labor market entry has become less stable in the last two decades. In this paper, we examine the changing transition from vocational training to the first job in Germany. We analyze the consequences of inter-firm mobility and unemployment after finishing vocational education for the transition to the first job. Our results show that leaving the training firm, and especially unemployment, strongly enhance occupational shifts at labor market entry. In addition, not keeping one’s trained occupation negatively affects the chances to enter skilled job positions.