Analyzing Gender Differences in Work-Life Occupational Mobility: Insights from Cohort Studies

1. Work-life career mobility: changing gender differences? Erzsébet Bukodi and Shirley Dex GeNet Final Conference Cambridge, 26-27 March 2009

2. Research questions Are there gender differences in the pattern of work-life occupational mobility? Are women’s and men’s occupational trajectories (in terms of earnings and social status) converging or diverging over time, across cohorts?

3. Overview • Policy and legislative context • Data and labour market context • Two measures for occupational standing • Occupational attainment over the career • A typology of occupational histories • The role of education and entry position in work-life occupational mobility

4. Some relevant background • 1970s was the decade of major legislative and policy change on equality: • Equal Pay legislation • 1975 Anti sex discrimination legislation • Statutory maternity leave • Decade for family policy changes from 1997 onwards • National Child Care Strategy; Sure Start Programme; Working Families Tax Credit; Part-time work directive; Family leave directive; parental leave; Paid paternity leave; enhanced and wider eligibility maternity leave, Min wage.

5. Data: Three British Birth Cohort Studies • MRC National Survey of Health and Development: • all children born in England, Wales and Scotland in one week in 1946. • follow up data collections took place twice from ages 1 to 4, 8 times between ages 5-15, 7 times between ages 16-31 and 3 times between ages 32-53 • The National Child Development Study • Census of babies born in a certain week of 1958 in GB • 7 main interview waves up to 2004 (age 46) • The British Cohort Study • Census of babies born in a certain week of 1970 in GB • 6 sweeps up to 2004 (age 34) • In all surveys: • Retrospective occupational histories

6. Data: sample size

7. Two measures for occupational standing • Earnings and social status can be seen as major rewards obtained via occupation • Occupational earnings scale: An updated and extended version of the Nickell scale • the average hourly earnings of all employees, men and women, working full-time • it provides a score for each of the 77 SOC90 minor occupational groups • Occupational status scale: Chan – Goldthorpe scale • extracting principal dimension from data on social interaction among members of occupations (close friendship) • provides scores for 31 occupational categories (either SOC90 minor groups or combinations of them)

8. Earnings and status hierarchies: different ones • The occupational earnings and occupational status hierarchies, although weakly correlated, are still clearly different scales. • Eg. when cross-classifying all jobs ever held by NCDS men aged 16-46, • just over 25% of all men were on the main diagonal; • over a half of men are in occupations that yield higher earnings relative to their status; • Under 25% of men in occupations with lower earnings than their status.

9. Labour market conditions at entry

10. Labour market conditions over cohorts’ life-courses Cohort 1946 aged 22-34 Cohort 1970 aged 22-34 Cohort 1958 aged 22-34

11. Economic conditions: Growth in GDP Cohort 1946: LM entry Cohort 1958: LM entry Cohort 1970: LM entry Cohort 1946 aged 22-34 Cohort 1958 aged 22-34 Cohort 1970 aged 22-34

12. Occupational earnings attainment over age MEN WOMEN

13. Occupational status attainment over age MEN WOMEN

14. A typology of occupational histories, ages 16 to 34

15. Work-life occupational earnings mobility

16. Work-life occupational status mobility

17. Two scales: differing patterns of gender differences

18. The role of education and career entry Multinomial regression: • Dependent variable: the 5-fold typology • Covariates: education, first occupational status, only full-time work over the career, father’s class: managerial & professional • Separately for cohorts and genders • Separately for the earnings and the status scale • Calculating predicted proportions of career types • for differing levels of education • for differing levels of first occupation

19. The role of education • 1946 cohort: Remarkably stable career for degree-holders (low rates of upward/downward mobility) • 1958 cohort: very unstable career regardless of level of qualification (especially for women with part-time experience and men) • For the less well educated, higher rates of downward mobility, especially in the 1958 cohort • For the tertiary educated, higher rates of upward mobility, but • for vast majority of 1958 cohort, upward moves are followed by downward moves • much higher probability in 1970 cohort of a steadily upward career (especially for men) • Generally, stronger effects of education for women in all cohorts

20. The first occupations - striking gender differences • Earnings hierarchy: • far greater immobility at the bottom of the hierarchy for women than men, especially for women with some part-time experience • women’s chances of mobility out of the bottom level of the earnings hierarchy are even getting worse • However, in case of the status scale • women’s chances for mobility out of the bottom are much higher than men’s, even if they experienced part-time work over their careers • Women and men, who start out at the top, tend to have relatively stable careers; but this is much more apparent in the 1946 and the 1970 than in the 1958 cohort

21. Conclusions • Occupational status: • women are more likely than men to move upwards • bad effects of part-time work are deteriorating over time • Occupational earnings: • women are less likely than men to move upwards, and are more likely to move downwards • women’s chances of moving out of the bottom are getting worse • on average, declining gender differences in this respect • Gender differences in career mobility: depending on how we measure them

22. Conclusions • The 1958 cohort: very unstable occupational careers, especially for men, at all levels of qualification, and regardless of the occupational levels at career entry: • the effects of economic circumstances under which they developed their early careers