4361 - Work and Inequality Across Different Labor Market Contexts

Session Submission Type: Paper Session (100 min)

Description

This collection of papers utilizes different theoretical and methodological approaches to examine inequality across a diverse range of labor market contexts. The authors pay particular attention to the macro- and micro-level mechanisms that produce inequality in the workplace. The specific issues addressed are varied, including how qualifications are perceived and rewarded in the global labor market (Chen; McElrath), how job quality changes over time in reaction to structural changes in the economy (Dill and Francis), how the features of certain jobs (e.g. unpredictable and unstable work schedules) produce difference in earnings and mobility outcomes (Fugiel), and how hiring agents use socio-technical intermediaries (e.g. recruiting firms, employee referrals, and employment websites) to facilitate and exacerbate social inequality (Damarin and McDonald). Together, these papers have implications for how we think about the structure of labor markets and their role in facilitating inequality over time and across the globe.

Sub Unit

• Labor Market

Presider

• Maria Aysa-Lastra, Winthrop University

Individual Presentations

• Digital Distinctions and Tacit Targeting: How Labor Market Practices Reproduce Inequality Today - Amanda K. Damarin, Georgia State University; Steve McDonald, North Carolina State University

• The Value of US College Education in Global Labor Markets: Experimental Evidence from China - Mingyu Chen, Princeton University

• Earnings Penalties and Overqualification: The Context of Labor Market Institutions - Kevin McElrath, State University of New York-Stony Brook

• Measuring the Availability of “Good Jobs” in the United States for Working-Class Men - Janette S. Dill, University of Minnesota; Robert Donald Francis, Whitworth University

• Work as an Option: Effects of Unpredictable and Unstable Schedules on Earnings and Mobility - Peter J. Fugiel, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Session Organizer

• Jacob C. Day, University of North Carolina at Wilmington