Summaries
Long-term career effects of flexible work
This article focuses on the long-term career ef fects of flexible work (more specifically: occu pational status and the likelihood to become unemployed). According to an important inter pretation of the human capital theory flexible jobs will have adverse career effects, because employers will not be willing to invest in flexi ble workers. Although our data confirm this unwillingness, we do not find an effect of courses taken during the working life on the later career.
Two contradictory hypotheses about the long-term career effects of flexible work have a prominent place in this article. According to the waiting-room hypothesis, adverse effects of flexible work in the beginning of the career will only be temporary because the flexible job will be a stepping-stone to a permanent posi tion. In contrast, the segmentation hypothesis expects a lasting adverse career effect of flexi ble work. With respect to occupational status our analysis supports the latter hypothesis, though our analysis of unemployment chances contradicts both hypotheses.
The idea that workers with a weaker labour market position will experience greater adverse career effects of flexible work is only partially supported by the data. We do find more adverse effects for younger workers, but not for wo men. With respect to education, the adverse ef fects for higher educated workers are higher compared to lower educated workers.
Educational motives of companies and the quality of training of the employees
The quality of apprenticeship training varies
considerably between firms. It is not always in the interest of the training firm to provide good training. If the training firm's expected future profits from training are small, it may be more interested in the direct productivity of apprentices than in their training. This article examines the relationship between training motives of the firm and the quality of apprenti ceship training. To measure the quality of the training, the way in which training and work were organised at the apprenticeship place were studied. It is found that firms that train apprentices because of a future need for quali fied workers, provide better quality training than firms that do not have long-term benefits from training. Furthermore there is some evi dence that the quality of training affects the chance of successful completion of the trai ning and the wages after the apprenticeship.
Who learns more, will go - or not? The effects of training on personnel mobility
Among employers as well as employees there exists no clear view on the benefits of in-com pany training. This paper analyses the impact of training on worker mobility. Using panel data of more than 4500 workers from the OS A Labour Force Survey, 1994-1996-1998, we find that job separations are not significantly affec ted by training; neither by firm specific trai ning, nor by general training. This is inconsis tent with the hypothesis that (a) firm specific training results in a reduction of voluntary worker mobility and (b) general training results in an increase in mobility. Furthermore, we find that worker mobility is relatively low in firms that have adopted a formal training poli cy.
Summaries External returns to higher education:
opening the 'black box'
In the discussion about how education is orga nized a lot of attention has been paid to the controversy between vocational and general education. Several studies stress that vocatio nal education leads to higher productivity others that generic education makes graduates more flexible. Despite the differences, scholars agree on one point: the curriculum and tea ching style affect the labour market returns to education. However, until now little or no em pirical evidence has been found for this. Exter nal returns to education have been investiga ted, but education itself remains a 'black box'. In this article we try to open this 'black box’ by examining teaching styles and graduates' ex periences during the study and use them as predictors for the external return to education. We use the graduates' gross hourly wages as an indicator for the external returns to education. In addition we examine to what extent gradua tes regard their study as useful for present work tasks and the further career. The data used come from a survey that was held in 1998 among higher education graduates in the Net herlands. We find that experiences and tea ching styles associated with vocational trai ning often influence the external returns to education in the short term. Experiences and teaching styles associated with generic trai ning effect the expected development of gradu ates' competences in the further career.
Did work values of young people change during the last decades?
It is sometimes supposed that the labour mar ket changes during the last decades went hand in hand with an increase in expressive and im material work values, and a decrease in instru mental and material values. It is also believed that there has been a general decline in the centrality of work. Finally, it has been sugges
ted that these changes in work values are found in most (West) European countries.
In this article we present an overview of Dutch and European research with respect to these developments. In reviewing the litera ture we use the 'continuity' or 'discontinuity' hypothesis. Our findings from quantitative and own qualitative research bring us to the conclusion that none of these hypotheses are supported by empirical research. It seems to be more likely that selective changes in work val ues took place, in which sex, environmental and cultural factors played an important role. Finally, we present some suggestions for the Netherlands' and the European transitional la bour market policies.
Work orientations in Europe at the end of the 20th century. A multi-level analysis with individual and contextual variables.
The data of the European Value Survey of 1999/2000 are used to analyse the differences in work orientations between 31 European countries. Hypotheses concerning individual and contextual factors are derived from moder nisation theory and the notion of scarcity. Mul ti level analysis is used to test these hypothe ses. The results indicate that the differences in work orientation are mainly due to individual, as opposed to contextual, variables. Especially individual characteristics are associated with an intrinsic work orientation. These associa tions mostly confirm our hypotheses. And in trinsic work orientation is also associated with post-materialism and with a self-oriented value (as opposed to conformity), as hypothesised. As far as the differences between the European countries are concerned, it appeared that the intrinsic work orientation was not associated with the level of prosperity, or the level of unemployment within a given country. These findings are discussed in the conclusion, and some suggestions for future research are for mulated.
