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Author: Rogers, David Edward
Resulting in 1 citation.
1. Rogers, David Edward
Effects of Individual and Occupational Characteristics on the Career Paths of Young Males
Ph.D. Dissertation, Cornell University, 1982
Cohort(s): Young Men
Publisher: UMI - University Microfilms, Bell and Howell Information and Learning
Keyword(s): Career Patterns; Discrimination, Job; Dual Economic Theory; Family Background and Culture; Heterogeneity; Labor Market, Secondary; Mobility; Occupational Segregation

Researchers have long been interested in factors influencing the initial labor force attachment and subsequent mobility of young workers. Many investigators examine various human capital investments that individuals undertake to differentiate themselves and improve their market position. Other researchers maintain that augmenting an individual's stock of human capital yields an insignificant marginal return because employment opportunities are non-existent or highly restricted. This view posits that labor markets are segmented and that discrimination, certain systematic factors, and even random effects can start workers off in bad jobs, and once there, antiwork behavior is reinforced, thereby creating a dead-end situation. This debate prompts several questions for analysis. First, can the existence of a secondary sector be documented and what are its characteristics? Second, who gets these bad jobs? Are there differential characteristics of these workers that might attribute the segmentation to heterogeneity in the population? Finally, to what extent is there mobility over time between good and bad jobs? The research provides an empirical test of the dead-end hypothesis, i.e., that a set of jobs restrict subsequent mobility. Of key interest is the extent to which it is the characteristics of the jobs or unobservable individual differences which cause this effect. The research uses recent information from the NLS of Young Men and the Dictionary of Occupational Titles to construct four-year work histories for 358 young males as they leave formal schooling. While this sample exhibits what can only be called a substantial amount of intersegment mobility, there is some evidence that suggests that the sector of past employment has an independent effect on sector of current employment. When controls for unobservable heterogeneity are incorporated, all evidence of sector persistence is eliminated. This suggests that it is not the past sector of employment per se which creates the observed persistence, but rather characteristics unique to the individuals.
Bibliography Citation
Rogers, David Edward. Effects of Individual and Occupational Characteristics on the Career Paths of Young Males. Ph.D. Dissertation, Cornell University, 1982.