Abstract
This study analyses how the long-term modernisation process as well as ups and downs of business cycles affect the entry of men into the labour market in West Germany and their career mobility. Combining longitudinal data from the German Life History Study and the ALWA study, we first reconstructed men’s job histories continuously for the period between 1945 and 2008. As a measure of men’s ‘goodness of jobs’ at entry into the labour market and across the job career, the magnitude prestige scale (MPS), has been employed. Then, we used the time series data obtained from official statistics to perform factor analysis and suggest a more substantially grounded approach than the conventional approach to the analysis of age (A), period (P) and cohort (C) effects. In particular, we assessed how the modernisation process and continuously changing labour market conditions affect men’s entry into the labour market across successive cohorts. Based on their further occupational careers, we used a multi-level event-history model to study how placements in first jobs (cohort effect) and the continuously changing macro structure (period effect) influence men’s upward, lateral, and downward career mobility, controlling for men’s individual-level resources, such as educational attainment and changing labour force experience (life-course or age effect). This fully dynamic analysis shows that there was improvement in the quality of entry-level jobs and increased mobility across men’s birth cohorts. This allows us to gain a better understanding of how long-term macroeconomic trends have influenced social inequality in West Germany across several generations.
Highlights
Since the global financial crisis in 2009 there has been a renewed interest in the impact of macroeconomic changes on the job trajectories of the workforce
Following research by Weber (1922) and Coleman (1986), the aim of this study was to contribute to a better understanding of how the long-term modernisation process and the ups and downs of the business cycle in the course of modernisation have affected the entry of men into the labour market in West Germany, and their career mobility, since the end of World War II (Mayer 2004)
Our longitudinal analysis shows that birth cohorts are one of the most important ‘cultural carriers’ of change in the labour market
Summary
Since the global financial crisis in 2009 there has been a renewed interest in the impact of macroeconomic changes on the job trajectories of the workforce. It is believed that while the older generations witnessed an improvement in job opportunities during the times of the German economic miracle since the 1950s and the expansion of the welfare state in the 1960s and 1970s, recent cohorts suffer from declining job entry opportunities and from more downward mobility, fewer upward job moves, and generally flatter career lines Based on these changes, it is assumed that the rising middle class is declining again (Herbert-Quandt-Stiftung 2007; Bertelsmann Stiftung 2013; Bosch and Kalina 2015; Nachtwey 2016). Utilising time series data obtained from official statistics we first identify the most relevant macroeconomic changes and their impact on the labour market by performing confirmatory factor analysis We apply these macro indicators in a multi-level regression model to assess the historical macro conditions under which the successive cohorts entering the labour market started their job careers in West Germany (cohort effect). Thereafter, we present empirical evidence for the job trajectories of men in West Germany, and we draw conclusions about the development of opportunities at the time of entry into the labour market, career mobility and the long-term trend of social inequality across generations
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