The Differential Impact of a Plant Closing on the Reemployment and Income Patterns of Displaced Blue- and White-Collar Employees

Abstract

In recent years social scientists have turned their attention to the impact of plant closings on displaced employees, but few studies have examined employees displaced in large-scale shutdowns in markets saturated with high unemployment, or groups other than white “prime age” male production workers. The present study examines the reemployment and income effects of displacement on a population of 3,596 factory production workers, managerial and clerical/technical employees, and includes women as well as men, all of whom were displaced in a single large-scale plant closing. A telephone survey of 555 subjects produced a response rate in excess of 90%. The actual postdisplacement reemployment experience of these employees is described and compared, as are their subsequent income levels. Regression analysis is used to test whether the hypothesized factors of age, sex, education, seniority and subsequent reemployment experience successfully predict the degree of income loss for the sample as a whole as well as the three subsamples.