Temporary Employment and Family Formation: An Income or Insecurity Effect?

Recent studies show that temporary workers postpone family formation transitions, but it remains unclear whether this effect is due to the lower income or the stronger perceptions of job insecurity that go with a temporary contract. To address this question, we link data from a large-scale survey among Dutch employees to longitudinal population register data on marriage and first births. Logistic regression models estimate the effects of temporary employment on marriage and first birth, and mediation analyses assess to what extent these effects are explained by income and perceptions of job insecurity. Results show that temporarily employed women delay first birth. There is also some evidence that temporarily employed men postpone marriage and first birth. These effects are partly explained by income, which increases marriage and first birth rates among men and women alike. Perceptions of job insecurity generally had little effect on family formation, although higher marriage rates were found among women who experienced affective job insecurity. Overall, this shows that it is their low income rather than their feelings of insecurity about future employment that explains why temporary employees postpone family formation.

From Social Assistance to Self-Sufficiency: Low Income Work as a Stepping Stone

Welfare reforms often focus on stimulating employment among benefit recipients, based on the theoretical mechanism that the performance of low income work will serve as a stepping stone towards financial self-sufficiency. Alternative theories, however, argue that the acceptance of low income work will reduce job search intensity and can signal low productivity, and therefore will not enable people to support themselves. Using longitudinal administrative data and discrete time linear probability models, we follow all social assistance recipients in the Netherlands from 2010 to 2015, and analyse whether, and for whom, low income work functions as a stepping stone towards sustainable self-sufficiency. We find that social assistance recipients are more likely to become self-sufficient when they are active in low income work. This stepping stone effect applies in particular to benefit recipients with limited work experience, a higher educational level, a shorter duration of welfare receipt and to those who belong to the native Dutch majority. The type of employment also matters: low income work through temporary employment agencies is found to be the most effective stepping stone towards self-sufficiency.