Navigating an Uncertain Labor Market in the UK: The Role of Structure and Agency in the Transition from School to Work

(2020) - Ingrid Schoon

Journal: The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science
Link:: http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0002716220905569
DOI:: 10.1177/0002716220905569
Links::
Tags:: #paper #NCDS #LabourMarket #Agency #Transition #school-to-work #SocialClass
Cite Key:: [@Schoon2020]

Abstract

This article reviews the evidence on young people in the UK making the transition from school to work in a changing socioeconomic climate. The review draws largely on evidence from national representative panels and follows the lives of different age cohorts. I show that there has been a trend toward increasingly uncertain and precarious employment opportunities for young people since the 1970s, as well as persisting inequalities in educational and occupational attainment. The joint role of social structure and human agency in shaping youth transitions is discussed. I argue that current UK policies have forgotten about half of the population of young people who do not go to university, by not providing viable pathways and leaving more and more young people excluded from good jobs and employment prospects. Recommendations are made for policies aimed at supporting the vulnerable and at provision of career options for those not engaged in higher education.

Notes

“I show that there has been a trend toward increasingly uncertain and precarious employment opportunities for young people since the 1970s, as well as persisting inequalities in educational and occupational attainment.” (Schoon, 2020, p. 77)

“In this review, I treat the SWT as a status passage in the institutionalized life course (Buchmann and Kriesi 2011; Shanahan 2000), meaning that youth transitions are largely shaped by opportunities and constraints presented by the sociohistorical context encountered and, within this context, are dependent on individual decision-making and agency (Schoon and heckhausen 2019).” (Schoon, 2020, p. 78)

“The manifestations of agency have to be understood within contextual constraints, and they vary depending on cultural context, gender, ethnicity, and social background” (Schoon, 2020, p. 79)

“Most liberal transition systems provide no structured path into skilled employment without college, emphasizing college education as a prerequisite for a viable career” (Schoon, 2020, p. 80)

“The term youth unemployment refers to 15- to 24-year-olds who are unemployed, which means that there can be variations in the operational definition between countries, as the lower age limit is usually determined by the minimum age for leaving school, where this exists.” (Schoon, 2020, p. 81)

“he experience of youth unemployment, in turn, can bring with it long-term “scarring effects” in terms of health and well-being. For example, using data collected for a UK birth cohort born in 1958, Bell and Blanchflower (2011) linked experiences of youth unemployment (between ages 16 and 23) to indicators of general health, life satisfaction, and depression at age 50, demonstrating the long-term effects of a problematic start into the labor market, associated with “permanent scars rather than temporary blemishes” (p. 260).” (Schoon, 2020, p. 82)

“SOURcE: Figure based on findings reported by Anders and Dorsett (2017).” (Schoon, 2020, p. 85)

“In sociology, terms such as structured or bounded agency (Evans 2002; Shanahan 2000) are used to reflect the social embeddedness of individual agency.” (Schoon, 2020, p. 88)

“Although individual agency and career planning are circumscribed by structural constrains, individuals are not passively responding to given structures, but are active coproducers of their own development. Agency has to be understood as a relational process, emerging through the interactions with the wider social context (Schoon and heckhausen 2019), and it involves “the externalization of conscious intentionality into human action” (Dannefer and huang 2017, 5).” (Schoon, 2020, p. 88)