Slipping into and out of underemployment: Another disadvantage for nonmetropolitan workers?

Leif Jensen, Jill L. Findeis, Wan Ling Hsu, Jason P. Schachter

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

64 Scopus citations

Abstract

Underemployment, which goes beyond unemployment to include the working poor, discouraged workers, and involuntary part-time workers, is a useful measure of employment hardship. We argue that underemployment should be included with other conventional indicators of the disadvantaged circumstances of nonmetropolitan (nonmetro) labor, in terms not only of prevalence, but also of the likelihood of transitions into and out underemployment. We take advantage of the quasi-longitudinal nature of the U.S. Current Population Surveys to estimates models of year-to-year employment transitions for the quarter century 1968 to 1993. We find that (1) adequately employed nonmetro workers are more likely than their more urban counterparts to become underemployed; (2) the nonmetro underemployed are less likely to become adequately employed; (3) statistical controls only strengthen these nonmetro disadvantages; (4) the employment transitions of nonmetro workers are less affected by shifts in the directions of the national economy than are those of metro workers; and (5) nonmetro women are more disadvantaged than women residing elsewhere.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)417-438
Number of pages22
JournalRural Sociology
Volume64
Issue number3
DOIs
StatePublished - Sep 1999

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Sociology and Political Science

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