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Project

Precarious Employment Biographies: Loss of Social Status due to Job Market Policies?

Natalie Grimm, Berthold Vogel (Project head)

(Last modified September 2008)

Precarious Employment Biographies is part of the joint project The Dynamics of Poverty and the Job Market, which is being carried out by scholars from the Hamburg Institute for Social Research, the Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung, Bundesagentur für Arbeit [Institute for Employment Research of the Federal Employment Agency] in Nuremberg, and the Institut für Sozialwissenschaftliche Forschung München [Institute for Social Science Research Munich] with funds supplied by the German Federal Ministry for Labor and Social Affairs. The project was designed as a qualitative study with two interview waves. Empirical data resulted from interviews with employed persons and individuals with paid employment but with a difficult or uncertain employment status

Starting point for this study was the thesis that current reforms of social security systems signal the departure from a key principle of the German welfare state, i.e., the state’s role in securing occupational and social status. This tradition is being abandoned not only with respect to old-age security and health insurance but also in the realm of labor market policies implemented by both the government and corporative entities. Implementation of the reform program “Modern Services on the Labor Market” means that fundamental changes in the institutional, political, and legal frameworks for paid employment and unemployment, for employment biographies and career patterns are now taking place

In keeping with the goals of promoting job-seeking activities by the unemployed and enhancing their employability, the focus of interventions by the welfare state is shifting, from securing living standards and status, to meeting basic needs. Since the emphasis on basic needs means that those who receive benefits must assume personal responsibility for their lives, labor market risks are now being individualized. This project aims to explore in greater detail the transformations emerging as a result of the realignment of labor market policies for both employees and job-seekers, centering on employment biography perspectives, career trajectories, and individual coping strategies and behavioral patterns.

Preliminary evaluation of the data collected reveal clearly that a new category can be defined for those active on the job market: so-called “Grenzgänger” (a term formerly used to refer to cross-border commuters). These people neither really belong to the world of stable employment, nor are they excluded completely; for them, the border between secure long-term employment and perpetually insecure zones in the world of work are increasingly blurred. They are forced to switch frequently between different situations with respect to their employment status (state-subsidized jobs, work as “temps”, short-term contracts, low-paying jobs that relegate them to the “working poor”, etc.). While they succeed in entering the world of employment, their prospects are often ruled by a culture of contingency. The employment biographies, experience, and orientations of these Grenzgänger are marked by the fact that they can neither be described as truly partaking in the benefits of stable employment, nor as effectively excluded. Border-crossers typically exhibit astonishingly dynamic employment biographies and a high level of individual activities. But in contrast to the normative concept of “activization”, which posits that high levels of activity on the part of the unemployed and precariously employed are the prerequisite for success, the results of data procured in this study points in a different direction: despite intense efforts, mobility, and creativity, only a few succeed in (re-)entering stable employment careers. Grenzgänger on the job market represent in a certain sense a state of frantic standstill. Increased activity with the aim of acquiring a job does not necessarily lead to improvements in the situation of these individuals, either in terms of actual employment or living situation in general. Instead, many of those interviewed found themselves remaining on a similar level of precarity. Short-term employment or improvements or declines in employment status had only marginal influence on the entire situation of these individuals. What may change is the site and conditions of employment and the status of the respective job, but the overall biographical situation, with respect to social and material criteria and status in general, remain virtually unchanged.

The study also shows, however, that these Grenzgänger are not only older employees or individuals with inferior qualifications or from less sought-after sectors of employment. People with precarious status are of all ages, have a broad spectrum of occupational qualifications, and have employment histories in nearly all spheres of society. How they perceive and cope with their precarious living and employment situation depends to a large extent on their previous life and employment trajectories. The experience and reference points of Grenzgänger on the job market is shaped decisively by their perception of how threatened they are with respect to their employment biography. Of special significance is the question, in which phases of their employment biography episodes of unemployment occurred. In spite of all the difference observed in this study, Grenzgänger on the employment market share one feature: they are all involved in an ongoing struggle to avoid a loss of status, occupationally and socially.