Unemployment, Underemployment and Heteroemployment: Research for the Labour Uncertainty and Insecuri

1
Unemployment, Underemployment and
Heteroemployment Research for the Labour
Uncertainty and Insecurity of Youth in Cyprus

• Research of the Cyprus Labour Institute
  (????-???) for the Cyprus Youth Board

2
The aims of the Research

• Examine the issue of Uncertainty and Insecurity
  of Youth at Work that originate from
• The Unemployment
• The Employment Conditions
• The Working Environment
• The Status of Youth in the Cypriot Community

3
The meaning of Insecurity

• The meaning of insecurity refers to the term
  precarité, a sense that corresponds to the
  experience of an uncertain position for people
  who have already been in this situation.
• The experience of a precarious position or
  volatile, unstable, indeterminable and uncertain
  situation that reflects to reality or it is
  possible to cover a greater part of the
  population. (???, 2002 7).

4
The term of Youth

• The term Youth (jugend) is used from different
  sciences, from the authorities as well as from
  the society with a different way while the
  legalization of the members that compose the
  picture of youth is to be differentiated. With
  the term youth can be comprehended a social
  category, a generation, a group, a life phase, a
  life part, a biological age In order to
  understand the term of the Youth we have to
  examine the legal, the medical, the
  psychological, the educational and sociological
  legalization of youth (???, 2003 514)

5
The term of Youth (cont.)

• In the frame work of this research we set the age
  boundaries of the youth from 15 until 35 years
  old.
• The selection of this age group allows the
  participation of young people who are still in
  education and young adults that are actively
  involved in the labour market.
• The military service and university attendance
  extend the period during which someone will not
  enter the labour market.

6
Methodology

• Comparative analysis of Statistical Data and
  Socio-economic Indicators.
• Comparative analysis of Institutional Regimes and
  analysis of the Employment Policies.
• Focus Questionnaires
• Focus Groups of Young People

7
Typology of the Insecurity forms

• 1. Insecurity caused by social exclusion and
  social marginalization the type of this
  experience can been mostly detected on people
  that face insufficiency in every aspect of the
  capital (economical, educational, social),
  resulting to their problematic enrolment to the
  labour market.
• 2. Insecurity that originates from the disharmony
  or the miscorrelation between the aims/
  expectations on the one part and the actual wages
  or working conditions on the other part.

8
Fields of insecurity and uncertainty experience

• A sense of social exclusion Is there a sense of
  non recognition or social marginalisation and
  what are the reasons behind this sense? At this
  point we examine if and in what way the age
  factor has an effect.
• The unequal participation in the labour market
  and its relation with the employment. Through the
  statistical data we try to examine the income
  inequality, the nature of the work (full-time,
  part-time and permanent employment), the
  unemployment and also the relation of young
  employees with the labour market i.e. in which
  extend young workers are satisfied with their
  daily experience at work.
• The social net and the family support. Whether
  the young is feeling included or excluded from
  the social life and the social nets which offer a
  sense of belonging as well as from the family
  and other social institutions

9
Resume of the Statistical Data

• Individuals in the age group of 15 34 are
  estimated to be around 212,800 and correspond to
  29 of the total population
• The unemployed under the age of 25 hardly cover
  the 12.1 of the total of the unemployed.
• The age group of 15-34 constitutes the majority
  of unemployed and covers the 51 of the total
  unemployed in the country.

10
Resume of the Statistical Data (cont.)

• The people with a low educational level,
  regardless age, compose the largest group of
  registered unemployed.
• In this group of unemployed the 2/5 (2003) belong
  to the age group of 15-34 and compose almost the
  1/8 of the total number of the unemployed.
• The two age groups of 15 24 and 25 34
  together, summing up to 1175 and 1173
  correspondingly, are composing the vast majority
  of the unemployed with university qualifications
  (2348 or 26 on the total).

11
Resume of the Statistical Data (cont.)

• Young workers consist the 43 of the part-time
  employees, with a total of 40 among them with
  university qualifications. This high percentage
  can be explained as the concentration of youth in
  more flexible forms of work.
• The youth composes the most vulnerable group
  since the 57(or 17879 persons) of the temporary
  employees belong to the age group of 15-34 and
  54 of those people are working temporarily
  because they were unable to find a permanent
  occupation.

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Youth and Unemployment

• The increase of unemployment is caused by the
  increase of the unemployed within the age group
  of 20-34
• The National Action Plan for Employment 2004-2006
  refers The selective focus of unemployment on
  youth that characterises many countries is also a
  characteristic of the Cypriot labour market. In
  2003, the rate of unemployment of young people on
  the age group 15 - 19 years was 14.2 and for
  those on the age group 20 24 was 8.1.

13
The National Action Plan for Employment and the
Essential Absence of Young Workers/Employees

• The guideline about the estimated active and
  preventive measures concerning unemployment
  refers to reinforcement of the effort of
  adjusting the abilities of newcomers, unemployed
  and employed to the needs of the labour market.
• Reference on a Strategy of lifetime learning and
  reduction of school drop-outs.

14
The National Action Plan for Employment and the
Essential Absence of Young Workers/Employees
(cont.)

• Guideline 3, which is concerned with
  confrontation of changes and promotion of
  adaptability and mobility within the labour
  market, refers to the supply of initial training
  to those who are not specialized, to newcomers
  and to learners.
• The extremely important age factor related to
  possible discrimination against young people is
  absent from Guideline 7 about Social Embodiment
  and Discrimination Opposition.

15
Collective Labour Bargaining (CLB) and Young
Employees

• In the case of Cyprus, the Trade Unions are much
  more powerful than elsewhere and the tripartite
  collaboration is exceptionally evolved. The
  endogenous weaknesses are obvious on this system
  
• Since the collective rights are subjected to
  balance variations of supply and demand, they are
  vulnerable to vicissitudes according to power
  interrelation (and the extend of mobility
  ability) of employees under the pressures of the
  market.
• Given the fact that not all working sections are
  organised at the same level and that not all
  units are involved to the same degree with Trade
  Unions, inevitably this inequality affects more
  the vulnerable groups of the working scale.

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Guidelines of Employment Macropolitics

• 1. The CLBs can be constructed on a cogent legal
  institutional framework.
• 2. There is an issue of more effective
  syndicalistic involvement of young employees. The
  Trade Unions could adopt measures of
  encouragement and evolution of young trade
  unionists, as well as ways of improved debate and
  enforced relations with young employees in
  general.

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Guidelines of Employment Macropolitics (cont.)

• 3. The socially accepted can be improved in
  benefit of young employees.
• 4. The CLBs on their own can impose new
  conditions which regulate the issues of young
  employees more favourably and they counterbalance
  as much as possible the vulnerability of the
  youth status.

18
The Discourse of Youth A first attempt for
Critical Discourse Analysis of Young People

• Basic issues mentioned by young people
• The Institution of the Family and Insecurity
• Education
• Supportive Networks
• Employment and Insecurity/Uncertainty

19
The Institution of the Family

• It appears from the discourse of young people
  themselves that the institution of the family
  affects negatively their chances of accessing the
  several means and perspectives for their
  successful inclusion in the labour market.
• Even in cases where the participation of children
  as extra working hands is not necessary, the low
  social status of the parents and their low
  educational level generates additional duties,
  workload and malfunctions.

20
The Institution of the Family (cont.)

• The socio-economic position and class origin of a
  person is transferred and inherited through the
  institution of the family. In that way, young
  people who would like to continue their
  education, follow the same patterns with their
  parents due to circumstances.
• In the case of youth with high educational level,
  the kind of insecurity most often observed is
  that of insufficient inclusion which derives by
  the combination of extended financial dependence
  on their parents after the completion of their
  studies.

21
Education

• Individuals with high educational level, mainly
  coming from lower middle class (petit bourgeois),
  tend to appreciate the value of education even if
  the educational level has not provided to the
  particular person the corresponding employment
  evolution.
• Individuals with middle or low educational level,
  mainly belonging on low or middle social class,
  express their disbelief for the value and
  importance of the educational system in Cyprus.
• Within the school institution context appears an
  indirect and not so obvious discrimination by
  teachers and fellow students, which generates
  labeling situations on the basis of the family
  financial situation and consequently aggravating
  those students with feeling of discomfort and
  abstention.

22
Supportive Networks

• One of the sources of labour insecurity as
  mentioned at the interviews and focus groups is
  the lack of trust in the national authorities
  specializing in finding jobs.
• The first type of insecurity reflects the
  internalization of ineffectiveness of the
  national authorities given the fact that young
  people feel that they will not receive anything
  useful from them.
• The second type expresses a feeling of
  undermining the human dignity originating from
  the behaviour of civil servants lower on the
  national mechanism.

23
Employment and Insecurity/Uncertainty

• The conclusions of the research show that the
  collective social capital (as defined by
  Bourdieu) obtained through time generates the
  proportional conditions for the context of
  insecurity that young people encounter.
• Rapid rate of occupational interchange occurring
  due to the logic of the absence of autonomy at
  work, boredom, low income and uninsured work is
  characteristic for individuals with low
  educational level.

24
Employment and Insecurity/Uncertainty (cont.)

• Another kind of labour insecurity mentioned by
  the research concerns individuals with low
  educational level who in the same time posses
  unqualified occupations and refers to a feeling
  of threat by foreign labour personnel
• Young individuals with high educational level
  exhibit a kind of insecurity deriving from the
  imbalance between their qualifications and their
  income.

25
Employment and Insecurity/Uncertainty (cont.)

• The dimensions of insecurity for the particular
  group of young people are not produced only by
  materialistic lack but by a comparison of
  symbolic stock with older individuals who posses
  high work positions, as well as by the feeling of
  insufficient status or respect that this youth
  group claims due to their educational level.
• Indicative of the insecurity between young
  individuals with high educational level is the
  fact that their current position in the labour
  market not only does not match their
  academic/educational qualifications but
  additionally it does not offer the proportional
  salary or the security of stability as this is
  connected with a governmental position.

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Summary General Ascertainments

• Young people in Cyprus undergo several types and
  intensities of labour insecurity and uncertainty
  which derives from
• The status of Youth in Cypriot society itself, a
  status that settles young people on a vulnerable
  position as receivers of discriminations on the
  basis of their age.
• The precarious work positions and the types of
  employment (underemployment, part time
  employment, temporary employment,
  heteroemployment).

27
Insecurity Types

• Type A Insecurity/Uncertainty occurring due to
  expectancy disappointment of individuals related
  to their position in the labour market
• Type B The second type of insecurity is a
  feeling of threat by multiple axis of social
  exclusion.

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Insecurity Type A General Characteristics

• The first type mainly applies on individuals with
  high educational level
• Positive experience in terms of parental support
  and their school/academic achievement
• We ascertained that on cases of individuals with
  high educational level, unemployment or
  employment types like certain time contacts
  generate a feeling of betrayal of expectations
  and a discontinuity of the supposed educational
  promises.

29
Insecurity Type A General Characteristics (cont.)

• Insecurity of individuals with high
  educational level is expressed in the following
  way
• Aspect of symbolic interaction with elder people
  who posses high work positions without the
  necessary qualifications
• Insecurity as a newcomer
• Feeling of insufficient inclusion
• Lack of financial autonomy and extended parental
  support

30
Insecurity Type B General Characteristics

• The second type of insecurity mainly applies on
  individuals with low educational level.
• It implies a feeling of threat by multiple axis
  of social exclusion.
• An insufficient inclusion on the institution of
  the school has been exhibited by those
  individuals.

31
Insecurity Type B General Characteristics (cont.)

• Individuals on this group accept that they have
  inherited the working class position, which they
  even feel possessing during the years at school.
• They set as a priority their employment on manual
  or technical occupations, due to the financial
  difficulties of their family.
• This group enters the labour market aiming
  towards manual and unqualified occupations.

32
Insecurity Type B General Characteristics (cont.)

• The working conditions in that kind of
  occupations often lead towards low incomes,
  uninsured employment, exhausting working hours,
  lack of respect and exploitation of physical
  condition of young people.
• Feeling of Insecurity/ uncertainty for the future
  enforced by the threat of the increasing number
  of foreign workers. Additionally, they express
  the belief that their insecurity is greater
  compared to people with high educational level.