Working Hours of Migrants in Austria and UK. a Cohort Analysis

Research on the economic advancement and the working conditions of migrants in Europe emphasises the persistent inequality between migrants and natives. For instance, migrants earn lower wages than natives (e.g. Siebers & van Gastel, 2015); they face a higher risk of being unemployed (e.g. Kahanec & Zaiceva, 2009), and they work more often in jobs below their level of qualifications and experience (e.g. Danzer & Dietz, 2014) or in precarious jobs (e.g. Corluy et al., 2011). Despite its significance for work in general, one facet of working conditions that extant literature considers only scarcely is the amount of individual working hours. However, working hours, here understood as the average weekly hours worked by individuals, are closely related to many other aspects of the working conditions. Furthermore, since working hours can be seen as a resource, their distribution among individuals itself may represent a source of inequality. Hence, it is crucial to analyse working times of migrants and explain differences between migrants and natives to enable a more holistic understanding of inequality issues.

This paper addresses migrant’s working hours. We replicate and extend a study by Lin (2011), who analysed microdata of Mexican migrants in the U.S., for the European context. Such a replication is important, since working time regimes differ between the U.S. and Europe (Bell & Freeman, 2001). The aim is to analyse differences in working hours between migrants (from different countries) and natives in Austria and the UK.

Against the background of Lin’s considerations, we develop and test the following hypotheses. First, we test for a human capital effect. Extant literature shows that highly-skilled individuals work more hours a week than lower skilled. As migrants and natives differ concerning their level of education, we propose that this compositional difference in their human capital leads to differences in working hours.

Second, we test for an employment segregation effect. Previous research indicates that segregating mechanisms, such as the use of social networks for job search, lead to different concentrations of migrants in particular segments of the labour market. As these segments (e.g. industries) are related to different working time regimes, we propose that employment segregation leads to different working hours of migrants and natives.

Third, we test for a selection effect. Extant literature points to differences between migrants and natives concerning their selection process into the labour market. For instance, migrants more often agree to work in jobs with worse working conditions (e.g. less working hours) than natives. Thus, we propose that this different selection process leads to different working hours of migrants and natives.

Fourth, we test for a discrimination effect. Since jobs in general and, more specifically, working hours represent a scarce resource, the opportunities to increase working hours are lower for minorities (e.g. migrants) than for the members of the majority group. Thus, we propose that discriminatory practices against migrants partly determine different working hours of migrants and natives.

Fifth, we test for a host country effect. Starting from Lin (2011), we expand the scope beyond a single country. We assume that institutions in the labour market play a role in determining the employment situation of migrants. Thus, we compare Austria and the UK as their differences make it an excellent case (e.g. Austria as coordinated market economy, the UK as liberal market economy; different labour market access criteria for migrants from Eastern Europe).

 

Methods

The analyses use microdata on individuals working in Europe, which were collected as part of the European Labour Force Survey (EU-LFS). Eurostat has been coordinating this survey since the 1980ies. Within a trend design, in each of the 28 EU member states as well as in Iceland, Norway, Switzerland, FYROM Macedonia and Turkey approximately 14,600 households are surveyed. We use data from Austria and the UK from 1998, 2002, 2007 and 2012. In particular, we consider individual weekly working hours as depending variable. As explaining and control variables, we consider country of origin, age, year of immigration/cohort, education, job status, family context as well as size and industry of employing firm.

Furthermore, we extend the work of Lin (2011) by considering the amount of hours worked in a second job, since we assume that migrants frequently increase their income through a second job. Finally, while Lin (2011) only analysed the working hours of men, we consider both women and men.

We apply a cohort design to account for cohort, age and period effects (Glenn, 2005). A cohort design seems to be particularly appropriate, since previous research indicates that all three effects may be in place (Amuedo-Dorantes & De la Rica, 2007; Chiswick & Miller 2012; Kogan, 2004).

References

Amuedo‐Dorantes, C., & De la Rica, S. (2007) Labour market assimilation of recent immigrants in Spain. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 45(2), 257–284.

Bell, L.A., & Freeman, R.B. (2001) The incentive for working hard: explaining hours worked differences in the US and Germany. Labour Economics, 8(2), 181–202.

Chiswick, B.R., & Miller, P.W. (2012) Negative and positive assimilation, skill transferability, and linguistic distance. Journal of Human Capital, 6(1), 35–55.

Corluy, V.; Marx, I., & Verbist, G. (2011) Employment chances and changes of immigrants in Belgium: the impact of citizenship. International Journal of Comparative Sociology 52(4), 350–68.

Danzer, A.M., & Dietz, B. (2014) Labour migration from Eastern Europe and the EU’s quest for talents. Journal of Common Market Studies, 52(2), 183–199.

Glenn, N.D. (2005) Cohort Analysis. 2nd ed. Sage.

Kahanec, M., & Zaiceva, A. (2009) Labor market outcomes of immigrants and non-citizens in the EU: An East-West comparison. International Journal of Manpower, 30(1/2), 97–115.

Kogan, I. (2004) Last hired, first fired? The unemployment dynamics of male immigrants in Germany. European Sociological Review, 20(5), 445–461.

Lin, K.-H. (2011) Do less-skilled immigrants work more? Examining the work time of Mexican immigrant men in the United States. Social Science Research, 40(5), 1402–1418.

Siebers, H., & van Gastel, J. (2015) Why migrants earn less. In search of the factors producing the ethno-migrant pay gap in a Dutch public organization. Work, employment and society, 29(3), 371–391.