Higher search intensity among the more educated than less educated youth is consistent with expectations. Young people with below-primary-school qualification were 17 per cent more likely to be in the employed not searching for job category (48 per cent), than those with tertiary educational qualification (31 per cent, Figure 5.16). Lacking education, they seem likely to have limited job options and narrower wage dispersion than those with secondary or tertiary education. Educated young people were 28 per cent more likely to be searching for a job while employed. Similarly, long duration of open job search seems to be less beneficial for those who have lower education qualification than for those with high education. Seeking an alternative job was more beneficial for those who faced wider wage dispersion, therefore young people with higher education were more likely to search either while employed or while unemployed.
Educated youth were likely to have higher occupational aspiration and wider job dispersion than less educated youth. That is why they were less likely to feel that their current jobs were matched (Figure 5.16) since they have several job options. Nevertheless, educated youth also have higher forgone earnings if they remain unemployed than less educated youth. This in turn encourages them to accept ‘temporary’ jobs but to continue the search (Figure 5.17), as a more affordable strategy to maximize their return on investment in education.
A similar pattern but with more substantial difference was evident among those with vocational training experience. Those with vocational training were 46 per cent less likely to be ‘employed not seeking a jo b ’ and 33 per cent more likely to be ‘employed seeking a job’ than those with no such training (Figure 5.18).
Positive relationships between education and having vocational training on the one hand and on the other hand search intensity supports search theory (human capital theory). Nevertheless, this does not necessarily mean rejection of social reproduction theory, which suggests that the positive relationship between levels of education and search intensity can happen as a result of the numerus clausus
(inflation of high education qualification and training) which narrows the possibility of getting a matched job because of fierce competition. This explanation is clearly relevant to social context in the three cities of Java in which during the 1980-1990 period, the growth of educated workers and job seekers was greater than of the less educated (Chapter 2).
Figure 5.16 Figure 5.17 Search probability by
education, school leavers 15 to 29 years, three cities of
Java, 1994.
P rim a ry Univ.
Search probability by vocational training experience, school leavers 15
to 29 years, three cities of Java, 1994. ■ O LF ■ EN S □ E S □ US Figure 5.18
Probability of finding matched job by education, employees 15 to 29 years, three cities of
Java, 1994 (°Q
P rim a ry Univ.
Source: Survey Data ‘The Dynamics o f Youth Education and Employment’, 1994.
OLF=Out o f the labour force.ENS=Employed not searching for a job.ES=Employed searching for a job.U S= Unemployed searching for a job.
5.4.Summary of findings
There was greater variation in the probability of continuing or stopping the search while employed (ENS or ES), than in the probability of searching for a job while unemployed (US) or out of the labour force (OLF). This indicates that different individual characteristics, parental background and socio-environmental background strongly affect the chance to continue or to stop the search if employed rather than to
be out of the labour force or openly unemployed. So, for most young people in this study, the question of whether to continue the search if employed possibly overrides the question of whether or not to enter the labour market. This study also shows that multinomial logit analysis of search behaviour seems to be more sensitive to measuring the school-work transition than is labour-force participation analysis (Chapter 4). This analysis also can identify the levels of employment (unemployed, employed-search for alternative job and employed not-searching for job) of young people with different characteristics.
Search behaviour in the three cities seems to be influenced by a complex set of factors. Although much is explained by factors such as a longer expected participation in the labour market, and wider job dispersion, as search theory or human capital theory suggests, but this theory seems to be inadequate to fully explain the search behaviour in the three cities. Search behaviour seems also to be influenced by other factors suggested by social reproduction theory: the cultural values and limited parental supports and field of possibility available in the social context; socialization process: the discrepancy between experience in the family, school and labour market; and segmentation: different nature of jobs.
In general, with regard to the effects of age, sex, place of birth, marital and migration status and education in particular, the findings of this study are similar to Fergus’s findings (1992) that focus on the effect of these factors on search behaviour of people aged 10 years and over in Java.
Indeed, in accordance with human capital theory, those who have a longer expected participation in the labour market (males, single and young) and have greater social networks (urban-bom children) are more likely to search for a job intensively. For example, among those who are married, males are more likely to be employees and to search for a job than married females, while among those who are
single, males were more likely to search for a job openly, while unemployed, than females. Those with high educational achievement or vocational training and bom in urban areas are more likely to be job seekers, either while employed or while unemployed. These tendencies seem to support the human capital hypothesis.
Nevertheless, other factors such as different socio-cultural and economic settings and the attitude of employed people towards their jobs also have important effects on their likelihood of continuing the search. Different socio-cultural and economic settings apparently provide different chances, supports and pressures. The Babesuma ethnic group, an ethnic minority and least dominant in the economy, the children of Moslem mothers and migrants, who are less likely to have adequate contacts with employers or social networks than non-Moslem and non-migrants, are more likely to continue searching for job. Coercion as assumed by reproduction theory, rather than job dispersion or parental support as assumed by human capital theory and the luxury hypothesis, may have forced these young people into unemployment or finding unmatched jobs, thus forcing them to continue the search while employed.
Another factor, the feeling that their jobs are mismatched, also appears to drive young people to continue their search. In this study, indeed, employees whose parents held low educational qualifications and whose mothers were Moslem were more likely to say that they found jobs that were unmatched with their educational qualification. Some of the reasons for this were ineffectiveness of job allocation resulting from lack of parental resources (reproduction theory); social and psychological discrepancies (socialization theory); or the short-term nature of the jobs obtained by these people (segmentation theory). Therefore it is understandable
The negative relationship between parental socio-economic status and search intensity supports the social reproduction hypothesis, because there were clear signals that children of parents with high socio-economic status experienced smooth transition into work through more effective job allocation that ensures socio economic status inheritance. The greater likelihood of obtaining a job matched to their education, and thus the lesser likelihood of seeking an alternative job among children of parents with high educational qualification, shows that job acquisition was more effective among this group. On the other hand, a higher probability of searching for an alternative job while employed among children of parents with low socio-economic status reflects their attempts to escape from the unwanted ‘social class trajectory’. This may become one of the reasons why social mobility is possible among children from low socio-economic background
If search intensity is related to occupational mobility - not necessarily vertical mobility - young people who were bom in urban areas, with Moslem mother, single, males, in the younger age group, migrants, who lived outside Jakarta, whose parents have low education, and who themselves have high education and vocational training experience, are among those most likely to experience occupational mobility.