Why Do People Migrate?

Labour Market Security and Migration Decisions

Maciej Duszczyk, Maciej Duszczyk

• Publisher: Emerald Publishing Limited
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781838677497
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Labour & Industrial Relations
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Migration is presently a topic that arouses universal interest. Why people choose to migrate is a question that sparks great discussion. Both economic and non-economic factors contribute to this monumental decision. This book, written by experts in the field, focuses on the issue of impact of the expected labour market security on migration decision-making. The idea of push factors such as low levels of security in the state of origin and pull factors such as the expectations of financial security are explored in depth. Another layer of analysis is added as the authors explore how the expected labour market security level may be achieved in various ways. Some migrants may choose a state with a model characterised by extensive legislation related to labour market security, while others will be more willing to choose countries with greater flexibility, where it is as easy to lose a job as to find one and have greater employment security. By providing the most recent research on the impact of labour market security on migration-related decisions, this important text will help not only answer the question of why people decide to migrate, but also uncover the decision-making process in choosing a specific receiving state. By using case studies from around Europe, this book will prove invaluable for researchers, leaders and policy makers in the field of politics and migration studies.

CHAPTER 1

LABOUR MARKET SECURITY AND MIGRATION-RELATED DECISIONS: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

Maciej Duszczyk and Kamil Matuszczyk

ABSTRACT

The main purpose of the chapter is to explain the impact of labour market security on migration-related decisions, especially in terms of push-pull factors theory. There are different ways to understand work-related security; the chapter discusses the importance of job security, employment security and income security from labour migration perspective. The article presents the existing body of literature on theoretical concepts as well as on some methodological facets of the measurements of the level of particular aspects of work-related security. Special attention is paid to labour migrants in terms of their working conditions in both sending and receiving countries. An overview of previous migration studies proves that the issue of migrants’ labour market security was not the subject of any in-depth analyses. There are, however, many examples of research showing that, under certain conditions, migration decisions are influenced by, among others, the generosity of a welfare state, stability of job and the desire to achieve the so-called normal life. In the case of migrants from third countries (e.g. from Ukraine), income security is of particular importance alongside remuneration.

Keywords: Migration theory; labour market security; insecurity; push and pull factors; migration-related decisions; labour migrants

INTRODUCTION

The dynamically changing labour market conditions, resulting from both the cyclical economic upturns and downturns and the evolution of global capitalism, bring the issues of finding and maintaining employment to the forefront. For most of us, gaining an appropriate employment is a key precondition for reaching the state of income security. At the same time, advanced industrial democracies, such as the EU member states, offer varying levels of protection through the system of social welfare and thereby supplement the security one can get through labour market. This allows for maintaining a certain standard of living when one is either out of employment for a relatively short period of time or permanently professionally passive, for example, because of reaching retirement age. The aforementioned are the elements constituting labour market security, meant as the condition of comfort for fulfilling the essential needs, both the individual ones and those of the other members of one’s household. In search for conditions facilitating the accomplishment of this sort of security, some people resort to leaving their native country and emigrating elsewhere.

The goal of this chapter is to explain the essence of labour market security and its potential impact on migration-related decisions. The authors put forward a thesis that employment-related security is a vital factor affecting both individual decisions to migrate and the choice of destination of migration. Special attention has been paid to the concept of ‘push-pull factors’ which, even if often criticised, allows us to understand the significance of labour market security as one of the determinants of the process of making migration decisions. The chapter is of theoretical character; it discusses and comments on the main concepts appearing in the literature on the issues of labour market security. Based on the extant literature review, several avenues for further research have been identified. They have thus far been either overlooked or discussed only sparingly. It particularly concerns the different forms of gaining and maintaining labour market security, including emigration as a means of accomplishing it. Special emphasis has been put on the issue of reaching income security, which is the main dimension of labour market security. There are two approaches to this issue. One of them is based on the notion of job security, that is, a preference for gaining income security by finding a job and maintaining it for a longer time. The other emphasises employment security, that is, an acceptance of the possibility of frequent changes of employer, provided that intervals between employments are short and have no negative effect on income security. The problem of precarious employment, one of the dangers for labour market security, has also been referred to in this chapter. This threat is directly related to the processes of migration. Oftentimes, migrants undertake employment within the so-called secondary segment of the respective labour market, a segment in which gaining labour market security tends to be very difficult. Last but not least, the chapter also deals with a number of other issues, including labour protection legislation and the role of institutional and welfare state models.

LABOUR MARKET SECURITY AS A PRECONDITION OF THE ACCOMPLISHMENT OF INDIVIDUAL AND COLLECTIVE GOALS

In the era of post-Fordism, the character of labour relations has changed substantially (Edgell, 2006). The relative position of employees and the conditions of employment, in addition to the shape of the trajectories of professional careers, have undergone a far-reaching transformation. The fundamental institutions of the welfare state, which for decades guaranteed high standards of protection and labour market security, have been undergoing deep changes (Gardawski, Bartkowski, Męcina, & Czarzasty, 2010). Numerous essential workers’ rights and privileges, secured under the framework of the post-war welfare state, are taking on a new essence in the time of high ‘flexibilisation’ of work. As Kiersztyn (2018, p. 93) notes, we are presently dealing with an intensification of both objective aspects of insecurity, determined by changes of the conditions of employment, and its subjective dimension, including feelings of threat and instability in the labour market. Heery and Salmon (2000, p. 2) summarise the changes as follows:

Employment in the developed economies has become more insecure or unstable in the sense that both continued employment and the level of remuneration have become less predictable and contingent on factors which lie beyond the employee’s control.

The turn of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries was the time of the fundamental transformations in the domain of workers’ security, understood as the perspective of stable employment with the same employer during the bulk of one’s occupational career. Nowadays, the meaning of the term security evolves towards a new paradigm. According to that paradigm, work has become more ‘flexible’ and the workers need to acquire the skill of adapting to frequent changes in the labour market. This often means the necessity of retraining, improving competence and being open to the perspective of professional and spatial mobility (Kalina-Prasznic, 2009; Marx, 2014). At the same time, this leads to the situation in which a great number of workers experience uncertainty as to whether or not they will find new employment quickly following a potential loss of their current job (Standing, 2011). As Green (2009, p. 344) argues:

these changes imply that workers are required to take on greater shares of individual risk and to expect less job security than hitherto.

Furthermore, Glavin (2013, p. 119) notes the social and economic consequences carried by that change:

Finally, the absence of secure, long-term employment may reduce individual’s tendency to engage in certain actions that require long-term planning, such as starting a family or purchasing a home - behaviours that may otherwise foster positive beliefs about personal control.

In an increasing number of cases, having an open-ended job based on an employment contract does not itself guarantee the accomplishment of personal and collective (most usually household-level) goals. In particular, those earning minimum wage are forced to undertake additional, casual work in order to reach a satisfactory level of income security. The essence of being an employee has changed as well and it currently encompasses new, flexible forms of employment. All these changes have been succinctly summarised by Edgell (2006, p. 12):

Thus employment is no longer a simple matter of being in or out of work, employed or unemployed, but more the matter of degree characterized by an employment continuum that ranges from zero employment to over-employment.

It should be noted, however, that the above-mentioned changes have not affected all categories of employees to the same extent. A noticeable division has emerged within the working population, the main dimensions of it being the form of employment and, indirectly, access (or a lack thereof) to welfare benefits. Labour markets have been subject to a split into at least two segments (Bauder, 2006). Those employed within first of them are mostly highly qualified professionals, enjoying a much higher level of labour market security than those employed within the second one. More often than not, migrants end up in the latter, less attractive segment. This polarisation is well defined by the concept of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ jobs, put forward by Kalleberg (2011). Focusing on the case of the United States, that author observed that permanent employment had never been such a socially diversifying attribute as it is in modern societies. As Boeri and van Ours (2008) point out, workers employed on contracts for an indefinite period of time, especially in the first segment populated by highly qualified employees, can still count on higher level of legal protection of their employment. But the rapidly growing number of workers employed for a fixed-term, the self-employed and those employed on the so-called zero-hours contracts cannot. At the same time, the profound changes to labour markets, which can be observed in virtually all advanced industrial societies, lead to the widening of the division between those enjoying the stability of employment – thanks to, among others, active labour market policies and the presence of trade unions – and the growing population of those deprived of access to the institutions of employment protection. This distinction is especially pronounced in the case of immigrants. They are highly overrepresented among those employed under the conditions of uncertainty, being rarely covered by a system of protection and having restricted access to welfare benefits. In their case, gaining labour market security tends to be much more difficult than it is for native workers.

In the context of the debates on the evolution of human labour, terms such as ‘precariat’ and the ‘precarians’ are often used by scholars, journalists and politicians. The concept and the notion of the ‘precariat’ are useful in describing recent changes taking place in the world of labour. The term denotes a growing category, or class, of people working and living under the (‘precarious’) conditions of permanent uncertainty and insecurity, resulting from their inferior and underprivileged labour market status (Standing, 2011). Obviously, migrants, as a category, are at high risk of becoming precarians. Standing (2002, p. 442) has pointed to the following seven work-related dimensions of security, typical of the industrial era (Fordism):

(1) labour market security – adequate employment and work opportunities, through high levels of employment ensured by macroeconomic policy;

(2) employment security – protection against arbitrary dismissal, and employment stability compatible with economic dynamism;

(3) job security – a post linked to an occupation or ‘career’, plus tolerance of demarcation practices, barriers to skill dilution, craft boundaries, job qualifications, etc.;

(4) work security – protection against accidents and illness at work, through safety and health regulations, limits on working time, on unsociable hours, and on night work for women, etc.;

(5) skill reproduction security – widespread opportunities to gain and retain skills, through apprenticeships, vocational training, etc.;

(6) income security – protection of income through minimum wage machinery, wage indexation, comprehensive social security, progressive taxation, etc.;

(7) representation security – protection of collective voice in the labour market, through independent trade unions and employers; associations and other bodies able to represent the interests of workers and working communities.

Standing (2011) argues that today’s employees are being successively denied the aforementioned privileges, which limits the possibility of gaining labour market security. This sort of a sharp statement seems to be too pessimistic and too general, however. We should rather speak about changing meanings of particular aspects of security and their relations to the character, time and place of performing work. The aforementioned types of security will thus be evaluated and sought with varying intensities depending on the particular category of workers, their qualifications and work experience. The accomplishment of just one of the types of security mentioned by Standing can have an impact on the general feeling of stability in the labour market and thus lead to the right’ state of income security. This, in turn, would translate into social and economic security. For example, a person with a high level of job security can have a much lower level of employment security and vice versa. For some workers, especially the less qualified ones, it will be more important to gain a satisfactory level of income security at the cost of skill reproduction security or representation security. We should also be aware that nowadays we are witnessing a very critical change; that is, many countries are moving away from the model based on job security towards one emphasising employment security. Auer (2010, p. 381) emphasises some even further-reaching changes:

The decisive and critical shift is thus not from job security to employment security, but towards what can be called labour market security. Labour market security implies that security for workers in today’s labour markets cannot stem from job and employment security alone. It has to be complemented by additional layers of security.

From the point of view of this study, special attention is paid to three essential categories of security, which seem to be crucial from the perspective of migrant workers: income security, employment security and job security. While the desire to reach a high level of income security is characteristic of the vast majority of workers, the situation appears to be far more nuanced in the cases of job and employment security. Some workers can choose job security as the desirable model of obtaining income security, that is, security on the labour market. Others display greater risk acceptance, preferring a model based on employment security. It indeed seems that, in spite of all the structural changes in the labour market, from the viewpoint of a large part of the working population, job security is still an important and desirable element of labour relations. It can have greater subjective importa...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Introduction
• Chapter 1 Labour Market Security and Migration-related Decisions: Theoretical Background
• Chapter 2 Are the Countries Different? Statistical View on Labour Market Security
• Chapter 3 Why and Where: Labour Market Security as a Push-pull Factor
• Chapter 4 Migration Policy: Recommendations for Sending and Receiving Countries
• Chapter 5 Conclusions
• Index