76 Monthly Labor Review October 1996

Nonstandard Work Arrangements

There is growing concern that the employment patterns of U.S. firms are shiftingtoward more temporary work arrangements, such as hiring workers from temporary

agencies or contracting work out, and away from

more standard direct hire and longer-term work

arrangements. The worry is that this development

might result in lower paying and less stable jobs.1

However, workers may take employment in a

nonstandard arrangement, such as working for a

temporary agency, for a number of reasons, including inability to find a permanent job, wanting to work fewer hours when they have a young

child at home, or wanting to learn about a number of different jobs or fields. In addition, some

nonstandard work arrangements, such as consulting or contracting, may provide workers with

relatively more flexible and lucrative employment opportunities.2

This article explores the impact on workers

aged 29 through 37 of being in a nonstandard

employment arrangement. It first examines the

distribution of workers among various employment arrangements, and then looks at aspects of

work behavior and life “events” that may have

influenced the likelihood of working in a nonstandard arrangement. Finally, it compares wages

and hours worked on the previous job with those

on the current job to see whether the nonstandard employment arrangements imply a relative

“step up,” versus a “step down,” with respect to

wages and hours.

Donna S. Rothstein is a

research economist in

the Office of Employment Research and

Program Development, Bureau of Labor

Statistics.

The data

As the other articles in this issue of the Review

emphasize, a need for individual-level data to

examine the number of workers in different employment arrangements and their characteristics

spurred the Bureau of Labor Statistics to create a

special supplement to its Current Population Survey (CPS), designed to collect information on

contingent workers and alternative work arrangements. The supplement was implemented in February of 1995. The need for individual-level information on different employment arrangements

also has been addressed in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY), a data set sponsored by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In 1994,

the NLSY asked questions that directly inquired

about each respondent’s type of employment relationship: each respondent was asked to indicate whether he or she was a regular employee at

the job, a temporary worker, a consultant, or a

contractor. This article uses data from the NLSY

because addressing the issues of concern requires

longer term longitudinal information as well as

current information.

The National Longitudinal Survey of Youth

data set began in 1979, with a national sample

of men and women whose ages ranged from

14 through 21 as of January 1 of that year. These

individuals were interviewed annually through

1994.3 In the latter year, the sample consisted

of 8,891 respondents, including oversamples

Nonstandard Work Arrangements

Donna S. Rothstein

Data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth

suggest that recent occurrences such as the birth of a child

or change in marital status can affect the likelihood

of entering different types of employment arrangements

Entry into and consequences

of nonstandard work arrangements
Monthly Labor Review October 1996 77

of blacks and Hispanics.4 The NLSY contains detailed information about many aspects of respondents’ lives, including their labor market experiences, fertility, and changes in

marital status over the years. One particular strength of the

data set is that it records much of the information as event

histories; thus, the dates of occurrences and transitions are

documented, and this information is updated with each interview. With respect to work history, the “start” and “stop” dates

of each job the respondent has held are recorded, as well

as dates of nonwork (such as maternity leave or layoff) within

each job. This allows various job-related measures, such

as the number of jobs held, weeks worked, and job tenure,

to be calculated.5 Dates of births, as well as those of marriages, divorces, and other changes in marital status also are

documented.

The wealth of longitudinal information in the NLSY allows

the use of data on personal characteristics and life “events,”

and job information about workers before they began their

current job to address the following issues: 1) During the period that preceded the start date of the current job, were there

any aspects of work behavior or other “events” that may have

affected the likelihood of later working in a nonstandard type

of employment arrangement? The “events” and work behavior analyzed are change in marital status, birth of a child,

number of jobs held, and percent of weeks worked. 2) How

does the most recent job that the respondents held prior to

their current job compare with the current one in terms of

wages and hours? This speaks to the issue of whether the

nonstandard work arrangements involve a relative “step up”

or “step down.”

Workers by employment arrangement

In 1994, respondents in the National Longitudinal Survey of

Youth who had been employed since their 1993 (or previous)

interview were asked whether they considered themselves a

regular employee at their job, a temporary worker sent by a

temporary help agency, a temporary worker hired directly by

the company, a consultant, or a contractor. On the basis of

this information concerning the main 1994 job, and the answers to questions about self-employment and usual hours

worked per week, individuals were assigned to one of the

following categories: full-time regular employee, part-time

regular employee, self-employed regular employee, temporary agency employee, temporary direct hire employee, consultant, and contractor.6

It should be noted that the employment categories used in

this article are not identical to those defined in other articles

in this issue of the Review. Those articles, which are based on

the CPS data set, define four groups of workers in “alternative” arrangements: independent contractors (this group also

includes consultants and freelancers), on-call workers, temporary help agency workers, and workers provided by contract firms.7 All other workers are combined into one employment group called “traditional.” While temporary direct

hire employees make up a distinct category in this article, the

other articles include them in the “traditional” classification

(if they do not fall into any “alternative” group). Given the

differences in definitions, one should be cautious in interpreting comparisons by employment category of results from

this article and the others.

The top panel of table 1 shows that about 3.9 percent of

workers in the NLSY defined themselves as temporary agency

employees, temporary direct hire employees, or contractors

at their main job from the 1994 interview.8 (All of the comparisons that follow in this section are made relative to the

full-time regular employment category.) Women were more

likely to be part-time regular, temporary agency, and temporary direct hire employees, and less likely to be working as

contractors.9 Blacks were less likely to be working as parttime regular employees and much more likely to be working

as temporary agency employees. Both temporary agency and

temporary direct hire employees were less likely to have a

bachelor’s degree or higher. The last row of the table’s top

panel indicates the percent of workers in each employment

category with 3 years of tenure or less with their employer.

Compared with the full-time regular employment category,

every other employment category has a higher percent of

workers with 3 years of tenure or less. Temporary agency and

temporary direct hires have the highest percentages, with

more than 90 percent each.

The discussion that follows centers on those workers with

3 years of tenure or less; the purpose of this restriction is to

keep the comparisons focused on a short span of years. The

breakdown of this subgroup of workers by various characteristics is shown in the bottom panel of table 1, with 6.9 percent of workers defined as temporary agency or direct hire

employees, or contractors. As before, women were more

likely to be working in regular part-time, temporary agency,

and temporary direct hire employment arrangements. The

results for blacks remain the same as those reported earlier

for all workers aged 29 through 37. However, temporary direct hire employees were no longer less likely to have a

bachelor’s degree or higher.

Workers prior attributes

Workers have various reasons for taking jobs in differing

types of employment arrangements. For example, they may

not be able to find permanent full-time jobs. Alternatively,

work arrangements such as temporary, regular self-employed,

or regular part-time may provide hours flexibility, which is

important for individuals who have additional demands on

their time (such as those who recently had a child). Tempo-
78 Monthly Labor Review October 1996

Nonstandard Work Arrangements

Percent distribution of employed persons aged 29 to 37 years, total and for those with 3 years of tenure or less, by

employment arrangements and selected characteristics, 1994

All persons aged 29 to 37 years

Total ............................................ 100.0 76.8 12.0 7.3 0.9 1.4 1.6

Sex, race, and Hispanic origin:

Men ....................................... 54.5 59.5 19.6 65.4 39.1 41.4 72.6

Women .................................. 45.5 40.5 80.4 34.6 60.9 58.6 27.4

White ..................................... 81.0 80.0 84.5 86.9 58.6 74.1 86.9

Black ..................................... 12.7 13.4 10.3 8.5 33.2 18.7 8.8

Hispanic origin ...................... 6.3 6.6 5.1 4.5 8.2 7.2 4.3

Educational attainment:

Less than a high school

diploma ............................... 9.5 9.1 10.1 12.4 8.3 15.1 11.7

High school graduate,

no college ............................ 42.9 43.4 44.1 33.7 57.2 39.5 42.7

Less than a bachelor’s

degree ................................. 22.3 21.5 23.1 27.9 19.7 31.0 27.5

College graduate .................. 25.2 26.0 22.8 26.1 14.7 14.4 18.2

Job tenure:

Three years or less ............... 44.8 40.7 60.9 56.1 92.7 93.2 61.2

Persons aged 29 to 37 years,

with 3 years of tenure or less

Total ............................................ 100.0 69.8 16.3 7.0 1.9 2.8 2.2

Sex, race, and Hispanic origin:

Men ....................................... 52.3 59.5 23.2 57.7 39.3 40.4 62.4

Women .................................. 47.7 40.5 76.8 42.3 60.7 59.6 37.6

White ..................................... 79.0 77.8 83.3 83.5 57.8 76.5 86.2

Black ..................................... 14.3 15.1 11.3 10.3 34.7 16.7 10.1

Hispanic origin ...................... 6.7 7.2 5.4 6.2 7.5 6.8 3.7

Educational attainment:

Less than a high school

diploma ............................... 13.3 13.4 12.9 11.9 8.1 14.4 15.6

High school graduate,

no college ............................ 43.1 43.0 46.8 35.1 57.8 40.8 29.2

Less than a bachelor’s

degree ................................. 21.9 21.0 20.8 29.3 20.6 29.8 32.1

College graduate .................. 21.7 22.6 19.5 23.7 13.4 15.0 23.0

rary work arrangements also may provide a path of entry or

reentry into the labor market for some, and allow workers to

learn about various fields and job types.

This section focuses on “events” and work behavior that

occurred over the 2-year period that preceded the start date of

the main job reported in the 1994 interview; these occurrences

may have influenced the likelihood of working in a nonstandard type of employment arrangement. The variables describing “events” are the birth of a child, change in marital status

to a married or remarried state, and change in marital status

to a separated or divorced state. They indicate whether workers who had these types of changes in their lives were relatively more likely to work subsequently in certain employment arrangements. The variables that are used to capture

aspects of work behavior are the percent of weeks worked

and the number of jobs held. These could suggest whether

workers in certain types of employment arrangements had

lesser labor force attachment or held a relatively high number of jobs before the current one. The detailed aspect of the

National Longitudinal Survey of Youth data set, which inCharacteristic Total

Full-time job Part-time job Selfemployed Agency

supplied

Temporar y worker

Employment arrangement of main 1994 job

Regular

Direct hire Contractor

Nonstandard

Table 1.

NOTE: Data refer to the main or primary job from the 1994 interview. Detail

may not sum to 100 due to rounding.

SOURCE: National Longitudinal Survey of Youth.
Monthly Labor Review October 1996 79

cludes job start and stop dates, as well as

dates of children’s births and marital status changes, allows the calculation of

these variables for the 2-year period preceding the start of the main 1994 job.10

Table 2 shows the distribution of

workers by employment category of the

main 1994 job for the following “events”

(or nonevents): remained unmarried,

marital status changed to married, remained married, marital status changed

to unmarried, no birth of a child, and

birth of a child. Each of the four marital

status columns is mutually exclusive, as

are the two birth columns. This allows a

comparison between the distributions of

workers by main 1994 employment category for those who did or did not experience a certain “event” in their lives during the 2 years that preceded the main

1994 job. Because the effects of the

“events” may differ for men and women,

the table also depicts these distributions

separately by sex.11 All workers have 3

years of tenure or less at their main 1994

job.

According to table 2, it appears that

workers who had had a child in the 2

years before the start of their job were

not more (or less) likely than those who

had not to work subsequently in a fulltime regular employment arrangement.

However, this masks some differences in

work behavior between the sexes. Specifically, women who had given birth in

the preceding 2 years were much less

likely than were women who had not to

be in a regular full-time employment arrangement at the main 1994 job.12 This

lends some support to the hypothesis that

the other types of work arrangements

(for example, regular self-employment)

allow more flexibility, which can be important for those who

have recently had a child. The table shows no effect for men—

men who had had a child in the preceding 2 years were not

more or less likely than were men who had not to be in a

regular full-time employment arrangement at the main 1994

job. Table 2 also indicates that women who had had a change

in their marital status to separated, divorced, or widowed during the 2 years that preceded the start of their main 1994 job

were more likely to work subsequently in a full-time regular

employment arrangement (and much less likely to work in a

regular part-time employment arrangement) than were those

who remained married. For men, there are no differences for

these two employment categories.

Table 3 displays, by employment category of the main

1994 job and by sex, the average percent of weeks worked

and average number of jobs held during the 2 years that preceded the start date of the main 1994 job.13 It appears that

both temporary agency and temporary direct hire employees

had spent much less time working during the 2 years preceding the start date of the main 1994 job, relative to full-time

Percent distribution of employed persons aged 29 to 37 years with 3

years of tenure or less, by employment arrangements, sex, and prior

events that may have affected choice of arrangements, 1994

Total, aged 29 to 37 years ... 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0

Regular job:

Full-time ......................... 73.8 78.9 65.0 72.0 70.4 65.9

Part-time ........................ 12.6 11.1 20.5 12.5 16.5 14.7

Self-employed ................ 6.5 4.4 7.9 5.5 6.4 11.0

Nonstandard job:

Temporary worker

Agency supplied .......... 2.2 1.5 1.7 1.9 1.9 1.7

Direct hire .................... 2.6 .6 2.8 7.0 2.7 3.5

Contractor ...................... 2.4 3.5 2.1 1.1 2.1 3.3

Men, aged 29 to 37 years ... 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0

Regular job:

Full-time ......................... 77.3 85.8 81.8 74.5 78.9 83.0

Part-time ........................ 8.0 4.9 6.5 7.6 7.9 2.8

Self-employed ................ 7.5 4.3 6.8 7.6 6.9 8.4

Nonstandard job:

Temporary worker

Agency supplied ............ 1.8 .5 .8 3.3 1.6 .4

Direct hire ...................... 2.6 – 1.7 5.9 2.2 2.0

Contractor ........................ 2.8 4.6 2.5 1.2 2.5 3.4

Women, aged 29 to

37 years ........................... 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0

Regular job:

Full-time ......................... 68.7 72.0 49.8 69.5 61.1 46.0

 Part-time ........................ 19.4 17.3 33.1 17.4 25.9 28.5

 Self-employed ................ 5.0 4.5 8.9 3.4 5.9 13.9

Nonstandard job:

Temporary worker

Agency supplied ............ 2.7 2.5 2.6 .5 2.3 3.2

Direct hire ...................... 2.6 1.1 3.8 8.1 3.3 5.2

Contractor ........................ 1.7 2.5 1.8 1.0 1.6 3.1

Prior events that may have affected choice of

employment arrangements

Marital status Birth of a child

N o Yes Remained

unmarried

Changed

to

separated,

widowed,

or

divorced

Remained

married

Changed

to

married,

remarried,

or reunited

Table 2.

Sex and employment

arrangement of main

1994 job

NOTE: Data refer to the main or primary job from the 1994 interview. Prior events are those occurring over the 2 years before the start date of the main job. Detail may not sum to 100 due to rounding.

SOURCE: National Longitudinal Survey of Youth.
80 Monthly Labor Review October 1996

Nonstandard Work Arrangements

Employed persons aged 29 to 37 years with 3 years or less of tenure, by employment arrangements, sex, and prior

work behavior, 1994

Total ................. 70.5 1.9 77.1 2.1 63.2 1.7

Regular job:

Full-time ................ 75.9 2.0 78.7 2.1 71.8 1.8

Part-time ................ 57.5 1.6 63.5 2.0 55.7 1.5

Self-employed ....... 62.4 1.8 75.2 2.0 47.9 1.5

Nonstandard job:

Temporary worker

Agency supplied .. 46.1 1.7 69.2 2.3 31.2 1.4

Direct hire ............ 48.4 1.7 67.0 1.9 35.9 1.7

Contractor ............. 68.5 2.0 (1) (1) (1) (1)

 Employment

arrangement of

main 1994 job

Total Men Women

Average percent

of weeks worked

Average number

of jobs held

Average percent

of weeks worked

Average number

of jobs held

Average percent

of weeks worked

Average number of

jobs held

1

 Due to the small number of unweighted observations in the contractor

cell, breakdowns by sex are not shown.

NOTE: Data refer to the main or primary job from the 1994 interview. Prior

work behavior refers to that occurring over the 2 years before the start of the

main job.

SOURCE: National Longitudinal Survey of Youth.

Table 3.

regular employees or any other employment category. Interestingly, relative to full-time regular employees, both types

of temporary workers did not hold a significantly different

number of jobs during that 2-year period. When means are

compared within sex, however, it appears that women in temporary agency work arrangements held relatively fewer jobs

than did women in full-time regular work arrangements.

Both part-time and self-employed regular employees had

a lower average percent of weeks worked relative to full-time

regular employees. It appears that, among men, only selfemployed workers did not spend significantly less time working in the 2 years preceding the start date of the main 1994

job, relative to full-time regular employees. Among women,

those in all other categories spent less time working than did

full-time regular employees. In all employment categories,

men spent a higher percentage of time working in the 2 years

preceding the start date of the main 1994 job than did women;

the difference is particularly great for the regular self-employed category and for both temporary worker employment

categories.

In summary, it appears that, relative to full-time regular

employees, workers in all other employment categories (except for self-employed men and contractors) spent a smaller

percentage of time working in the 2 years preceding the start

of the main job. This is one of the strongest patterns found

overall among the variables examined in this section. It is

also interesting that, relative to full-time regular employees,

workers in the other work arrangements did not hold a higher

number of jobs during those previous 2 years. The sex differences in the impact of the birth of a child variable also are

informative. Women who had had a child in the preceding 2

years were much less likely than women who had not to be in

a regular full-time employment arrangement at the main 1994

job; this was not true for men. The results for women speak

to the issue of the possible flexibility of the other types of

work arrangements.

Current and previous jobs compared

This section examines the hourly wages and hours per week

of workers’ main 1994 jobs, and also looks at whether workers had held a job during the 2 years before the start date of

their main 1994 job; comparisons are made by employment

category and sex. For those workers who had held a previous

job during the 2 years before the start date of their main 1994

job, the following variables are examined by employment category and sex: the hourly wage at the main 1994 job minus

the hourly wage at the most recent previous job, the hours per

week at the main 1994 job minus the hours per week at the

most recent previous job, the years of tenure at the previous

job, and the number of weeks without work between the end

of the previous job and the start of the main 1994 job. As

above, this analysis relates only to those workers whose tenure on their main 1994 job was 3 years or less.

Table 4 displays the average hourly wage, average hours

per week, and percent of workers who had held a job during

the 2 years before the start of the main 1994 job, by employment category.14 This information also is further broken down

by sex. Overall, it appears that regular part-time, temporary

agency, and temporary direct hire employees have a lower

average hourly wage than do full-time regular employees.

This finding still holds when the data are broken down by

sex. In addition, workers in all employment categories average fewer hours per week than do full-time regular employPrior work behavior and sex
Monthly Labor Review October 1996 81

Employment arrangements and characteristics of main 1994 job held by employed persons aged 29 to 37 years

with 3 years or less of tenure, by sex, 1994

Total ......................................... $11.12 $12.33 $9.80 40.1 44.0 35.7 92.2 96.4 87.6

Regular job:

Full-time ........................................ 11.64 12.38 10.56 44.5 46.0 42.4 94.8 96.6 92.1

Part-time ........................................ 9.20 10.51 8.81 22.7 24.2 22.2 84.2 94.2 81.2

Self-employed ............................... 12.40 15.86 8.45 38.4 43.1 33.0 91.3 96.5 85.5

Nonstandard job:

Temporary worker

Agency supplied .......................... 7.61 7.78 7.50 37.4 40.2 35.7 82.9 98.7 72.7

Direct hire .................................... 8.57 9.36 7.99 34.3 38.9 31.1 86.6 92.8 82.3

Contractor ..................................... 11.62 (1) (1) 40.3 (1) (1) 86.9 (1) (1)

Table 4.

ees. Within the full-time and self-employed regular employment categories, men have higher hourly wages than do

women, on average; within all employment categories, men

average more hours per week than women do.

Relative to male full-time regular employees, the percent

of men who held a job the 2 years before the start of the main

1994 job in each other employment category (part-time regular, self-employed regular, temporary agency and temporary

direct hire) does not differ (table 4). However, each of the

employment categories shows a lower percent of women having held a previous job during the 2 years before the start of

the main job than is the case for the women in the full-time

regular employment category. This suggests that women may

find these other types of employment categories useful as an

inroad to the labor market.

For those who had held a job during the 2 years before the

start of the main 1994 job, a comparison is done of the magnitudes of wage changes (hourly wage of the main 1994 job

minus hourly wage of the previous job) and hours changes

(hours per week of the main 1994 job minus hours per week

of the previous job) across the various employment classifications.15 The purpose is to address the issue of whether the

main 1994 job is a relative “step up” or a “step down” in

terms of wages and hours. Table 5 displays, by employment

category of the main 1994 job and by sex, the number of

weeks without work between the end of the previous job and

the start of the main 1994 job, years of tenure at the previous

job, the hourly wage at the main 1994 job minus the hourly

wage of the previous job (wage change), and the hours per

week at the main 1994 job minus the hours per week of the

most recent previous job (hours change).

The table indicates that relative to full-time regular employees, part-time regular, self-employed regular, temporary

agency, and temporary direct hire employees had a larger gap

between the stop date of the previous job and the start date of

the main 1994 job. When the data are broken down by sex,

this finding remains for women, but for men, it remains only

for those in part-time regular jobs. In addition, in all employment categories except regular part-time, women had a larger

average number of weeks without work between the end of

the previous job and start of the main job than did men; the

difference is particularly large for those in regular self-employed and temporary agency employment arrangements.

Relative to male and female full-time regular employees,

the average change in hours between the main 1994 job and

the previous job is different only for male and female parttime regular employees and female self-employed regular

employees. This suggests that the change in hours among employees in most of the other work arrangements was not significantly different from the change in hours for those in the

full-time regular employment arrangement. For men, relative

to full-time regular employees, the only significant difference

in the average change in hourly wages between the main job

and the previous job is for regular self-employed workers,

with the regular self-employed doing better in terms of wage

growth. However, among women in the regular part-time,

regular self-employed, and temporary agency categories, the

main 1994 job appears to be a relative “step down” in terms

of wage growth when these workers are compared with regular full-time employees.

THE DATA PRESENTED HERE from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth have been used to examine a number of issues

regarding workers in different employment arrangements.

Among the more salient findings: Relative to the full-time

regular employment situation, women are more likely than

1 Due to the small number of unweighted observations in the contractor

cell, breakdowns by sex are not shown.

NOTE: Data refer to the main or primary job from the 1994 interview. Prior

work behavior refers to that occurring over the 2 years before the start of the

main job.

SOURCE: National Longitudinal Survey of Youth.

Average hourly wage

 in 1994 dollars Average hours per week Percent who held a job

during prior 2 years Employment arrangement of

main 1994 job

Total Men Women Total Men Women Total Men Women
82 Monthly Labor Review October 1996

Nonstandard Work Arrangements

Footnotes

1

 For example, see Louis Uchitelle and N.R. Kleinfield, “On the Battlefields of Business, Millions of Casualties,” The New York Times, Mar. 3,

1996, pp. 1, 26–29; and Lewis M. Segal and Daniel G. Sullivan, “The Temporary Labor Force,” Economic Perspectives, vol. 19, no. 2, 1995, pp. 2–19.

2

 Employers may prefer nonstandard types of employment relationships

because they provide the flexibility to adjust the work force quickly when

product demand conditions change, and permit employers to benefit from

lower hiring and training costs, to pay lower wages and benefits, and to hire

temporarily workers with expertise in a particular area (such as consultants).

Many of these employer- and employee-sided rationales are described in

Anne E. Polivka and Thomas Nardone, “On the definition of “contingent

work,’ ” Monthly Labor Review, December 1989, pp. 9–16. 3

 After 1994, respondents to the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth

will be interviewed on a biennial basis.

4

 In this article, 1994 sample weights are used in all computations to

adjust for differing sampling and nonresponse rates; this ensures that the

data are nationally representative of the relevant age cohort.

5

 In addition, because the dates of these job-related behaviors are recorded for each individual, these variables can be calculated for a specific

period—for example, the number of jobs each worker held during the 2 years

before the start date of a certain job can be determined.

6

 Full-time regular employees are defined as those working at least 35

hours per week; part-time regular employees are those working fewer than

men to be found in certain employment arrangements—specifically,

part-time regular, temporary agency,

and temporary direct hire situations.

Men and women in part-time regular,

temporary agency, and temporary direct hire employment arrangements,

as well as women in the self-employed regular employment arrangement, spent less time working than

did regular full-time employees during the 2 years before they took their

current job—a finding that indicates

relatively less work experience during

the period for these individuals. In all

of these employment categories, however, men spent a higher percentage

of time working during those 2 years

than did women. Women who had

given birth during the preceding 2

years were much less likely to be in a

regular full-time work arrangement at

their main 1994 job than were women

who did not have a birth, implying

that other types of work arrangements

provide more flexibility than full-time

regular work arrangements.

Finally, the average change in

hours between the previous job and

the main 1994 job was different only

for men and women who worked in

the regular part-time employment arrangement and women in the selfemployed regular arrangement, relative to the changes for those in the

full-time regular employment arrangement. For men, no employment

arrangement had significantly lower

average wage growth than the full-time regular employment

situation. However, women who were regular part-time, regular self-employed, and temporary agency employees had a

relatively smaller average wage change than did their counterparts in full-time regular employment; this suggests that

their main 1994 job is a relative “step down” with respect to

wage growth.

Comparison of the previous job and the main 1994 job held by employed

persons aged 29 to 37 years with tenure of 3 years or less, by sex, 1994

Total, aged 29 to 37 years ......... 11.2 2.4 $1.06 1.3

Regular job:

Full-time ............................... 9.4 2.5 1.13 3.4

Part-time .............................. 15.3 2.2 .21 –9.2

Self-employed ...................... 16.0 2.6 3.21 1.4

Nonstandard job:

Temporary worker

Agency supplied ................ 21.9 1.3 –.43 2.8

Direct hire .......................... 14.3 1.5 1.68 .0

Contractor ............................ 13.7 2.5 –.50 2.5

Men, aged 29 to 37 years ...... 9.3 2.5 1.23 1.5

Regular job:

Full-time ............................... 8.6 2.5 1.04 2.5

Part-time .............................. 16.5 2.4 –.13 –11.3

Self-employed ...................... 9.5 3.2 5.99 2.4

Nonstandard job:

Temporary worker

Agency supplied ................ 10.8 1.1 .17 1.3

Direct hire .......................... 7.8 1.9 2.49 –1.9

Women, aged 29 to

37 years ............................... 13.5 2.2 .86 1.2

Regular job:

Full-time ............................... 10.8 2.4 1.26 4.9

Part-time .............................. 14.9 2.2 .33 – 8.5

Self-employed ...................... 24.3 1.7 –.65 .0

Nonstandard job:

Temporary worker

Agency supplied ................ 31.5 1.5 –.98 4.2

Direct hire .......................... 19.3 1.1 1.00 1.5

Sex and employment

arrangement

of main 1994 job

Average

number of

weeks worked

between end

of previous job

and start of

main job

Average

years of

tenure at

previous

job

Average hourly

wage of main

job minus

hourly wage of

previous job

(1994 dollars)

Average

hours per

week of

main job

minus hours

per week of

previous

job

Table 5.

NOTE: Data refer to the main or primary job from the 1994 interview. Previous job refers to the most

recent job held over the 2 years before the start date of the main job.

SOURCE: National Longitudinal Survey of Youth.
Monthly Labor Review October 1996 83

35 hours per week. The main job from the 1994 interview is defined as the

most recent job since the 1993 or previous interview (and the job in which

the individual worked the most hours, if he or she held dual jobs). The stop

date for the main job could be between January 1993 and December 1994,

although it is between June and October of 1994 for the majority of individuals because that was the period during which most of the respondents had

their 1994 interview.

7

 They define an “alternative” work arrangement as one that is either

intermediated through a third party, such as a temporary agency or contract

company, or one in which work potentially arrives in an irregular manner.

8

 The employment classification for the main job used throughout this

article is that reported at the 1994 interview. It is possible that some workers

changed employment classifications over time. For example, about 8.1 percent of full-time regular employees report that before they became a regular

employee at their job, they worked as either a temporary worker, a consultant, or a contractor for the same employer. Each variable in table 1, and all

others, is based on responses from those individuals who reported valid data

for that variable. There are only 21 unweighted observations in the consultant category, and they thus have been excluded. The 34 individuals who defined themselves as employees of contractors were classified as either fulltime or part-time regular employees. The CPS shows 1.1 percent of workers

aged 29 to 37 to be temporary help agency employees, while the NLSY shows

0.9 percent in the same category. In addition, the CPS has about 6.2 percent of

workers in this age group defined as “independent contractors” (which includes consultants and freelancers), while the NLSY has 1.6 percent defined

as contractors (and 0.4 percent as consultants). The disparity could be due to

the differences in the employment category definitions as well as in the wording of the questions. Additionally, year of the interview and seasonality may

play roles because the CPS response is for February of 1995, while that from

the NLSY was obtained, for the most part, between the months of June and

October of 1994.

9

 All inferences reported are statistically significant at the 95-percent confidence level.

10 The definition of a job is a period of work with a specific employer; for

self-employed workers, the workers themselves define each “new” job.

11 See Francine D. Blau and Marianne A. Ferber, The Economics of Women,

Men, and Work, 2nd. ed. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ, Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1992),

for a discussion of sex differences in labor market transitions, attachment,

and job types.

12 Rebecca Blank, “The Role of Part-Time Work in Women’s Labor Market Choices Over Time,” American Economic Review, May 1989, pp. 295–

99, looks at how marital status changes, birth of a child, and children’s ages

affect women’s choices of job categories.

13 There are only 36 unweighted observations for men and 25 for women

in the contractor classification, and they thus have been excluded from tables

with breakdowns by sex.

14 All wage data are in 1994 dollars; hourly wages are restricted to be

between $2 and $60 and hours per week are restricted to be between 1 and

98.

15 Segal and Sullivan, “The Temporary Labor Force,” examine wage

changes for those in the personnel supply industry.