Atypical employment and the Intergenerational Transmission of disadvantage: Britain and Germany in Comparative Perspective

Project outline

Since the early 1990s, the incidence of atypical employment – fixed-term, part-time, low paid or flexible shift work – has increased markedly in many advanced economies. This includes but is not limited to the rise of the ‘gig economy’, i.e. the growing share of the economy that relies on work being performed through short-term contracts or freelancing. We currently lack a good understanding of whether, how and to what extent the negative consequences of atypical employment that are known to affect individuals in these kinds of employment conditions are further transmitted to the next generation, thus entrenching social disadvantage amongst this group and hampering social mobility. Our project aims to shed light on this question by bringing together two bodies of inquiry — research on social consequences of atypical employment and research on the intergenerational transmission of disadvantage. Building on the theoretical and empirical advances in these two fields of research, we aim to establish the empirical associations between different types of atypical employment in the parental generation and the development and life chances of children.