Temporary employees more satisfied with jobs than expected

During today’s tough economic times, the temporary services industry has become an important source of low-skilled work, growing five times faster than overall employment between 1972 and 2000. Some argue that these workers, particularly women, are more likely to be paid less than permanent employees, work fewer hours and are unsatisfied with their jobs. New research from the University of Missouri-Columbia examines whether this is the case.

"In general, women who take such jobs are not being pushed into them and are not unhappy with their experiences on the job," said Kenneth Troske, associate professor of Economics at MU. Troske conducted the research along with fellow associate Economics professor Peter Mueser and Carolyn Heinrich, associate professor of public affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. "Nor does the evidence suggest that those who take temporary jobs are stuck at the bottom of the wage ladder. In fact, earning increases over two years are greater than in other job sectors where welfare workers are employed, and job mobility is high and frequently positive in these temporary work situations."

The researchers examined the employment dynamics of welfare mothers who took temporary service jobs in two states, North Carolina and Missouri. Through interviews and surveys, they found that the women, whose wage expectations were just under $8 an hour, were receiving just 37 cents less than their desired wage, and for almost half of the respondents, it was equal to or more than the desired wage.

Two-thirds of the women thought that their current temporary positions would lead to permanent ones. Also, the majority of the women expressed high levels of satisfaction with the kind of work they were doing, with their relationships with supervisors and coworkers, and, to a lesser degree, with their hours and work locations.

"Welfare recipients, those with jobs–whether in temporary help firms or in direct employment environments–face much better prospects than do those without jobs, in terms of both their welfare earnings and their chance of leaving welfare," Troske said.

One important separate finding, Troske said, was that the most powerful predictor of temporary sector employment was race. In all groups, non-whites were more likely to be in temporary jobs. Another important predictor was the region in the state; those in metropolitan counties, which offer a larger marketplace for temporary service firms, were more likely to be in temporary jobs than those in non-metropolitan counties.

Their research was featured in the winter 2004 edition of Focus, which is published by the Institute for Research on Poverty and is available at http://www.ssc.wisc.edu/irp/focus/foc231a.pdf.

2004

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Kenneth Troske
Peter Mueser
Department of Economics

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