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ABSTRACT
Despite some attention devoted to part-time employment with insufficient or inadequate work hours, research is still too limited on how the burden of underemployment is distributed disproportionately on vulnerable workers and its implications for financial well-being and work-family balance. Furthermore, scarce research considers the role of control over work hours in the context of worker underemployment. Using unique data and measures constructed from a nationally representative survey of the 2006 and 2016 US General Social Survey, we find that being part-time underemployed is concentrated toward workers who are minority, lower income, and employed in certain service occupations. Multivariate analysis reveals that, relative to both part-time workers satisfied with their hours and to full-time workers, the part-time underemployed endure significantly greater risks of facing lower financial status and financial dis-satisfaction. Part-time underemployed workers also experience more frequent work-to-family conflict, compared to other part-time workers, and no less than otherwise comparable full-time workers. Their elevated work-family conflict is intensified when having limited control over their work hours. We derive implications of these findings for preventative public policies that would help curb both the extent and the harms of underemployment, recently rendered even more necessary by its rise during the 2020 recession.
Acknowledgement
We acknowledge and thank the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) for their support for the initial research, in particular, Pronita Gupta, Job Quality program, and their reviewers and staff.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Jaeseung Kim
Jaeseung Kim is an Assistant Professor at the University of South Carolina, College of Social Work. His research centers on work and caregiving challenges for low-income parents and how work-family policies, both private and public, can help address such challenges and contribute to health and mental health of low-income parents and their children. His recent research focused on the impacts of the child care subsidy program for low-income families and the implications of precarious work conditions for worker well-being. Across his scholarship, he aims to improve the well-being of low-income families by advancing knowledge to inform program and policy interventions. He received his PhD at the University of Chicago, School of Social Service Administration and his master’s degree in social work from Columbia University.
Lonnie Golden
Dr. Golden is a Professor of Economics and Labor & Employment Relations at Penn State University, Abington College. He is affiliated with the Project for Middle Class Renewal, University of Illinois School of Labor and Employment Relations, the International Labor Organization, Geneva, Economic Policy Institute in DC. His research analyzes trends, patterns, determinants and consequences of hours of work and non-standard employment, in labor markets, organizations and individuals. Specifically–underemployment and overemployment mismatches, overtime and part-time work, work scheduling, labor flexibility, outcomes such as overwork, worker health, earnings differentials, happiness, work-family time and time-use; and policies such as the Fair Labor Standards Act, Fair Workweek (predictive/secure scheduling) and work-sharing. He has a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Illinois-Urbana, in labor and macro-economics. He has published two books, Working Time and Nonstandard Employment, and articles in leading academic journals such as Industrial Relations, Monthly Labor Review, and Cambridge Journal of Economics. He teaches courses on Labor Economics, Labor Markets and Work-Life Policies and Practices.