IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/woemps/v22y2008i4p635-654.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Have stethoscope, will travel: contingent employment among physician health care providers in the United States

Author

Listed:
  • Angelo A. Alonzo

    (Yale University, angelo.alonzo@yale.edu)

  • Arthur B. Simon

    (abs1300@sbcglobal.net)

Abstract

The goal of this study was to describe locum tenens physicians in the context of contingent, nonstandard employment in the US. The target population for this study was 1662 physicians who accepted at least one locum tenens assignment. Response rate for the 50-item questionnaire was 47 percent. One third of respondents considered a locum tenens practice pattern permanent. Female physicians were younger and disproportionately represented in primary care specialism; 64 percent used locum income as sole source of support and were motivated by a need for flexible scheduling. Male locum physicians were older, weighted toward the sub-specialisms and motivated to practice part-time. Overall, locum physicians were satisfied with contingent work. Shifts towards part-time employment among women and a desire for flexibility are changing the nature of physician employment. Locum physicians, as`gold collar' contingent workers are very different from contingent workers in manufacturing and service sectors of the economy.

Suggested Citation

  • Angelo A. Alonzo & Arthur B. Simon, 2008. "Have stethoscope, will travel: contingent employment among physician health care providers in the United States," Work, Employment & Society, British Sociological Association, vol. 22(4), pages 635-654, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:woemps:v:22:y:2008:i:4:p:635-654
    DOI: 10.1177/0950017008096740
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0950017008096740
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0950017008096740?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dr Chris Forde, 2001. "Temporary Arrangements: The Activities of Employment Agencies in the UK," Work, Employment & Society, British Sociological Association, vol. 15(3), pages 631-644, September.
    2. Susan N. Houseman, 2001. "Why Employers Use Flexible Staffing Arrangements: Evidence from an Establishment Survey," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 55(1), pages 149-170, October.
    3. George Gonos, 2001. "Free-Splitting Revisited: Concealing Surplus Value in the Temporary Employment Relationship," Politics & Society, , vol. 29(4), pages 589-611, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Angela Knox, 2014. "Human resource management (HRM) in temporary work agencies: Evidence from the hospitality industry," The Economic and Labour Relations Review, , vol. 25(1), pages 81-98, March.
    2. Zuberi, Daniyal M. & Ptashnick, Melita B., 2011. "The deleterious consequences of privatization and outsourcing for hospital support work: The experiences of contracted-out hospital cleaners and dietary aids in Vancouver, Canada," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 72(6), pages 907-911, March.
    3. Angela Knox, 2018. "Regulatory avoidance in the temporary work agency industry: Evidence from Australia," The Economic and Labour Relations Review, , vol. 29(2), pages 190-206, June.
    4. Mauro, Marianna & Cardamone, Emma & Cavallaro, Giusy & Minvielle, Etienne & Rania, Francesco & Sicotte, Claude & Trotta, Annarita, 2014. "Teaching hospital performance: Towards a community of shared values?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 107-112.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Linda McDowell & Adina Batnitzky & Sarah Dyer, 2008. "Internationalization and the Spaces of Temporary Labour: The Global Assembly of a Local Workforce," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 46(4), pages 750-770, December.
    2. Ashley Baber, 2024. "Labour Market Engineers: Reconceptualising Labour Market Intermediaries with the Rise of the Gig Economy in the United States," Work, Employment & Society, British Sociological Association, vol. 38(3), pages 723-743, June.
    3. John S. Heywood & W.S. Siebert & Xiangdong Wei, 2011. "Estimating the Use of Agency Workers: Can Family-Friendly Practices Reduce Their Use?," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(3), pages 535-564, July.
    4. Camelia M. Kuhnen & Paul Oyer, 2016. "Exploration for Human Capital: Evidence from the MBA Labor Market," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 34(S2), pages 255-286.
    5. Kim Bosmans & Deborah De Moortel & Christophe Vanroelen, 2022. "Enforceability of rights in the temporary agency sector: The case of Belgium," Economic and Industrial Democracy, Department of Economic History, Uppsala University, Sweden, vol. 43(4), pages 1519-1538, November.
    6. David H. Autor & Susan N. Houseman, 2010. "Do Temporary-Help Jobs Improve Labor Market Outcomes for Low-Skilled Workers? Evidence from "Work First"," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 2(3), pages 96-128, July.
    7. Corinne Perraudin & Héloïse Petit & Nadine Thevenot & Bruno Tinel & Julie Valentin, 2009. "Inter-firm dependency and employment inequalities : Theoretical hypotheses and empirical tests," Post-Print halshs-00375550, HAL.
    8. Carlos García-Serrano & Virginia Hernanz & Luis Toharia, 2010. "Mind the Gap, Please! The Effect of Temporary Help Agencies on the Consequences of Work Accidents," Journal of Labor Research, Springer, vol. 31(2), pages 162-182, June.
    9. Elke J. Jahn & Jan Bentzen, 2012. "What Drives the Demand for Temporary Agency Workers?," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 26(3), pages 341-355, September.
    10. Joshua D. Gottlieb & Avi Zenilman, 2020. "When Workers Travel: Nursing Supply During COVID-19 Surges," NBER Working Papers 28240, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Francesco Devicienti & Paolo Naticchioni & Andrea Ricci, 2018. "Temporary Employment, Demand Volatility, and Unions: Firm-Level Evidence," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 71(1), pages 174-207, January.
    12. Shirota, Toyoichiro, 2020. "Note on alternative work arrangements, tasks, and compensations : Evidence from a quasi-natural experiment," Discussion paper series. A 355, Graduate School of Economics and Business Administration, Hokkaido University.
    13. Stef Bouwhuis & Dimitris Pavlopoulos & Mauricio Garnier‐Villarreal & Wendy Smits, 2024. "Ad hoc decisions as latent strategies: How do firms use nonstandard employment contracts?," Industrial Relations Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(2), pages 81-99, March.
    14. Fang, Tony & Samnani, Al-Karim & Novicevic, Milorad M. & Bing, Mark N., 2013. "Liability-of-foreignness effects on job success of immigrant job seekers," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 48(1), pages 98-109.
    15. René Böheim & Martina Zweimüller, 2009. "The employment of temporary agency workers in the UK – with or against the trade unions?," Economics working papers 2009-12, Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria.
    16. Christopher L. House & Jing Zhang, 2012. "Layoffs, Lemons and Temps," NBER Working Papers 17962, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. YOKOYAMA Izumi & HIGA Kazuhito & KAWAGUCHI Daiji, 2015. "The Effect of Exchange Rate Fluctuations on Employment in a Segmented Labor Market," Discussion papers 15139, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    18. Teruyama, Hiroshi & Goto, Yasuo & Lechevalier, Sebastien, 2018. "Firm-level labor demand for and macroeconomic increases in non-regular workers in Japan," Japan and the World Economy, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 90-105.
    19. Robert S. Huckman & Gary P. Pisano, 2006. "The Firm Specificity of Individual Performance: Evidence from Cardiac Surgery," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 52(4), pages 473-488, April.
    20. Koangsung Choi & Chung Choe & Daeho Lee, 2021. "The Effect of Employing Temporary Workers on Efficiency: Evidence From a Meta-Frontier Analysis," SAGE Open, , vol. 11(4), pages 21582440211, November.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:woemps:v:22:y:2008:i:4:p:635-654. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.britsoc.co.uk/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.