Occupational Mobility

An examination of the way women move between jobs was a central focus of the empirical analysis reported in the last chapter. The occupational profiles described there were constructed essentially from horizontal movements between occupation groups; that is, between jobs which were in the same occupational category or an equivalent status occupation. When disruptions occurred to women’s employment, vertical occupational mobility was found to occur in many instances; that is, movements up or down, but mainly down the occupational scale. It is to these vertical movements we now turn. The WES data provided the rare opportunity to examine women’s experiences of vertical occupational mobility over their lifetime. The analysis rests, of course, on being able to identify vertical moves up and down the occupational scale; this is an issue which is discussed below. It was possible to see from the results when and why vertical occupational mobility occurred, the extent of these experiences and how often women recovered from a loss of occupational status. The findings have an important bearing on the theories of labour market mechanisms and how women fit into labour market structures.