Search Results

Title: Building a Career: The Effect of Initial Job Experiences and Related Work Attitudes on Later Employment
Resulting in 1 citation.
1. Raelin, Joseph A.
Building a Career: The Effect of Initial Job Experiences and Related Work Attitudes on Later Employment
Kalamazoo, MI: Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, 1980
Cohort(s): Young Men, Young Women
Publisher: W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research
Keyword(s): Career Patterns; Discrimination, Sex; Job Aspirations; Schooling; Socioeconomic Status (SES); Wages; Work Attitudes; Work Experience

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

This investigation of the long term effects of early work experiences develops a causal model of early youth careers in order to examine the relationship between different work characteristics, job satisfaction, aspirations, and later wages. Findings include: (1) the quality of entry jobs and initial career attitudes are determined by background factors, particularly education; (2) later occupational status is affected primarily by prior work experience and attitudes; (3) young women face enormous barriers to achieving wage parity with young men and they experience sex discrimination throughout their careers. The author presents nine public policy recommendations based on these and other findings. Included among them is the recommendation that young people should be encouraged to hold the highest possible career aspirations since there is no disutility to exaggerated aspirations and since strong aspirations also help youth improve their disadvantaged positions.
Bibliography Citation
Raelin, Joseph A. Building a Career: The Effect of Initial Job Experiences and Related Work Attitudes on Later Employment. Kalamazoo, MI: Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, 1980.