Well-being, job satisfaction and labour mobility

I investigate whether two indicators of job-related well-being predict subsequent quitting. I find that both the Depression-Enthusiasm scale and the Anxiety-Comfort scale predict quitting, the former more strongly, and this contributes an element of criterion validity to their use as welfare measures. However, overall job satisfaction, which implicitly captures well-being relative to outside job opportunities, predicts job mobility better than either the Depression-Enthusiasm or the Anxiety-Comfort scale. I also find asymmetric effects: relative to intermediate levels, low well-being or job satisfaction are associated with greater quitting, yet high well-being or job satisfaction are not significantly associated with reduced quitting. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.