The Evolution of Early Job Insecurity in Europe

The present study proposes a meaningful multidimensional index of early job insecurity for European countries based on raw micro-data drawn from the European Union's Labor Force Survey (EU-LFS), and captures its evolution over time, before and during the years of the post-2008 economic crisis. More specifically, a number of different indicators capturing various domains of early job insecurity are estimated, utilizing the data behind the EU-LFS survey for all European Union (EU) member states. These indicators are then composed into a single indicator of early job insecurity, which is used to apprehend and compare the degree of early job insecurity in EU member states, during these years. The proposed indicator captures the whole range of early job insecurity aspects, such as labor market conditions, job quality, school-to-work transitions, and job security, in an overall measurement providing a way of estimating and comparing early job insecurity among different countries. The results uncover the considerable differences between EU countries when early job insecurity is considered. Moreover, countries are ranked according to the degrees of early job insecurity for the years 2008-2014.