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Fragmented careers?

Winners and losers in young adult labour markets

Esther Dermott

University of Bristol

It has been argued that people's engagement with work is becoming more like a series of encounters than an enduring relationship. In this article we address the question of whether this fragmentation is characteristic of people in the early stages of their working lives by drawing on a study of young adults in Bristol. We conclude that there is a core of young adults who are employed in a relatively stable pattern, along with a sizable minority, mostly of low paid workers, whose working lives can be described as discontinuous and fragmented. The study suggests that employment fragmentation is concentrated among young adults with less education, and in lower status, lower paid occupations and does not support a generalized picture of uncertainty and discontinuity.These employment patterns among younger people tend to highlight the continuing significance of long-standing social divisions of socio-economic advantage and gender-related disadvantage.

Key Words: careers • employment • flexibility • young adults

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