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Temps Dip Deeper: Temporary Employment and the Midlife Nadir in Human Well-Being

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  • Alan Piper

Abstract

Temporary employees rank lower than permanent employees on various measures of mental and physical health, including well-being. In parallel, much research has shown that the relationship between age and well-being traces an approximate U-shape, with a nadir in midlife. Temporary employment may well have different associations with well-being across the lifespan, likely harming people in midlife more than at the start of their working lives. Using over twenty years of the German Socio-economic panel (SOEP), this investigation considers the relationship between temporary employment, age and well-being. In doing so, it both sheds new light on the relationship between temporary employment and well-being, and explores a reason for the oft-found U-shaped relationship between age and well-being. The results show that temporary employment deepens the U-shape in midlife, and that this result holds when many socioeconomic factors as well as the industry, region, cohort, personality, employment security and job worries are taken into account. Furthermore, the investigation considers transitions between permanent and temporary employment and uses these to assess causation and selection.

Suggested Citation

  • Alan Piper, 2020. "Temps Dip Deeper: Temporary Employment and the Midlife Nadir in Human Well-Being," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 1109, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    • Handle: RePEc:diw:diwsop:diw_sp1109
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    Cited by:

    1. Blanchflower, David G. & Piper, Alan, 2022. "There is a mid-life low in well-being in Germany," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 214(C).
    2. Blanchflower, David G. & Piper, Alan, 2021. "The well-being age U-shape effect in Germany is not flat," GLO Discussion Paper Series 921, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    3. David G. Blanchflower & Carol L. Graham, 2022. "The Mid-Life Dip in Well-Being: a Critique," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 161(1), pages 287-344, May.
    4. Piper, Alan, 2023. "Age and Happiness," MPRA Paper 117556, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Christoph K. Becker & Stefan T. Trautmann, 2022. "Does Happiness Increase in Old Age? Longitudinal Evidence from 20 European Countries," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 23(7), pages 3625-3654, October.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Temporary employment; permanent employment; age; life satisfaction; SOEP;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I31 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General Welfare, Well-Being
    • J41 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - Labor Contracts

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