Wandel der Erwerbsformen: Welche Rolle spielen strukturelle Änderungen am Arbeitsmarkt? / Changes in Work Arrangements: What is the role of structural changes within the labour market?

Since the beginning of the 90s the composition of work arrangements has changed considerably. Absolutely and relatively, full-time, permanent employment, excluding agency work, has become less important in the last two decades. Non-standard work arrangements like part-time employment, fixed-term employment, agency work or one-person-businesses, however, have increased. Non-standard work arrangements have become even more a women’s domain and are especially widespread in the tertiary sector. Changes have not occurred recently, but there is in addition a long­term trend underlying. According to a shift-share analysis structural changes in employment like an increasing amount of women’s employment respectively an employment growth in the service sector do not significantly contribute to the development. The main cause for changes may rather be behavioral due to institutional alterations, shifts in market power, changing preferences or needs of employers and employees. Yet, the different functions of non-standard work arrangements do not allow an evaluation of the changing patterns of employment, particularly since there is a high level of heterogeneity even within specific work arrangements.