QUALIFICATION MISMATCH AND OCCUPATIONAL CHANGE: THE ROLE OF DEMAND, SUPPLY AND INSTITUTIONAL FACTORS IN EXPLAINING CROSS-NATIONAL VARIATIONS
type: CreativeWork
description: The occupational structure of advanced economies has undergone significant changes over the past decades. On the demand side, technological change intensified and has been considered the main driver behind these transformations, with competing predictions concerning its impact on society. On the supply side, a very substantial educational expansion took place worldwide, allowing to cope with technological progress, boosting productivity and growth. The interaction between the two creates reasons for optimism through the upgrading of occupational structure, and pessimism due to the “hollowing out” of susceptible to automation middle-skilled jobs and the growth in low-skilled jobs. Furthermore, the imperfect match between demand and supply resulted in an increasing phenomenon of qualification mismatch and overeducation, questioning whether having higher education results in having a better job. However, the magnitude of these processes appears to vary across countries, with more promising upgrading trends in some countries and polarization in others. This suggests that a more detailed assessment of the role of demand, supply factors, and institutional characteristics might be important for drawing conclusions and developing policy remedies to address the challenges posed by rapid technological advancements. In this dissertation, I analyse how the occupational structure has changed in 29 European countries over the past 15 years, investigating whether the technological change has been skill-biased or routine-biased and how these changes in occupational structure affected the risk of overeducation for individuals with different levels of education. I do so by analysing different sources of data and primarily the European Labour Force Survey (EU LFS). In the first part of the thesis, I provide a comparative assessment of changes in occupational structure based on different dimensions of job quality and task content of occupations. This assessment is followed by a multiva…
abstract: The occupational structure of advanced economies has undergone significant changes over the past decades. On the demand side, technological change intensified and has been considered the main driver behind these transformations, with competing predictions concerning its impact on society. On the supply side, a very substantial educational expansion took place worldwide, allowing to cope with technological progress, boosting productivity and growth. The interaction between the two creates reasons for optimism through the upgrading of occupational structure, and pessimism due to the “hollowing out” of susceptible to automation middle-skilled jobs and the growth in low-skilled jobs. Furthermore, the imperfect match between demand and supply resulted in an increasing phenomenon of qualification mismatch and overeducation, questioning whether having higher education results in having a better job. However, the magnitude of these processes appears to vary across countries, with more promising upgrading trends in some countries and polarization in others. This suggests that a more detailed assessment of the role of demand, supply factors, and institutional characteristics might be important for drawing conclusions and developing policy remedies to address the challenges posed by rapid technological advancements. In this dissertation, I analyse how the occupational structure has changed in 29 European countries over the past 15 years, investigating whether the technological change has been skill-biased or routine-biased and how these changes in occupational structure affected the risk of overeducation for individuals with different levels of education. I do so by analysing different sources of data and primarily the European Labour Force Survey (EU LFS). In the first part of the thesis, I provide a comparative assessment of changes in occupational structure based on different dimensions of job quality and task content of occupations. This assessment is followed by a multiva…
author: DAMARONAK, ALENA
language: eng
keywords: Settore SPS/09 - Sociologia dei Processi economici e del Lavoro
date published: 2022
date modified: 2026-07-27T20:18:56Z
provider: Università degli Studi di Milano
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: Università degli Studi di Milano

PropertyValue
property ID: Handle
value: http://hdl.handle.net/2434/940656

PropertyValue
property ID: DOI
value: 10.13130/damaronak-alena_phd2022