Perceived Job Insecurity and Life Satisfaction: Testing a Causal Model of Job Stress Proliferation

• In Event: 161 - Section on Organizations, Occupation and Work Roundtable Session (one-hour).
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 14. Job Insecurity and Temporary Employment I

Abstract

The organization of work in the United States has changed dramatically over the last three decades as a result of globalization, industrial shifts, and technological innovation. Long-term, stable employment relationships are increasingly being replaced with insecure work arrangements characterized by shorter job tenure and fewer worker protections. This study tests a causal model of job stress proliferation among a nationally-representative, longitudinal sample of working adults (n=843) in the National Survey of Midlife Development in the United States. Perceived job insecurity is negatively associated with life satisfaction net of controls for personality, demographic, job, and health characteristics, as well as competing job stress hypotheses from the job strain model and the effort-reward imbalance model. Negative work-to-family spillover of stress significantly mediates the relationship between perceived job insecurity and life satisfaction for those with chronic job insecurity or declining job security over a ten-year period. However, negative work-to-family spillover suppresses the effect of perceived job insecurity on life satisfaction for those with improving job security over time. Having at least a bachelor's degree and being married buffers the effect of perceived job insecurity on life satisfaction. The findings provide support for conceptualizing work-to-family spillover as a causal mechanism in the stress process linking perceived job insecurity and life satisfaction modified by social status and educational resources.

Author

• Anne E Fehrenbacher, University of California-Los Angeles