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The spread of over-qualification is a consequence of individuals having acquired more credentials than required at the workplace. In some cases, it may be that this mismatch plays a role in allowing workers to compensate for the lack of some other skills, to escape from unemployment, or to achieve job stability in the labour market. Consequently, workers may feel no less satisfied, at least in some aspects, than adequately-matched workers. The aim of this paper is to analyse the relationship between over-qualification and the various dimensions of job satisfaction in Spain, a country characterised by a strongly-segmented labour market with high unemployment levels, and a significant number of mismatched employees. Using micro data for a representative sample of Spanish workers, we carry out simultaneous maximum likelihood estimations on a two-equation system to control for potential endogeneity. The results obtained provide evidence that does not reject the hypothesis that mismatched workers do not necessarily feel less satisfied than adequately-matched workers in the dimensions of job satisfaction related to extrinsic domains or social relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose The recent economic crisis in Spain is felt most severely in the labour market. The purpose of this paper is to examine job satisfaction among the occupied workers according to their job types throughout the ongoing economic cycle comparing the period of boom and that of bust.Design/methodology/approach Surprisingly, the average job satisfaction has stayed virtually constant between the two periods, which suggests the existence of compensating forces operating among the occupied population. The authors find first the compositional change of working population, such as a decreasing proportion of temporary contract workers had only small effects, unable to explain the puzzle. The authors also find that macroeconomic conditions affect workers’ job satisfaction differently by the type of workers or jobs. In fact, high-level managerial workers and self-employed employers have suffered a significantly large reduction in their job satisfaction during the crisis while some other types of workers such as ordinary employees have enjoyed increased job satisfaction. In order to explore the causes of these differences, the authors examine the satisfaction in different job domains.Findings The results suggest that in the case of self-employed, decrease in job satisfaction with respect to wages job stability superior evaluation is significant and the promotion prospect is not relevant for self-employed, while for managerial workers, the only significant decrease is due to superior evaluation.Research limitations/implications The Spanish data with a reasonable sample size which include information on job satisfaction are the Spanish Survey of Life Quality at Work. Unfortunately, the survey is not longitudinal, therefore unable to examine the factors affecting transitions in satisfaction level or to control for fixed individual effects, and the data only cover until 2010. Further investigation including more recent data and data from other countries would be helpful to better understand the consequences of economic crisis on job satisfaction.Originality/value This paper contributes in two ways. First, the authors show what has been happening to the job-related well-being during the recession in Spain by the type of workers: high-level managers, managers, self-employed and employees. Job satisfaction can be determined by pressures to work harder and longer hours, reduced wages, lower promotion possibility and higher layoff probability, and all of them could have been changed by the economic crisis. Consequently, the second contribution is to analyse different dimensions of job satisfaction as satisfaction with wages, flexibility, stability, stress and promotion to determine the causes of the changes in average level of job satisfaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The cost of duration moral hazard in workplace accident insurance has been amply explored by North-American scholars. Given the current context of financial constraints in public accounts, and particularly in the Social Security system, we feel that the issue merits inquiry in the case of Spain. The present research posits a methodological proposal using the econometric technique of stochastic frontiers, which allows us to break down the duration of work-related leave into what we term "economic days" and "medical days". Our calculations indicate that during the 9-year period spanning 2005-2013, the cost of sick leave amongst full-time salaried workers amounted to 6920 million Euros (in constant 2011 Euros). Of this total, and bearing in mind that "economic days" are those attributable to duration moral hazard, over 3000 million Euros might be linked to workplace absenteeism. It is on this figure where economic policy measures might prove more effective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article proposes a new methodology to measure precarious employment with a multidimensional approach. The adjusted multidimensional precariousness rate employed to measure job precariousness is calculated on a counting approach and exhibit several advantages, including its decomposability according to the relative contribution to total precariousness of different dimensions and sub-populations. For illustrative purposes, the methodology is applied to the Spanish case using microdata from the Encuesta de Estructura Salarial (Wage Structure Survey) and considering three precariousness dimensions of jobs (low wages, fixed-term contracts and part-time work). The evidence obtained shows that at the beginning of the economic crisis there was an increase in the incidence and intensity of precariousness for new jobs created in the Spanish economy. Moreover, obtained evidence shows that the incidence of precarious employment is particularly high in certain economic sectors and for females. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent recession has generated a tremendous increase in unemployment rates in Spain. In this paper we use a very rich repeated cross-section dataset on workers' job conditions, together with regional unemployment rates, to investigate whether peers' unemployment affects individuals' job satisfaction. We find that, once perceived job stability is controlled for, peers' unemployment shows a positive effect on individuals' wellbeing at work, greater and more precisely estimated for men and private-sector workers. The impact is highly non-linear and the greatest effect is found for unemployment rates exceeding 10 %. Interestingly, the results are robust to controlling for workforce selection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]