TY - JOUR
T1 - What does a temporary help service job offer? Empirical suggestions from a Japanese survey
AU - Okudaira, Hiroko
AU - Ohtake, Fumio
AU - Kume, Koichi
AU - Tsuru, Kotaro
N1 - Funding Information:
This paper is based on a research project at the Research Institute for Economy, Trade, and Industry (RIETI) led by Kotaro Tsuru. We are grateful to two anonymous referees and to Yukiko Abe, Richard Freeman, Yoshio Higuchi, Charles Yuji Horioka, Hidehiko Ichimura, Takao Kato, Noriaki Kojima, Kohei Kubota, Tomohiro Machikita, Naoki Mitani, Nobuko Nagase, Hideo Owan, Tadashi Sakai, Masaru Sasaki, Ryuhei Wakasugi, Kazuo Yamaguchi, Isamu Yamamoto, Kengo Yasui, and Yukiko Yokoyama, as well as the seminar participants at RIETI, Hokkaido University, Okayama University, 2011 Trans-Pacific Labor Seminar in Kyoto, West Japan Labor Workshop, Japanese Economic Association Spring Meeting, and Keio University for their helpful comments. All remaining errors are our own. A previous version of this paper ( Okudaira et al., 2011b , available only in Japanese) presented results only from the baseline ATT estimation and did not conduct any sensitivity tests. We thank Yuki Umeoka for her excellent assistance. Okudaira acknowledges research grants from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science and from Okayama University.
PY - 2013/6
Y1 - 2013/6
N2 - The aim of this paper is to test whether or not a temporary help service (THS) job benefits workers in Japan. By applying the average treatment effect on the treated estimation and its sensitivity tests to the Japanese survey data, we obtained the following findings. First, we observed no evidence that THS work has a positive impact on the probability of being permanently employed in subsequent waves, when compared to directly hired part-time jobs. Rather, THS workers suffer from a significantly higher probability of being unemployed, at least at some point over the next 2. years, than directly hired part-time workers do. At the same time, however, we also found weak evidence that THS workers have a lower probability of being unemployed than those who were originally unemployed. We conclude that THS work in Japan has failed to provide a stepping stone to permanent employment, although it may have provided employment opportunities to those who were otherwise unemployed.
AB - The aim of this paper is to test whether or not a temporary help service (THS) job benefits workers in Japan. By applying the average treatment effect on the treated estimation and its sensitivity tests to the Japanese survey data, we obtained the following findings. First, we observed no evidence that THS work has a positive impact on the probability of being permanently employed in subsequent waves, when compared to directly hired part-time jobs. Rather, THS workers suffer from a significantly higher probability of being unemployed, at least at some point over the next 2. years, than directly hired part-time workers do. At the same time, however, we also found weak evidence that THS workers have a lower probability of being unemployed than those who were originally unemployed. We conclude that THS work in Japan has failed to provide a stepping stone to permanent employment, although it may have provided employment opportunities to those who were otherwise unemployed.
KW - ATT estimation
KW - Stepping-stone
KW - Temporary help service job
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U2 - 10.1016/j.jjie.2013.01.004
DO - 10.1016/j.jjie.2013.01.004
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84875274579
SN - 0889-1583
VL - 28
SP - 37
EP - 68
JO - Journal of the Japanese and International Economies
JF - Journal of the Japanese and International Economies
ER -