Occupational Trajectories and Health Inequalities in a Global Perspective

Abstract

Continued paid work is an important prerequisite of material and psychosocial well-being during adult life. In economically advanced societies large parts of working-age populations are formally employed, whereas worklessness and informal, unprotected employment conditions prevail in a majority of less-developed countries. Still, substantial social inequalities of quality of work and employment persist in the former countries, exposing workers in lower socioeconomic positions to more disadvantaged, less healthy jobs. In this chapter, this observation is substantiated by research findings applied to two stages of occupational careers, the stage of entrance into the labor market in young adulthood and the stage in midlife when large parts of workers have achieved their main occupational position. Here, social gradients of adverse material and psychosocial work environments and their impact on workers’ physical and mental health are demonstrated. In a subsequent section, we ask to what extent adverse work and employment conditions contribute to the explanation of social inequalities in health in working populations, referring to findings from mediation and moderation analyses. In view of limited current evidence of this contribution, a more elaborated conceptual approach to the analysis of advantaged and disadvantaged occupational trajectories is proposed. The chapter ends with a short discussion of policy implications of this new knowledge. There are at least two compelling reasons to extend these implications to a global scale; first, the far-reaching impact of economic globalization and, second, the involvement of occupational health in two globally emerging concerns, the recent worldwide pandemic of COVID-19 and the climate crisis of global warming. As working populations are affected by these challenges all over the world, common and inclusive strategies need to be developed to promote and ensure decent and healthy work.