Career Strategies in Capitalism and Socialism: Work Values and job Rewards

This article compares work values and job rewards in Hungary and the U.S., using data from a recent study of workers in these two countries (the 1989 International Social Survey Program). We argue that individuals ' career strategies and attainments are shaped by their nation's structures of employment relations. The results indicate that Hungarians placed greater importance on economic incentives and on having more "leisure " time from their main jobs, time which they can then presumably use to maximize their earnings in second-economy jobs. Workers in the U.S. were more concerned with promotion and advancement opportunities. Analyzing differences between capitalist and socialist economies in the organization of work and individuals ' work orientations has proved to be a useful way to evaluate theories of how economic, social and political institutions affect employment relations. The demise of state socialism in eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union has not rendered such comparisons anachronistic. On the contrary, the attempts to transform those economies heighten the relevance of comparisons across social systems. If we are to understand the current changes, we need to know much more about what is being changed. Instead of offering blueprints for how to move from socialism to capitalism (see Stark 1992, for a critique of "designer capitalism"), we contribute more to an analysis of transformation if we have a better understanding of similarities and differences in work organization and career strategies between socialist and capitalist countries