Work values: Their emergence and their consequences for labour market behaviour

What people value in their job is a research subject of growing interest. Most research has focused on the structure in work values or on the differences in preferences that workers have for various job aspects. The effects of work values on work-related behaviour have received much less attention. The body of research in this book therefore focuses on exploring the relationship between work values and labour market behaviour. It investigates (1) how work values affect the decision of employees to change jobs voluntarily, and (2) whether work values explain forced job endings among male and female workers? It finds using longitudinal data and applying event history analysis that work vales indeed matter for job mobility that is voluntarily motivated but that work values hardly affect forced job mobility of men and women. To delve deeper into the effect of work values on work related behaviour this book also examines whether social norms, i.e. the behavioural rules of peers, possibly incorporate the effect of values on individual labour market behaviour. Finally, this book looks closer into the origins of work values. It examines whether labour market characteristics affect work values. The research in this book thus gives insights in the emergence of work values and the consequences of work values for labour market behaviour