Gasteen A. and Houston J. (2007) Employability and earnings returns to qualifications in Scotland, Regional Studies 41, 443-451. Scottish Social Inclusion and Lifelong Learning policies emphasize the need for individuals to become qualified through the acquisition of formal qualifications. Although education policy in Scotland is a devolved activity, there has been little investigation of the earnings and employment returns in the labour market. This paper examines the earnings and employability performance of qualifications using Labour Force Survey data from 1999-2003. School-leaving qualifications offer a greater chance of employment and attract significantly superior earnings' premia than intermediate-school and lower-level Further Education qualifications. There is also evidence that individuals who had followed a standard educational route to higher level qualifications may enjoy extra earnings' premia. Gasteen A. et Houston J. (2007) L'employabilite et le rendement des diplomes en Ecosse, Regional Studies 41, 443-451. En Ecosse, les politiques envers l'inclusion sociale et l'apprentissage a vie mettent l'accent sur l'importance d'etre diplome. Bien qu'en Ecosse la politique d'education soit regionalisee, rares sont les recherches sur son rendement dans le marche du travail en termes du revenu et de l'emploi. A partir des donnees provenant de la Labour Force Survey (enquete sur l'emploi), 1999-2003, cet article cherche a examiner les effets revenu et emploi des diplomes. Les diplomes de fin de scolarite fournissent une meilleure possibilite d'emploi et entrainent un dividende de revenu nettement superieur que ne le font les diplomes de niveaux moyen ou inferieur dans l'enseignement professionnel. Il s'est avere aussi que les individus qui ont suivi une voie traditionnelle aux diplomes de niveau superieur pourraient jouir d'un dividende de revenu supplementaire. Rendement de l'education Diplomes Revenu Employabilite, Ecosse Gasteen A. und Houston J. (2007) Auswirkung von Qualifikationen auf Beschaftigungsfahigkeit und Einkommen in Schottland, Regional Studies 41, 443-451. Mit den Politiken fur gesellschaftliche Eingliederung und lebenslanges Lernen in Schottland wird die Notwendigkeit betont, dass sich die betroffenen Personen durch Erlangung formeller Qualifikationen qualifizieren. Seit der Dezentralisierung ist Schottland fur die Bildungspolitik zustandig, doch die Auswirkungen auf Einkommen und Beschaftigung im Arbeitsmarkt wurden bisher nur wenig untersucht. In diesem Beitrag werden die Auswirkungen von Qualifikationen auf Einkommen und Beschaftigungsfahigkeit anhand der Daten des Labour Force Survey von 1999 bis 2003 untersucht. Schulabschlusse auf hohem Niveau steigern die Wahrscheinlichkeit einer Beschaftigung und fuhren zu signifikant hoheren Einkommenspramien als Schulabschlusse auf mittlerem Niveau oder niedrigere Abschlusse im Rahmen des zweiten Bildungsweges. Ebenso weist einiges darauf hin, dass Personen, die eine hohere Qualifikation auf dem ublichen Bildungsweg erworben haben, von zusatzlichen...

Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics’ (STEM) knowledge and skills are of increasing importance to the Scottish (and UK) economy in terms of economic growth and better-paid employment opportunities. Shortages of suitably qualified individuals mean that policymakers are concerned to increase the study of STEM subjects at both tertiary and secondary education levels, as the latter feeds the former. Persistent, gendered patterns of STEM subject choice exist at all school qualification levels with, for instance, Biology more likely to be studied by females and Physics by males. These differences have been attributed to social conditioning and gender-biased environments rather than any innate, biological differences with little known about the latter. This paper used Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) administrative data for 2002-2009, linked to the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD), to explore whether biological factors may play a part in STEM subject choice in Scottish state secondary schools. Specifically, it examined the impact that potential exposure to increased levels of testosterone, in-utero, for female twins with male co-twins (the Twin Testosterone Transfer hypothesis) may have on their STEM subject choices. Twins and a control group of closely spaced sibling pairs were identified from SQA administrative data. Logistic regression was employed to examine Maths, Biology, Chemistry, Physics, general Science and Computing subject choices. No evidence of any testosterone effect was found despite clear patterns of gender segregation. The impact of socio-economic background was stark. The odds of individuals from more disadvantaged backgrounds taking named sciences fell as deprivation levels rose. Age-14 educational choices and general age-16 attainment were seen to be critical for studying STEM subjects at Higher, the crucial qualifications for university entry, indicating that policy interventions to increase uptake need to begin well before this to redress social inclusion and gender imbalance issues.

We quantify the returns to higher education for degree disciplines, namely 'professional' degrees, Medicine/Dentistry, Law, Accountancy and Psychology, within the UK from 2007 to 2015. We estimate the returns to education in the form of employment and wage premia associated with each subject. Our analysis contributes to the existing literature on the topic of horizontal mismatch by estimating the wage premia in different occupational settings and identifying the penalty associated with horizontal mismatch in each field, and relative to all other graduates. We identify how wage premia vary between employment outcomes when individuals with professional degrees are employed inside, as opposed to outside, their professional sector. A distinct difference in mismatch penalties between male and female graduates was found. Male mismatch penalties are isolated to law graduates, while female mismatch penalties appear, and persist within all fields across the duration of a female graduate's career.

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The aim of this paper will be to identify the factors determining the use of ‘non‐standard employment contracts’ or what we term ‘primary flexibility’. While ‘standard employment contracts’ relate to full‐time, permanent jobs, non‐standard employment contracts concern part‐time or temporary labour and combinations of the two. In the literature non‐standard employment contracts have been lumped together with other flexible working practices, (e.g. overtime or shiftwork), under the umbrella of ‘flexibility’ or the concept of the ‘flexible firm’, which may employ one or a number of labour supply adjustment mechanisms in response to product market demand volatility. ‘Working practices’ are arrangements appertaining to the organisation of the workforce within the pre‐established basic contractual boundaries of the job, (i.e. whether it is full or part‐time, permanent or temporary). Clearly, such an amalgam of non‐standard forms of employment and flexible working practices, an organisation's use of which carries the tag ‘flexible firm’, can be misleading. The flexible firm is held by some to be the antithesis of the internal labour market (ILM) form of employment structure, in which labour is a quasi‐fixed factor of production. However, flexible working practices obviously can, and do, operate within both ILM structures and non‐standard forms of employment. The concept of the flexible firm, therefore, requires tighter definition. We would define the flexible firm as one which embodies non‐standard employment contracts for the majority of its workers, or primary flexibility. (‘Primary’ because flexibility is built into the job contract rather than superimposed). The flexible firm, thus defined, is indeed the antithesis of an ILM structure. Flexible working practices or ‘secondary flexibility’, as noted above, may operate within a flexible firm or an ILM employment structure.