On gender-specific socio-demographic determinants of the transition from school to work : a longitudinal analysis based on French data

This paper looks at the professional and family history of young people who definitively left school in 1998 and were surveyed three years later, in 2001. Using original data from a survey called “Generation 98” conducted by the French Ministry of Education and Labor we built a longitudinal database to estimate the probability of getting a job (short term contract or unlimited duration contract) at three points in time, separately for each gender. Our econometric framework relies on the specification of three types of panel data modelling, derived from a Probit model with random effects. Our findings show that the transition to a stable job depends heavily on the decision to leave the parental home, this being true for both men and women. More heterogeneous types of behavior are observed among men as far as getting a short term contract (henceforth called CDD) is concerned. As a result, young women do not seem to have much flexibility when trying to combine the double constraint of family and active life. Moreover, the birth of children has a negative and durable effect on the probability that women get a stable job.