The joint impact of microeconomic parameters and job insecurity perceptions on commitment towards one’s job,occupation and career: A multilevel approach

Abstract

This study investigates the relationship of microeconomic parameters and subjective job insecurity perceptions with vocational commitment, i.e. commitment towards one’s job, occupation and career in a sample of 236 individuals, nested in 47 German administrative districts. Applying a multilevel approach, job insecurity (quantitative and qualitative) and vocational commitment indicators (operationalized via job involvement, occupational commitment and career satisfaction) were measured at the individual level, whereas microeconomic parameters were collected at the level of administrative district. In addition to regional unemployment rates, we included two further economic parameters, namely change in gainful employment (i.e., change in a district’s number of gainful workers) and change in economic growth (i.e., change in a district’s GDP). It is worth noting that our findings only revealed spillover effects from economic parameters on qualitative (not quantitative) job insecurity on a bivariate level (not after considering controls in multilevel regressions). Cross-level interactions further indicated that environmental economic conditions are important for the relationship between subjective job insecurity perceptions and outcomes.