Human capital, matching and job satisfaction

Abstract

Using a model of wage determination developed by Stevens (2003) we offer an explanation of why tenure has a negative effect when entered in job satisfaction equations. If job satisfaction measures match quality, then the explanation follows from a model of the labour market in which workers accumulate specific human capital at the firm they work and the way in which this accumulation affects the way workers react to outside job opportunities.

Four Dimensions of Quality in Australian Jobs

“…The indirect approach measures job quality through a proxy, such as overall job satisfaction or satisfaction with components of work, which is likely to reflect workers’ perceptions of job conditions (e.g. Barmby et al , 2012; Buddelmeyer et al , 2015; Ferreira & Taylor, 2011; Kifle et al , 2014). Job satisfaction is an easy‐to‐use measure that is correlated with many aspects of job quality, but it is a distinct measure and may capture other aspects of a person’s work situation.…”

Four Dimensions of Quality in Australian Jobs

“…The indirect approach measures job quality through a proxy, such as overall job satisfaction or satisfaction with components of work, which is likely to reflect workers' perceptions of job conditions (e.g. Barmby et al, 2012;Buddelmeyer et al, 2015;Ferreira & Taylor, 2011;Kifle et al, 2014). Job satisfaction is an easy-to-use measure that is correlated with many aspects of job quality, but it is a distinct measure and may capture other aspects of a person's work situation.…”

Volunteering, Match Quality, and Internet Use

“…However, job satisfaction, while having the advantage that it also captures nonpecuniary rewards, is only an indirect measure of match quality, even though job satisfaction and match quality should exhibit a stronger positive correlation than match quality and wages (Gielen 2013). Moreover, job satisfaction often can be measured along several different dimensions, giving rise to the question of how to condense these information into a single and comprehensive measure of match quality (Barmby et al 2012; but see also, Ferreira and Taylor 2011).…”

“…On the other hand, job-specific human capital lowers the incentive to search for another volunteer position within the GRC or in another volunteer organization. In the terminology of labour economics, a long-serving volunteer who has accumulated much job-specific human capital will reject "outside offers" even if match quality is low (see Barmby et al 2012, and the references cited therein).…”