The rural pay penalty: youth earnings and social capital in Britain

Abstract

Young people in rural areas are under-researched, and there is a particular paucity of studies on rural youth in the labour market. This paper addresses that dearth. I pose the research question: how does rural location affect the earnings of young people in full-time employment in Britain? I consider the background of rural disadvantage, and its specific effects on young people and outline the relevance of social capital to this topic, identifying norms and networks as the two constituent elements of the concept. Using data from the British Household Panel Survey Wave 17 (2007/8), I find that rural youth are paid less than urban counterparts. When coupled with higher living costs, this amounts to a double disadvantage for rural youth. Concerning social capital, I find that norms Á in terms of trust in individuals, community and institutions Á exert a significant effect on net pay. Conversely, despite prior research positing the importance of informal contacts for rural jobseekers, networks do not exhibit any significant effect on wages. This corroborates accounts of social capital as a protean concept, illustrating how one facet alters the likelihood of finding work, while the other facet determines outcomes once in employment.

Job access after leaving education: a comparative analysis of young women and men in rural Germany

“…For the 15-19 and 20-24 age groups, the probability of flowing from student to employment is approximately 20-30 % and does not differ much between the two samples (national level and rural areas). In line with our findings, a study by Culliney (2014) identified no difference in the shares of rural and urban respondents (under age 25) who access part-or full-time jobs in Britain.…”

“…The results related to access to employment opportunities in rural and peri-urban locations do not provide a link between the residence of an individual and the occupation entered or the place of employment. Although there are few studies of rural youth employment prospects, previous literature has noted that rural youths are more dependent on temporary jobs and/or occupations without promotion opportunities (Hodge et al 2002;Midgley and Bradshaw 2006;Culliney 2014). Additionally, commuting between rural places of residence and urban places of employment is commonly observed among most European countries (Eliasson et al, 2003;Moss et al, 2004;Unay-Gailhard, and Baqueiro-Espinosa, 2015).…”

Beyond the prophecy success: how place attachment and future time perspective shape rural university students intentions of returning to small islands

“…Rural youths are paid less than their urban counterparts (Culliney, 2014), with young rural women earning less than young men (Corbett, 2007;Stockdale, 2004). Moreover, rural youths deal with a greater mismatch between low income and living costs, and with a labor market narrowing their professional alternatives to low-wages and precarious jobs (Culliney, 2014). In turn, well-paid jobs are anticipated in urban areas, further pressing the intention to leave the countryside (Theodori & Theodori, 2015).…”

Connectors, Horizon Stretchers, Outsiders: Youth Justice Practitioners in Rural England

“…Resonating with the descriptions of ‘unique rural barriers’ described above (Culliney, 2014; LGA and PHE, 2017; Milbourne, 2016; Milbourne and Kitchen, 2014; Wierenga, 2011), youth justice practitioners in Fordshire describe themselves as working in an environment in which the physical remoteness of the area, compounded by a lack of public transport infrastructure, was restricting access to services among young people. Descriptors including ‘isolated’, ‘desolate’, ‘barren’ and ‘vast’ recurred throughout practitioners’ accounts of the physical landscape of Fordshire, and interview participants described the need for both practitioners and young people to travel significant distances as part of living and working in the region.…”

“…Following on from this, as Farrugia (2016) demonstrates, the decline in the availability of basic services, amenities and economic opportunities in isolated rural areas has contributed to the production of a ‘mobility imperative’ for rural youth, necessitating significant travel to access education, employment and social services based in urban areas (LGA and PHE, 2017; Wierenga, 2011). Yet despite this ‘mobility imperative’, the means to undertake these journeys are often restricted (Milbourne and Kitchen, 2014), owing to the increasing sparsity, scarcity and cost of public transport in rural England (Culliney, 2014; LGA and PHE, 2017; Wierenga, 2011). Accordingly, increasing isolation of rural areas from education, employment and social services, compounded by the erosion of mobility resulting from cuts to public transport services, presents a second barrier facing rural youth.…”