Introduction

There has evolved in Europe a popular rhetoric of winners and losers linked to the changing labour markets of the ‘new economy’ of Europe and the advanced capitalist economies. This chapter picks up this idea, already explored by Plug and du Bois-Reymond in Chapter Three. While it is commonly stated that major social and economic changes are under way, involving the advancement of some groups and the decline of others, there is little systematic empirical evidence concerning such changes. For example, two major chroniclers of such change, Richard Sennett (1998) and Ulrich Beck (2000), have spoken of the tide of insecurity and demoralisation resulting from ‘flexible capitalism’ and of the ‘Brazilianisation’ of European labour markets, with increasing numbers of people confined to temporary, insecure and subcontracted jobs, but they have provided little hard data in support of their claims.

This chapter explores the notion of winners and losers in relation to the changing labour market situation of young people. The major group who are ‘losing out’ are those totally excluded from the labour market, especially those labelled in Britain as ‘NEET’ (not in employment, education and training). But since unemployment and exclusion are explored elsewhere in this volume (see, for example, Chapters One, Four and Seven), another focus here is on difference and disadvantage among those who are within the labour market. How are young people being affected by flexibilisation and the end of a ‘job for life’? Are there common labour market disadvantages faced by all young people? Are the changes overturning fixed and persistent disadvantages of class, gender and ethnicity? In other words, this chapter poses the questions ‘On what terms are young people included in the labour market?’, and ‘Are the terms different for different groups?’.

To answer these questions, the chapter draws particularly on primary data from a study of young adults (aged 20-34) in one local labour market, that of Bristol, a service-based ‘post-industrial’ city in the south west of England. The Bristol survey provides data on different aspects of young adults’ labour market experience and various indicators of labour market success or failure.