This is a proposal to examine the impact of major technological and market structure changes on individual occupational and firm mobility opportunities. It will be carried out through comparative analysis of both individual- level and society-level data from the United States, Germany, Sweden, and the Netherlands. At the individual level, longitudinal data extending over approximately a decade will be examined using a discrete-time logit model. The links between the major changes occurring in the structure of economies as America and other countries enter the post-industrial era and the livelihoods and career opportunities of individuals are still insufficiently understood. This project will help us understand these links at both a conceptual and empirical level through an extremely sophisticated examination of how the nature of the labor market, welfare state provisions, and other features of the four countries studied affect how societal changes reverberate into individual work lives and career opportunities. The results of this project have important potential policy significance as well through their bearing on individual welfare and national economic competitiveness.
