Transition from school to work in transition economies

Abstract

This paper explores school-to-work transitions in three new EU Member states, Hungary, Slovenia and Estonia, focusing on the effect of the level of education and social background on the timing of the first significant employment and the match between educational qualifications and occupation among school leavers. So-called cohort effects are a focal point as well, since transition process and outcomes seem to be largely influenced by the dynamics of economic and social changes in the transition economies. To explore the early career developments of job entrants in the three transition countries during the 1990s, the study utilizes the European Union Labour Force Survey ad hoc module on school-to-work transitions, which has been launched in Hungary, Slovenia in 2000 and in Estonia in 2002. Event history methods are applied to explore transition to first significant employment, while the match of educational qualification and occupational attainment is modelled using multinomial logistic regression techniques. © 2005 Taylor & Francis Group Ltd.