Temporary Work in Turbulent Times: The Swedish Experience



The prevalence of fixed-term contracts is particularly visible among women, the young and
foreign-born residents, and especially among young women. The higher fixed-term contract
intensity of foreign-born residents is primarily to be found among the 25 to 44 year olds and is
double that of native Swedes. By the turn of the century, 18 percent of the female employees
were on fixed-term contracts, a figure to be compared with 13 percent for the male employees.
The trend rise in temporary work is striking for both men and women. Among young women
aged 16-24, close to 60 percent were in temporary work by the end of the century; the
corresponding share for young men was around 40 percent. There is a marked trend rise in
temporary work also among the young.

It is also worth noting that fixed-term contracts account for a much higher share of the total
flow of new hires than of the total stock of employment. Available data for the private sector
reveal that fixed-term contracts accounted for roughly 50 percent of all new hires in the late
1980s. By the late 1990s, they accounted for some 70 percent.5

3.2 Sector Distribution and Types of Fixed-Term Contracts

Temporary work has increased in every broad sector of the economy; see Table 3.1. Two sectors
stand out. Financial and Business services exhibit both the greatest increase in fixed-term
contract rate and share of all fixed-term contracts while Health and Care show the lowest growth
rates in both these figures. We note, however, that the Health and care sector still accounts for
one quarter of all fixed-term contracts in the labour market.

Labour law permits different forms of fixed-term contracts defined in terms of the
employer’s motivation to employ labour for a specified duration. Figure 3.3 shows the number

work accounted on average for 10.6 percent of the total number of employees during 1984-87.



More intriguing information

1. The Prohibition of the Proposed Springer-ProSiebenSat.1-Merger: How much Economics in German Merger Control?
2. Opciones de política económica en el Perú 2011-2015
3. Surveying the welfare state: challenges, policy development and causes of resilience
4. Orientation discrimination in WS 2
5. MICROWORLDS BASED ON LINEAR EQUATION SYSTEMS: A NEW APPROACH TO COMPLEX PROBLEM SOLVING AND EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
6. The name is absent
7. EU Preferential Partners in Search of New Policy Strategies for Agriculture: The Case of Citrus Sector in Trinidad and Tobago
8. Psychological Aspects of Market Crashes
9. Testing the Information Matrix Equality with Robust Estimators
10. The name is absent
11. Visual Artists Between Cultural Demand and Economic Subsistence. Empirical Findings From Berlin.
12. DISCUSSION: ASSESSING STRUCTURAL CHANGE IN THE DEMAND FOR FOOD COMMODITIES
13. Non Linear Contracting and Endogenous Buyer Power between Manufacturers and Retailers: Empirical Evidence on Food Retailing in France
14. Perfect Regular Equilibrium
15. Ventas callejeras y espacio público: efectos sobre el comercio de Bogotá
16. Importing Feminist Criticism
17. The name is absent
18. An Investigation of transience upon mothers of primary-aged children and their school
19. On the Integration of Digital Technologies into Mathematics Classrooms
20. News Not Noise: Socially Aware Information Filtering