Professor Sergio Scicchitano’s Paper on Involuntary Part-Time Work Wins Award
Professor Sergio Scicchitano’s paper “Navigating the Precarious Path: Understanding the Dualisation of the Italian Labour Market Through the Lens of Involuntary Part-Time Employment” won the best paper at the 2024 UB|IREA Institute Annual Conference at the Universitat de Barcelona.
The paper, recently published in Papers in Regional Science, was co-authored with Liliana Cuccu and Vincente Royuela.
According to the authors, despite the optimistic figures of Italy’s record unemployment rate, many troubling trends persist: the number of hours worked is declining, the working-age population is shrinking, and part-time work, particularly involuntary part-time, is on the rise.
The study by Scicchitano, Cuccu, and Royuela sheds light on this issue, revealing that between 2004 and 2019, the share of part-time workers nearly tripled from 12% to 21%. Alarmingly, this growth is driven by involuntary part-time work—arrangements dictated by employers rather than employees. While voluntary part-time work has remained stable at 8%, involuntary part-time has surged to 13%, tripling over 15 years.
The Increasing Polarization of the Italian Job Market
The labor market in Italy is becoming increasingly polarized. On one end, skilled workers are securing better work-life balance through flexible schedules. Conversely, “poor work” is growing, encompassing those with insufficient hours and low pay. Many workers seek full-time employment but are restricted to part-time contracts, often working full-time hours off the books.
This trend disproportionately affects women, youth with low education, workers in the tertiary sector, and those in southern Italy. Among women, part-time employment accounts for 35% of contracts, compared to just 9% for men. Moreover, 21% of women are in involuntary part-time roles, three times the rate for men. In practical terms, six out of ten women with part-time contracts wish to work more hours.
Involuntary Part-time Work Undermines Women
This reliance on part-time work undermines women’s bargaining power in the labor market, further marginalizing their role in the workforce. For many women, securing adequate employment and wages is critical to achieving substantive, enforceable rights.
Paradoxically, while involuntary part-time work grows, voluntary part-time requests—where employees seek reduced hours for personal reasons—remain discouraged by employers, highlighting systemic inflexibility in addressing individual needs.
These trends underscore the dualism in Italy’s labor market, where gains in employment mask deep structural challenges, particularly for vulnerable groups like women and low-skilled workers.
Professor Sergio Scicchitano is Associate Professor of Economics and currently Chair of JCU’s Department of Economics. He teaches a broad range of courses including Microeconomics, Macroeconomics, Applied Economics, Econometrics, and Labor Economics. His research interests are applied economics, labor economics, evaluation of public policies, Covid-19 and labor markets, Sustainable Growth, National and International Income Distribution, Regional and Cohesion Policies, Gender Economics, Human Capital and Technology, Policy Evaluation, Future of Work, and Returns of Education.
