Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Introduction
- 2 The Changing Economic Base of Cities
- 3 Advanced Producer Services and Labour Demand
- 4 Foreign direct Investment and Immigration
- 5 Immigration and Unemployment
- 6 Conclusions and Discussion
- Epilogue: The 2008 Financial Crisis and its Aftermath
- Appendix A Polarization and Professionalization Studies
- Appendix B Data & Operationalization
- Appendix C Employment shares in manufacturing for each metropolitan area 1995-2007
- Appendix D Robustness Checks
- Literature
- Index
3 - Advanced Producer Services and Labour Demand
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 February 2021
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Introduction
- 2 The Changing Economic Base of Cities
- 3 Advanced Producer Services and Labour Demand
- 4 Foreign direct Investment and Immigration
- 5 Immigration and Unemployment
- 6 Conclusions and Discussion
- Epilogue: The 2008 Financial Crisis and its Aftermath
- Appendix A Polarization and Professionalization Studies
- Appendix B Data & Operationalization
- Appendix C Employment shares in manufacturing for each metropolitan area 1995-2007
- Appendix D Robustness Checks
- Literature
- Index
Summary
The structure of economic activity has brought about changes in the organization of work that are reflected in a pronounced shift in the job-supply, with strong polarization occurring in the (…) occupational distribution of workers (Sassen, 2006a: 197).
Sassen's thesis of growing social polarisation in global cities is flawed [because] it fails to engage adequately with existing work on social change, and the evidence of large-scale professionalisation in the occupational
structure of Western societies and many global cities (Hamnett, 1994a: 422). Studies of the city traditionally posit a division between a city's economy and its culture, with culture subordinate in explanatory power to ‘work’ (Clark et al., 2003: 291).
Introduction
This chapter aims to assess the empirical validity of two competing theories in the global city debate on urban labour demand: the polarization and professionalization theses. The former essentially argues that the clustering of advanced producer services leads to an hourglass-shaped urban occupational hierarchy, with a high demand for labour for both the highest and lowest occupational strata. Consequently, this thesis predicts that in cities with the highest employment shares in the advanced producer services, the occupational hierarchy will be the most strongly polarized; and these cities will thus have the smallest mismatch between labour demand and supply at the bottom of the labour market.
The professionalization thesis, on the other hand, argues that the clustering of advanced producer services leads to high labour demand for the highest occupational stratum and low labour demand for the lowest. In terms of the former outcome, the polarization and professionalization theses do not, therefore, differ. However, the crucial difference between them is that professionalization theory predicts that cities with the greatest share of employment in the advanced producer services have to cope with the largest, instead of the smallest, mismatch between labour demand and supply at the bottom of the labour market.
Section 3.2 will elaborate on the theoretical arguments of the polarization and professionalization theses, while Section 3.3 will assess their empirical validity when it comes to explaining the labour demand for less-educated urbanites.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Global City Debate ReconsideredEconomic Globalization in Contemporary Dutch Cities, pp. 45 - 72Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2015