The Effect of Teenage Employment on Character Skills, Expectations and Occupational Choice Strategies

Abstract

A growing body of research suggests that, even after controlling for cognitive abilities, personality predicts economic success in later life. The learning environment at school focuses on knowledge and cognitive skills. The transmission of character skills, however, is not at the center of attention. Leisure activities as informal learning activities outside of school may affect the formation of skills. By providing valuable opportunities, working part-time while attending full-time secondary schooling can be seen as a stepping stone toward independence and adulthood. The channel of the positive influence, however has not been identifed empirically. I suggest that employment during adolescence promotes the formation of character skills that are known to have a positive effect on labor market outcomes and educational achievement. Employing a flexible strategy combining propensity score matching and regression techniques to account for self-selection, I find beneficial effects on character skills. Further, it improves future expectations, the knowledge on which skills and talents school students have and reduces the importance of parents' advice with respect to their child's future career. The results are robust to several model specifications and varying samples and robust to including family-fixed effects.