On October 30th, 2024, the Shift Project community gathered to learn about Kristen Harknett & Lizzy Kuhlman’s research on precarious work and relationships.
Guest Speaker
Kristen Harknett is a Professor of Sociology at the University of California, San Francisco and co-Director of the Shift Project. Her research interests focus on how job conditions, policies, and social supports influence health and well-being.
Lizzy Kuhlman is a pre-doctoral fellow with the Shift Project at Harvard’s Kennedy School.
Kristen and Lizzy presented their research, titled “Predictably Unstable?: Precarious Work and Precarious Relationships in the U.S.” Drawing on panel data from The Shift Project, they show that unpredictable work schedules have a destabilizing effect on marital and cohabiting partnerships.
Paper Abstract
Employment and earnings are well-established predictors of relationship dissolution, with many studies demonstrating that men’s employment and earnings stabilize relationships and debating whether women’s employment and earnings have a stabilizing or destabilizing effect. What has gone missing and untested in this research and debate is the role of other job attributes that have profound effects on the rhythm of life, namely the predictability and consistency in the number and timing of work shifts. In this paper, we draw on panel data from The Shift Project to examine whether work schedules that are volatile and unpredictable have a destabilizing effect on marital and cohabiting partnerships. Drawing on cross-sectional (n=77,607) and longitudinal survey data (n=4,923) from The Shift Project collected between 2019 and 2022, we provide evidence that shift workers who are subject to unstable and unpredictable work schedules are at higher risk for relationship dissolution. Our results suggest that the demands of contemporary low-wage work, predicated on the ideal worker norm, are at odds with the maintenance and stability of marital and cohabiting unions.
