This study examines the employment and earnings trajectories of immigrant men and women relative to the employment and earnings of native men and women in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area in 2006–2017. The study also sheds light on the role workplaces and mobility between workplaces have in immigrants’ relative earnings development. This earnings development may take place within workplaces and through changing workplaces. The empirical examinations of this study were based on individual-level longitudinal data where the same individuals and their labour market outcomes can be followed over time. This data was provided by Statistics Finland. The immigrants under study are foreign-born persons of foreign origin who lived in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area, migrated to Finland in 2006–2016, were 18–60-years old at arrival and lived in Finland continuously. Those immigrants who began studies towards a qualification immediately after arriving to Finland are not included in the sample. About two thirds of the immigrant men in this sample found their first job by the end of their first full year since arrival. Among the immigrant women, the corresponding share was notably smaller, about two fifths. Finding a job was more common among men than women also in the later years since arrival under study. About five immigrant men out of six and two thirds of immigrant women found their first job by the end of their fifth full year since arrival. Immigrants’ employment and earnings growth relative to that of natives in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area was examined among 25–60-year-olds. Examinations of relative earnings growth involved only the employed. According to the results, the employment and earnings of immigrant men and women were lower than those of native men and women in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area throughout the observed twelve years since arrival. The employment and earnings of immigrant men and women did catch up, however, to the employment and earnings of native men and women over time. This relative growth was not continuous though, and the observed pattern was different among men and women. The employment and earnings growth of immigrant men relative to native men occurred predominantly during the first years since arrival. The employment gap between immigrant and native men decreased until the end of the sixth full year since arrival. In a similar fashion, the relative difference in earnings between employed immigrant and native men narrowed until the end of the fifth full year since arrival. In the later observed years since arrival, neither the employment nor the earnings gap between immigrant and native men closed that much further. The employment gap between immigrant and native women narrowed over all the observed years since arrival. The decrease in the relative difference between the earnings of employed immigrant and native women was not similarly continuous: Except for the large decrease in this gap from the arrival year to the subsequent year, the earnings gap between employed immigrant and native women began to narrow only after the fourth full year since arrival. The earnings growth of employed immigrant men and women relative to employed natives described above took place mostly within workplaces. Mobility between workplaces did not contribute in a substantial way to immigrants’ relative earnings growth. Mobility between different types of workplaces did not contribute to relative earnings growth at all. Mobility between similar workplaces was relevant mainly among men, and only in terms of affecting the annual rate of relative earnings growth in some early years since arrival. However, neither type of mobility between workplaces contrib-
Maahanmuuttajien työllisyys- ja tulokehitys pääkaupunkiseudulla
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