Female Labour Segregation in the Domestic Services in Italy

Elisa Barbiano di Belgiojoso () and Livia Elisa Ortensi ()
Additional contact information
Elisa Barbiano di Belgiojoso: University of Milan-Bicocca
Livia Elisa Ortensi: University of Milan-Bicocca

Journal of International Migration and Integration, 2015, vol. 16, issue 4, No 15, 1139 pages

Abstract: Abstract Third-country immigrants are over-represented among lower status workers in all EU countries and rarely achieve upward mobility. The present paper aims to analyse the migration trajectories of foreign-born women who entered the Italian labour market as domestic workers, in order to assess the role of personal and group characteristics in determining the chances of leaving this sector. The data were collected as part of a project studying the working trajectories of migrants in Italy. The survey was conducted during 2009 on 13,000 migrants aged 18 and over, living in Italy at the time of the interview and born in high emigration countries. We used a piecewise exponential model with random intercept for citizenship with time measured from the beginning of the person’s first domestic work in Italy. Our results show low exit rates from the domestic sector but we identify personal and group characteristics which facilitate exit from this segment of the labour market. Employment experience, including unskilled, has a positive effect on the transition in the host country, as do education achieved in the country of origin and higher levels of tasks and duties in the last job held in the country of origin, whereas ethnic networks limit access to other occupations. The aims of the women’s migration project include a strong emphasis on occupational mobility, whether they migrate for work or for family reasons. Finally, we find evidence of the existence of a “U-shaped” pattern in occupational mobility for this particular subpopulation of workers.

Keywords: Labour segregation; Domestic workers; Italy; Gender; Migration; Working trajectories (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s12134-014-0384-y Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:joimai:v:16:y:2015:i:4:d:10.1007_s12134-014-0384-y

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.springer ... tudies/journal/12134

DOI: 10.1007/s12134-014-0384-y

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of International Migration and Integration is currently edited by Lori Wilkinson

More articles in Journal of International Migration and Integration from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().