Youth employment in rural Russia

On the rural labor market of Russia there is a significant imbalance between the demand for and supply of labor. Analyzing the factors of instability of employment of rural youth in Russia allows assess the potential for growth of the economic activeness of young people in rural areas. The objective of this study is to analyze the influence of the type of employment contract, employer's status and employment conditions on the stability of employment of rural youth aged 15-19 and 20-24 years. The information base of this study is the results of the Comprehensive monitoring of the living conditions of the population of Russia conducted by Rosstat in 2014 (Comprehensive monitoring of living conditions 2014). For the purposes of our study we made a subsample consisting of 1 017 young rural people. The study is carried out by analyzing the multivariate distributions of respondents' answers with the use of the software package SPSS 17.0. It is shown that men are more likely to be employed on the basis of fixed-term employment contracts or without official registration than women. Indefinite-term employment contracts are more often preferred by employers with the status of legal entities. Employers - individuals more often provide employment under fixed-term employment contracts or without any official registration. Our findings suggest that fixed-term employment contracts, and especially employment without official registration, cause higher shares of those who are employed not as hired workers working for payment, but rather as apprentices, trainees or interns. In addition, it is shown that young people working under fixed-term contracts or without official registration are far more often employed overtime (working more than 41 hours a week and also on official holidays and weekends). We also find that the degree of mismatch between the working duties and the specialty acquired is high, especially in the 20-24 age group. Our study empirically proves the existence of some elements of instability (vulnerability) of rural youth employment depending on the type of employment contract. Our findings indicate that the influence of the type of employment contract on the employment of rural youth is different for the age groups 15-19 and 20-24 years.