1. Self-employment: independent ‘enterprise’, or precarious low- skilled work? The case of the UK Nigel Meager

2. Self-employment in the UK since the 1980s (three phases)

3.  more dynamic: increases since 1980s in transitions in and out of self-employment  growing share of the workforce experiences self- employment affects broader range of jobs/sectors, and broader range of people (youth, women) than before  self-employed have very polarised earnings distribution  self-employment increases chances of very low earnings (some evidence of long-term ‘scarring’ effect)  work histories with self-employment spells increase chances of poverty in old age (partly due to savings and pensions effects) What we learned about self-employment in the 1980s and 1990s

4.  Recent new research on job quality* using longitudinal UK survey data (1992-2012) shows: Controlling for differences in personal and work characteristics, self-employed have higher intrinsic job quality than employees on most indicators:  Task discretion  Variety at work  Skills match  Job satisfaction (but less satisfied with pay and job security)  Although they do work harder and have less training than employees The quality of self-employment on most of these indicators has deteriorated since 2006, but still remains higher than that of employees. But… also some more positive findings *Baumberg and Meager 2015 (in Felstead et al., Unequal Britain at Work, OUP)

5.  Post-2000, strong growth in UK self-employment Before and after the economic crisis  Grown by 1.3m in 15 years, from 11.8% to 15.0% of employed workforce, and still growing  Generated debate: Is it an entrepreneurial upsurge? Or is it (especially since crisis) precarious work driven by lack of alternative labour market opportunities? Or a bit of both? The recent development of self- employment

6. Self-employment rates 2014 (EU): 15-64 year olds source: Eurostat

7. Change in self-employment 2000-15 (EU): all ages source: Eurostat

8. Unemployment and self-employment since 2000

9. The role of self-employment following the economic crisis  UK labour market has behaved very differently in the latest recession  In particular employment fell much less than we might have expected, given the massive fall in GDP partly because employers retained labour more than in previous recessions (with hours reductions) partly because workers accepted falling real wages (and unions were weaker) partly because of much more extensive active labour market policies but partly because there was a shift to self- employment………

10. Sources of employment growth in economic recovery since 2009

11. Self-employment by gender and working time: change 2008-15

12. Self-employment by occupation: change 2008-15

13. Self-employment by sector: change 2008-15

14.  Recent crisis has given further impetus to the growth of self- employment, particularly: among women in short-hours jobs (‘mini-jobs’) in lower level occupations in service sectors and non-traditional sectors earning less (between 2007-12 median self-employed earnings fell by 20%, compared with 6% fall for employees)  Although most self-employed are still skilled trades-people, managers or professionals working long hours: the crisis has added a wider variety of people from different backgrounds, picking up small bits of work, because they can’t find work as an employee the profile of self-employment is changing what we are seeing is not simply an entrepreneurial upsurge, but is also likely to be a more negative response to the crisis Some conclusions (1)

15.  This kind of growth in self-employment may reinforce many of the negative potential features of self- employment noted in previous literature: low and insecure incomes poor social security and pension coverage low levels of training/human capital development  And the job quality data shows a deterioration in self- employed job quality since the crisis (but still better on most indicators than employees)  Little real recognition of these problems in the policy debate in the UK emphasises the promotion of entrepreneurship and SMEs, and the encouragement of self-employment as a valid alternative for the unemployed Some conclusions (2)

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