The Bulgarian educational system and gender segregation in the labour market

authored by: Franziska Bieri, Christian Imdorf, Rumiana Stoilova, Pepka Boyadjieva
Abstract: School-to-work transitions are embedded in the institutional structures of educational systems. In particular, vocational education has been linked to greater horizontal gender segregation in employment. Similarly, research on higher education has uncovered how stratification at the tertiary level can promote gender segregation in the labour market. This paper investigates how gender typical employment is conditioned by the institutional features of the educational system in Bulgaria. Despite the post-socialist transformations of Bulgaria's educational system and its labour market, horizontal gender segregation has remained rather moderate from an international perspective. We use data from a 2012 nationally representative survey. We find that the educational system shapes the gendered occupational trajectories for men but it does not hold the same explanatory power for women. Neither vocational nor higher education has a significant effect for women. In contrast, men with vocational education are more likely to work in male-typed occupations and, in line with the literature, higher education steers men toward gender mixed and a-typical occupations. Our study points to the importance of educational institutional factors in shaping gender (a)-typical career paths. The Bulgarian case, in particular, offers insights into the mechanisms that can potentially decrease horizontal gender segregation in the labour market.
External Organisation(s): University of Basel
University of Bern
Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (BAS)
Type: Article
Journal: European societies
Volume: 18
Pages: 158-179
No. of pages: 22
ISSN: 1461-6696
Publication date: 14.03.2016
Publication status: Published
Peer reviewed: Yes
ASJC Scopus subject areas: Demography, Geography, Planning and Development
Sustainable Development Goals: SDG 5 - Gender Equality
Electronic version(s): https://doi.org/10.1080/14616696.2016.1141305 (Access: Closed)