Youth, Work, and Inequality in Credentialed Societies

Recent cohorts of young people in wealthy countries are navigating a reconfigured nexus of two of the most important social structures, that is, the education system and the labor market. On one hand, the credentialization of youth has continued apace in recent decades, with the volume of qualifications issued by education systems steadily expanding. On the other hand, the labor market structures that young people navigate are increasingly shaky amid the decline of stable, full-time, and middle-class employment opportunities and careers. In this chapter, I explore the role educational qualifications play in the production of inequality in this new education system-labor market configuration. I highlight how education and training systems increasingly operate as stratified and highly diversified markets in certified cultural capital. I discuss the loosening of the qualification-job coupling, as well as the resources and processes that explain young people’s unequal chances of converting their credentials into valued paid work. I conclude by highlighting how renewed interest in the articulation of qualification-job inequalities must be contextualized within broader shifts in opportunity structures for young people.