Armut und Erwerbslosigkeit hängen eng miteinander zusammen. Dort, wo viele Menschen ohne Arbeit sind, ist auch die Armut meistens hoch. Eine hohe Arbeitsmarktintegration mindert dagegen das Armutsrisiko. Doch in den letzten Jahren sind in der Schweiz die Phänomene erwerbsbezogener Armut, d. h. Working Poor und prekäre Beschäftigung, stärker ins Blickfeld des öffentlichen Interesses gerückt. In der Schweiz und auch in Basel ist deutlich spürbar, wie sich der Arbeitsmarkt weiter verändert : Durch den anhaltenden technologischen Fortschritt entfallen besonders in produktionsstarken Branchen immer mehr Arbeiten. Die Anforderungen an die Qualifikation von Arbeitnehmer /- innen steigen und wandeln sich schneller als früher.

Small world theories and modern communication facilities convey the impression of a connected world where geographical boundaries have lost their importance and where everyone can reach everyone else in just a few steps, overcoming large geographical distances apparently with ease. Most studies on network processes, like, for instance, the accumulation of (dis)advantage in network clusters, focus on topological factors only, ignoring geography, while work on network geography often does not attempt to explain the large variance in link distance. This article analyses the geography of everyday links of a young cohort in Switzerland, integrating several levels of analysis: individual characteristics (micro-level), extended ego networks (intermediate level), and functional regions (aggregate or macro level). Our results show that everyday links are very close, and, for our young sample, get larger with age. Residential mobility shows an effect limited in time. However, distance of links is not only a personal, but also a network characteristic; some individual characteristics only have an effect when cumulated at the network level. An analysis of cross-regional links showed that social links among young people in Switzerland are heavily segregated by language and structured along canton borders, but also determined by the type of region of residence. Thus, while it is crucial to take geography into account when analyzing real-world social networks, link distance alone is not sufficient to render the complexity of social ties.

We propose a method to decompose the young adult mortality hump by cause of death. This method is based on a flexible shape-decomposition of mortality rates that separates cause-of-death contributions to the hump from senescent mortality. We apply the method to US males and females from 1959 to 2010. Results show divergences between time trends of hump and observed deaths, both for all-cause and cause-specific mortality. The study of the hump shape reveals age, period and cohort effects, suggesting that it is formed by a complex combination of different forces of biological and socioeconomic nature. Male and female humps share some traits in all-cause shape and trend, but also differ by their overall magnitude and cause-specific contributions. Notably, among males the contributions of traffic and other accidents were progressively replaced by those of suicides, homicides and poisonings, whereas among females traffic accidents remained the major contributor to the hump.

En s’appuyant sur une recherche doctorale (encadré), ce chapitre souhaite explorer certains aspects du travail réalisé par des salarié-e-s qui appartiennent aux fractions les plus riches du salariat (Godechot 2007) : Comment travaille-t-on à la mise en ordre des activités économiques ? Comment faire le travail qui consiste notamment à supprimer celui des autres ? On reviendra tout d’abord le « réel » du travail de conseil en gestion, pour interroger le statut et la perception de certaines activités, relevant, aux yeux des consultants, du « sale boulot » et en particulier les interventions liées directement à la suppression du « boulot des autres ». Il s'agit ensuite de comprendre comment est construite l’invisibilité de ce sale boulot et ce qui aide à sa mise à distance.