Over-Qualification and the Dimensions of Job Satisfaction
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Over‑Qualification and the Dimensions of Job Satisfaction Inmaculada García‑Mainar1 · Víctor M. Montuenga‑Gómez1 Accepted: 25 July 2019 © Springer Nature B.V. 2019
Abstract The spread of over-qualification is a consequence of individuals having acquired more credentials than required at the workplace. In some cases, it may be that this mismatch plays a role in allowing workers to compensate for the lack of some other skills, to escape from unemployment, or to achieve job stability in the labour market. Consequently, workers may feel no less satisfied, at least in some aspects, than adequately-matched workers. The aim of this paper is to analyse the relationship between over-qualification and the various dimensions of job satisfaction in Spain, a country characterised by a strongly-segmented labour market with high unemployment levels, and a significant number of mismatched employees. Using micro data for a representative sample of Spanish workers, we carry out simultaneous maximum likelihood estimations on a two-equation system to control for potential endogeneity. The results obtained provide evidence that does not reject the hypothesis that mismatched workers do not necessarily feel less satisfied than adequately-matched workers in the dimensions of job satisfaction related to extrinsic domains or social relations. Keywords Over-qualification · Job satisfaction · Simulated maximum likelihood estimation · Spain JEL Classification D82 · I26 · J24 · J28 · J62
1 Introduction The study of the phenomenon of over-qualification, a general concept encompassing overeducation, over-experience, and skill under-utilisation, and its impact on labour market outcomes, is attracting interest in various fields of the research agenda. An extensive literature in economics, organizational psychology, and management systematically finds that overqualification is negatively related to diverse indicators of job attitudes, such as job satisfaction. According to this, firms would prefer to hire adequately-qualified job applicants, since dissatisfaction in the workplace is associated with absenteeism, voluntary turnover, and/or lower productivity (Khan and Morrow 1991; Tsang et al. 1991; Bolino and Feldman 2000;
* Víctor M. Montuenga‑Gómez [email protected] 1
Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Zaragoza, Gran Vía 2, 50005 Zaragoza, Spain
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Johnson and Johnson 2000; Johnson et al. 2002; Feldman et al. 2002; Verhaest and Omey 2006, 2009). However, several studies show that there are advantages to hiring employees who selfperceive that they are over-qualified. Holton et al. (2002), Fine and Nevo (2008), and Erdogan and Bauer (2009), although finding a negative relationship between perceived over-qualification and job satisfaction, provide convincing evidence of over-qualification being positively related to certain indicators of job performance. It is argued that the over-qualified may bring valuable skills to an organization (Erdogan et al. 2011a). As
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