ABSTRACT
Essential to the notion of the dual labour market is the assumption that the labour market is segmented into a number of structures ... Primary sector jobs have relatively high earnings, good fringe benefits, good working conditions, a high degree of job security and good opportunities for advancement, while secondary jobs have relatively low earnings levels, poor working conditions, negligible opportunities for advancement and a low degree of job security ... The difference between the opportunities for advancement offered by jobs in the primary sector and those in the secondary sector is usually related to the existence of structured internal labour markets to which primary jobs are attached. A highly structured internal labour
37 ‘In explaining the characteristic features of women’s position in the labour force in terms of characteristics of women themselves, the common sense explanations are all individualistic forms of explanation ... They explain the position of women in the organisational structure in terms of assertions about women’s nature, or capabilities or temperament, rather than social structures. Individualistic explanations very often implicitly or explicitly involve biologically determinist claims, that is, claims that women’s capabilities are determined by their biological attributes.’ Beechey, V, ‘Women’s employment in contemporary Britain’, in Beechey, V and Whitegg, E (eds), Women in Britain Today, 1986, Milton Keynes: OU Press,
market contains a set of jobs organised hierarchically in terms of skill level and rewards, where recruitment to higher positions in the hierarchy is predominantly from lower positions in the same hierarchy and not from the external labour market. Only the lowest’s positions in the firm’s job hierarchy are not filled from within the organisation by promotion. Secondary jobs, on the other hand, are not part of a structured internal market; recruits to these jobs tend to come from outside the organisation ... Furthermore, because of the low skill requirement for most secondary jobs, training is non-existent or minimal, so that secondary workers rarely acquire skills which they can use to advance their status on the open market ...
