ABSTRACT
One of the most important aspects of everyday life is that related to paid work. Such work contributes much more than money to a person’s existence. For example, the type of job held by an individual has often been taken in social science as an indicator of overall well-being. In other words, the holding of a certain job or position can contribute significantly to the definition of ‘self’ and to the way in which the community at large treats an individual. For this reason, and because of basic economic factors, jobs and work are topics well worthy of study by human geographers. This is particularly the case at a time of rapid economic change when alterations in both the nature and availability of work are having profound effects on the lives of many people throughout the world. In order to appreciate the importance of jobs and work, it is essential to appreciate the nature of contemporary economic change because the economic behaviour of individual actors is ultimately very dependent on the context in which they find themselves operating.
