Consequences of job mismatch : empirical evidence from South Korean labor market

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

This study explores the effects of education-job mismatch, skill-job mismatch, and
major-job mismatch on job satisfaction as well as on turnover intention. Moreover, special
attention is paid to differences in the labor effects of job mismatches among junior college
graduates, university graduates, and postgraduates who are currently enrolled, completed, or
graduated from a master's or Ph.D. programs.
The data used is based on 2014 Graduates' Occupational Mobility Survey
(2014GOMS1). Furthermore, the samples are restricted to following categories: employees
aged 25-34, graduates from tertiary education, and wage workers currently employed.
Major findings from the empirical results are as follows; 1) under-education and skill
deficit have significantly positive impacts on job satisfaction but do not have any significant
influences on turnover intention; 2) over-education and skill surplus have significantly negative
effects on job satisfaction and positive effects on turnover intention; 3) employees who
experience job mismatches with respect to the field of education are less likely to be satisfied
with their jobs and do not have significant relationship with turnover intention.
Furthermore, although the labor market effects of job mismatches do not vary much
according to educational levels; there are two different outcomes. These are 4) under-education
does not have significant impact on job satisfaction in the case of postgraduates; and 5) with
respect to turnover intention, it has been found that postgraduates from master’s or doctorate
programs tend to be more influenced by skill-job mismatch, while university graduates tend to
be more affected by education-job mismatch.
Likewise, the degree of influence of education, skill, and major mismatches on job
satisfaction and turnover intention is different. Therefore, public policy formulations would
need to consider not only education-job mismatch, but also skill-job and major-job mismatches,
when dealing with the issue of job mismatches. Consequently, it would be proposed that
Korean education and labor policy measures that aim to close the huge mismatch gap between
their tertiary education outcomes and industry needs should consider these three distinct types
of job mismatches simultaneously in order to align both fields better.