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Schedule Unpredictability and High-Cost Debt: The Case of Service Workers

Mariana Amorim, Daniel Schneider

Sociological Science April 4, 2022
10.15195/v9.a5


High-cost financial services allow economically insecure families to make ends meet but often contribute to additional financial strain in the long run. This study uses novel data from the Shift Project to describe the link between schedule unpredictability and high-cost debt (i.e., payday loans, pawnshop loans, auto-title loans, overdrafts, and problematic credit card debt) among service workers. First, it compares the relative magnitude of the associations between high-cost debt, schedule unpredictability, and levels of income. Second, it investigates whether income volatility mediates the relationship between schedule unpredictability and high-cost debt. Finally, it describes whether the link between schedule unpredictability and high-cost debt varies by institutional and policy contexts. Results indicate that schedule unpredictability is a substantively meaningful, independent, and understudied dimension of inequality in financial outcomes.
Creative Commons LicenseThis work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Mariana Amorim: Department of Sociology, Washington State University
E-mail: mariana.amorim@wsu.edu

Daniel Schneider: Department of Sociology, Harvard Kennedy School, Harvard University
E-mail: dschneider@hks.harvard.edu

Acknowledgments: We gratefully acknowledge support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (grant INV-002665), the RobertWood Johnson Foundation (award 74528), and theW. T. Grant Foundation (grant 188043). The findings and conclusions contained within are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect positions or policies of these foundations. We also thank Timothy Flake for his feedback on corporate programs addressing financial well-being, Megan Bea for the suggestion to use the State-Mandated Education Database, and Evelyn Bellew and Annette Gailliot for research assistance.

  • Citation: Amorim, Mariana, and Daniel Schneider. 2022. “Schedule Unpredictability and High-Cost Debt: The Case of Service Workers.” Sociological Science 9:102-135.
  • Received: November 10, 2021
  • Accepted: January 17, 2022
  • Editors: Jesper Sørensen, Cristobal Young
  • DOI: 10.15195/v9.a5


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