CRIS Scientific Seminar 2023-2024

Friday, March 29th 2024, 11:30 am
Sciences Po, Room K008 (1, St-Thomas-d'Aquin)

Are occupations “bundles of skills”?
Identifying latent skill profiles in the labor market using topic modeling

Marie Labussière

Postdoctoral researcher
University of Amsterdam, Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences

Occupations are a central unit for understanding inequalities in the labor market. In the literature, it is often assumed that workers in different occupations obtain different labor market returns because they perform different skills and tasks. However, this premise that occupations form distinct bundles of skills has never been empirically tested.

In this study (co-authored with Thijs Bol), we use a unique dataset of millions of online job postings in the United Kingdom to map the skill structure of the labor market and analyze its relationship to existing occupational classifications.

While previous literature has often defined skills as unidimensional and independent factors, we conceptualize and operationalize the notion of "skill profile", which refers to the combination of general and specialized skills that workers are required to master for their jobs.
Using topic modeling on highly detailed job skill requirements, we identify the skill profiles of job postings and analyze the extent to which they vary within and between occupational categories.

Our results reveal both overlap in skill content between occupations and significant heterogeneity within occupations, even using the detailed 3-digit occupational classification. These findings challenge the often assumed role of occupations as distinct bundles of skills, and instead offer new perspectives for analyzing labor market stratification.

Open Seminar. Please register here to join us!