The relationship between work experience and well-being among Mexican-origin youths
Description
This research explores the relationships between work experience and self-esteem, delinquency, educational attainment, and future income among youths of Mexican descent. Social scientists have addressed the concern that teenage work experience might undermine the emotional well-being of adolescents as well as their investment in education. Despite what appears to be a propensity for early labor market participation among adolescents of Mexican-origin, investigators have focused little attention on the effects of employment vis-a-vis this segment of the population. But the question remains an important one in light of demographic projections for population growth among Hispanics, the majority of whom claim Mexican ancestry, as well as their relatively low rate of high school completion. Using multivariate regression techniques and data from two distinct national surveys, I find that for U.S.-born youths of Mexican descent early work experience lowers self-esteem, increases delinquency, stymies educational attainment, but increases income gains over the long-run. In contrast, among Mexican immigrant adolescents, employment increases self-esteem, reduces delinquency, and enhances high school completion as well as future earnings. That outcomes for the former group more closely resemble those for non-Hispanic White adolescents than Mexican immigrants, suggests that U.S.-born youths of Mexican descent may suffer adverse effects from assimilation processes that Mexican culture appears to nullify