Comparing Labour Market among Spain, Italy, Argentina and Chile

The chapter, elaborated in the context of the INCASI European project, deals with the issue of social and employment inequalities seen from the dynamics of labour market segmentation. The study uses a specific analytical model to identify a range of segments that differentiate the employment positions hierarchically, in correspondence with the individual characteristics and professional profiles. The transnational comparison between two European countries and two in Latin America, which share the belonging to the Southern part of the world, allowed us to demonstrate that there are unexpected similarities between the contexts considered, both in the trends and in the configuration of the occupational segmentation. Despite significant differences in both socio-economic contexts and institutional regulation of labour, the structure of inequalities is reproduced through its intrinsic logic, functional to the needs of global capitalism.