Changing employment structures (Cambridge (CIE) IGCSE Geography): Revision Note

Changing employment structure

• Employment structures change as economies develop

  • The primary sector dominates in the pre-industrial  period, while the secondary and tertiary sectors steadily grow

  • This structure is generally found in low-income countries (LICs), as they have low-cost production and low-skilled jobs

    • As economies grow, the reliance on the primary sector for jobs begins to decline

    • LICs such as Ethiopia, Afghanistan and Madagascar are in this stage

  • During the industrial phase, employment in the secondary sector increases as manufacturing shifts from high-income countries (HICs) to emerging, low-cost economies

  • This is known as the global industrial shift

    • The primary sector continues to decrease and the tertiary sector increases

    • Medium-income countries (MICs) such as China and India have moved into this stage

  • In the post-industrial phase, the tertiary and quaternary sectors increase whilst the secondary and primary sectors decrease

    • The tertiary sector dominates employment and GDP in the post-industrial period

    • High-income countries such as Germany, Australia and the USA are in this stage

• As an economy advances, the proportion of people employed in each sector changes

• Places like the UK and the USA are ‘post-industrial societies’, where most work in the tertiary or quaternary sectors

• Places such as China and India are ‘industrial societies’, where many people work in the secondary sector

• Bolivia and Mozambique are ‘pre-industrial societies’, where most people work in the primary sector

• The Clark Fisher Sector Model above illustrates these trends, as do the examples below:

Causes of changes over time

• There are several reasons for the change in percentages employed in each sector:

  • Increasing mechanisation in agriculture leads to a decrease in the number of jobs available

  • People moving to urban areas to find jobs in secondary and tertiary sectors

  • Increasing mechanisation and global changes then lead to a decrease in secondary employment in some countries  - this is known as deindustrialisation

  • Technological improvements lead to an increase in tertiary and quaternary employment

  • International corporations often set up factories in LICs where land and labour costs are lower