Informal Search and Job Opportunities among Secondary-school Leavers in Hungary*

This paper addresses two questions: (1) Do informal job searchers find good jobs in Hungary? (2) Do social resources theory and the theory of employee referrals explain the conditions under which informal job searchers find good jobs? The questions are examined using a rather unique dataset which was collected among people who completed secondary vocational education in 1998. It is found that the use of informal methods in itself rarely promotes one’s chances of finding a good job. Rather, good jobs can be accessed through either high status contacts or employee referrals. These findings are consistent with both social resources theory and the theory of employee referrals.