Pandemic anxiety and employment insecurity: how overeducation and precarious employment intensify fear of job loss in South Korea

The COVID-19 pandemic generated unprecedented labor market disruptions globally, yet limited attention has been paid to how overeducation and precarious employment shape workers’ psychological responses to economic shocks. This study investigates the differential impacts of overeducation and precarious employment on fear of job loss during the pandemic, examining the psychological pathways and workplace factors that mediate and moderate these relationships. Using nationally representative data from the Korean Labor and Income Panel Study (KLIPS) 24th wave, we employ binary probit regression, Fairlie non-linear decomposition, and mediation and moderation analyses. Our findings reveal that both overeducation and precarious employment significantly and positively affect fear of job loss through distinct psychological mechanisms. Decomposition analysis indicates that the fear of job loss differential between overeducated and adequately educated workers is attributable in approximately equal measure to observable compositional differences in labor market positions and to unobservable factors such as psychological mechanisms specific to educational mismatch per se. Mediation analysis identifies personal financial worry as the dominant transmission pathway, accounting for 68.5% of overeducation’s effect on fear of job loss, with national economic worry and anger providing supplementary channels. Moderation analysis demonstrates that job-related psychological factors, particularly career potential dissatisfaction, substantially buffer the anxiety-inducing effects of overeducation, as workers who have internalized pessimistic assessments of their advancement prospects undergo psychological adaptation that paradoxically attenuates the marginal contribution of credential mismatch to employment anxiety. Heterogeneity analysis reveals that overeducation effects are concentrated among men and older workers, while precarious employment effects are more pronounced among men and younger workers; neither effect reaches statistical significance in the manufacturing sector. These findings underscore the need for policies that address both structural labor-market mismatches and psychological support mechanisms, with particular attention to strengthening income support programs and providing career development opportunities for vulnerable workers.