De la Flor, L. (2018). La importancia de las prácticas preprofesionales en la transición al empleo. Un estudio en las ciudades capitales del Perú. Lima: GRADE. Avance de Invetigación, 33.

Professional unemployment and underemployment are problems that affect thousands of Peruvians. Their incidence is generally attributed to a mismatch between labor demand and supply. University education does not guarantee a job appropriate to the academic level obtained. Pre-professional internships are a low-cost, high-impact intervention to attack this problem. Far from being a government intervention, many Peruvian universities have taken matters into their own hands and have introduced pre-professional internships as part of their curriculum.

This paper contributes to the literature on transition to employment by estimating the causal effect of internships on employment outcomes. The objective of this text is to understand how much internships influence employment outcomes once students have graduated. To this end, the incidence and intensity of internships are assessed. In addition, the mechanisms by which pre-professional internships impact these outcomes are explored.

Using the instrumental variables method, it is found that practicing an additional month increases by 2% the probability of working in a job related to the career studied, raises the salary by 4% and reduces the probability of working in an informal job also by 4%. One of the mechanisms through which pre-professional internships operate is that of the first job. Internships work, in part, because they increase the probability that students will have access to a better first job, which, in turn, translates into better employment outcomes in future jobs.