Publication: How Did the COVID-19 Crisis Affect Different Types of Workers in the Developing World?
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Date
2021-08
ISSN
Published
2021-08
Author(s)
Kugler, Maurice
Viollaz, Mariana
Duque, Daniel
Newhouse, David
Palacios-Lopez, Amparo
Weber, Michael
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Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic is the worst global macroeconomic shock since the Great Depression. This brief reports which groups of workers have been hit hardest by the economic fallout of COVID-19 in developing countries. Larger shares of female, young, less educated, and urban workers stopped working, with gender differences being particularly pronounced. Gender gaps in work stoppage stemmed mainly from differences within sectors rather than differential employment patterns across sectors. Among those that remained employed, changes in sector of employment and employment type were similar for all groups except for age, where young workers saw a slightly larger decline in industrial employment. Employment increased between April and October, with larger gains for the groups with larger initial job losses, but for most groups these gains fell far short of pre pandemic employment levels. Finally, evidence from five countries suggests that phone surveys give a generally accurate picture of group disparities in employment rates following the onset of the crisis and are proving to be a valuable tool for monitoring differential impacts of the crisis on workers
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“Kugler, Maurice; Viollaz, Mariana; Duque, Daniel; Gaddis, Isis; Newhouse, David; Palacios-Lopez, Amparo; Weber, Michael. 2021. How Did the COVID-19 Crisis Affect Different Types of Workers in the Developing World?. Jobs Watch COVID-19;. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/36168 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
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Publication How Did the COVID-19 Crisis Affect Different Types of Workers in the Developing World?(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-07)This paper investigates the impacts of the economic shock caused by the COVID-19 pandemic on the employment of different types of workers in developing countries. Employment outcomes are taken from a set of high-frequency phone surveys conducted by the World Bank and National Statistics Offices in 40 countries. Larger shares of female, young, less educated, and urban workers stopped working. Gender gaps in work stoppage were particularly pronounced and stemmed mainly from differences within sectors rather than differential employment patterns across sectors. Differences in work stoppage between urban and rural workers were markedly smaller than those across gender, age, and education groups. Preliminary results from 10 countries suggest that following the initial shock at the start of the pandemic, employment rates partially recovered between April and August, with greater gains for those groups that had borne the brunt of the early jobs losses. Although the high-frequency phone surveys greatly over-represent household heads and therefore overestimate employment rates, case studies in five countries suggest that they provide a reasonably accurate measure of disparities in employment levels by gender, education, and urban or rural location following the onset of the crisis, although they perform less well in capturing disparities between age groups. These results shed new light on the labor market consequences of the COVID-19 crisis in developing countries, and suggest that real-time phone surveys, despite their lack of representativeness, are a valuable source of information to measure differential employment impacts across groups during a crisis.Publication How Did the COVID-19 Crisis Affect Different Types of Workers in the Developing World?(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-06)This paper investigates the impacts of the economic shock caused by the COVID-19 pandemic on the employment of different types of workers in developing countries. Employment outcomes are taken from a set of high-frequency phone surveys conducted by the World Bank and National Statistics Offices in 40 countries. Larger shares of female, young, less educated, and urban workers stopped working. Gender gaps in work stoppage were particularly pronounced and stemmed mainly from differences within sectors rather than differential employment patterns across sectors. Differences in work stoppage between urban and rural workers were markedly smaller than those across gender, age, and education groups. Preliminary results from 10 countries suggest that following the initial shock at the start of the pandemic, employment rates partially recovered between April and August, with greater gains for those groups that had borne the brunt of the early jobs losses. Although the high-frequency phone surveys greatly over-represent household heads and therefore overestimate employment rates, case studies in five countries suggest that they provide a reasonably accurate measure of disparities in employment levels by gender, education, and urban/rural location following the onset of the crisis, although they perform less well in capturing disparities between age groups. These results shed new light on the labor market consequences of the COVID-19 crisis in developing countries, and suggest that real-time phone surveys, despite their lack of representativeness, are a valuable source of information to measure differential employment impacts across groups during a crisis.Publication Early Labor Market Impacts of COVID-19 in Developing Countries(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-01-22)The economic crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic sharply reduced mobility and economic activity, disrupting the lives of people around the globe. This brief presents estimates on the crisis’ impact on labor markets in 39 countries based on high-frequency phone survey (HFPS) data collected between April and July 2020. Workers in these countries experienced severe labor market disruptions following the COVID-19 outbreak. 34 percent of respondents reported stopping work, 20 percent of wage workers reported lack of payment for work performed, 9 percent reported job changes due to the pandemic, and 62 percent reported income loss in their household. Measures of work stoppage and income loss in the HFPS are generally consistent with GDP growth projections in Latin America and the Caribbean but not in Sub-Saharan Africa, indicating that the phone survey data contributes valuable new information about the impacts of the crisis. 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Based on simple averages across countries, 34 percent of the respondents reported stopping work, 20 percent of wage workers reported lack of payment for work performed, 9 percent reported job changes due to the pandemic, and 62 percent reported income loss in their household. Stopping work was more prevalent in the industrial and service sectors than in agriculture. Measures of work stoppage and income loss in the high-frequency phone survey are generally consistent with gross domestic product growth projections in Latin America and the Caribbean but not in Sub-Saharan Africa. This suggests that the survey data contribute new and important information on economic impacts in low-income countries.
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