Sector shutdowns during the coronavirus crisis: which workers are most exposed?

Abstract

The lockdown in response to the [Coronavirus Disease 2019] Covid-19 pandemic has effectively shut down a number of sectors. Restaurants, shops and leisure facilities have been ordered to close, air travel has halted, and public transport has been greatly reduced. Our analysis shows: (1) The lockdown will hit young workers the hardest. Employees aged under 25 were about two and a half times as likely to work in a sector that is now shut down as other employees. On the eve of the crisis sectors that are shut down as result of social distancing measures employed nearly a third (30 per cent) of all employees under the age of 25 (25 per cent of young men and 36 per cent of young women). This compares to just one in eight (13 per cent) of workers aged 25 and over. (These figures all exclude full-time students with part-time jobs); (2) Low earners are seven times as likely as high earners to have worked in a sector that is now shut down. Fully one third of employees in the bottom tenth of the earnings distribution work in shut down sectors versus just 5 per cent of those in the top 10 per cent; (3) Women were about one third more likely to work in a sector that is now shut down than men: one in six (17 per cent of) female employees were in such sectors, compared to one in seven (13 per cent of) male employees; and (4) One mitigating factor is that the majority of the affected younger workers and lower earners live with parents or others whose earnings are likely to be less affected, so many may suffer smaller hits to their living standards than otherwise.