Who Will Bear the Brunt of Lockdown Policies? Evidence from Tele-Workability Measures Across Countries

Abstract

Lockdowns imposed around the world to contain the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic arehaving a differential impact on economic activity and jobs. This paper presents a new indexof the feasibility to work from home to investigate what types of jobs are most at risk. Weestimate that over 97.3 million workers, equivalent to about 15 percent of the workforce, areat high risk of layoffs and furlough across the 35 advanced and emerging countries in oursample. Workers least likely to work remotely tend to be young, without a college education,working for non-standard contracts, employed in smaller firms, and those at the bottom of theearnings distribution, suggesting that the pandemic could exacerbate inequality. Crosscountryheterogeneity in the ability to work remotely reflects differential access to and use oftechnology, sectoral mix, and labor market selection. Policies should account fordemographic and distributional considerations both during the crisis and in its aftermath.