Coronavirus shutdown set to hit youngest workers and women hardest
Sector-wide shutdowns caused by the coronavirus outbreak will have a disproportionate impact on the youngest and lowest paid workers and women, a top think tank has warned.
The government-ordered lockdown has shuttered restaurants, shops and leisure facilities, while air travel has been halted and public transport reduced.
But analysis published today by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) revealed that young workers will be hit the hardest, with employees under 25 roughly two and a half times more likely to work in a sector that has now been shut down than other workers.
Industries that have ground to a halt as a result of the crisis employ nearly a third of all UK employees under the age of 25. This is compared to just 13 per cent of workers aged over 25.
The pandemic will also take its toll on the lowest paid workers, who are seven times more likely than high earners to have worked in a sector that is now shut down.
Moreover, the research showed that women were roughly a third more likely to work in a sector that has now shut down than men.
The IFS said one mitigating factor could be that the majority of young workers and lower earners live with parents or others whose earnings were less likely to be affected, meaning the impact on their living standards may be limited.
“There is a remarkable concentration of younger and lower paid workers in the sectors most affected by the current lockdown. Women are also more likely to be affected than men,” said Xiaowei Xu, senior research economist at IFS.
“Fortunately, in the short run, many will have the cushion of the incomes of parents or other household members. But for the longer term there must be serious worries about the effect of this crisis on the young especially and on inequality more generally.”