Photo: World Bank Authors: Michael Weber and David Newhouse There is now clear evidence that the devastating economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic were distributed unequally among workers in many developed countries. We recently explored how the crisis has affected different types of workers and find substantial differences. Drawing on phone survey data from about 40 developing…
Photo: World Bank Authors: Michael Weber and David Newhouse Even a year and a half after lockdowns started to go into effect, it’s difficult to get a clear picture of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Global South. Face-to-face data collection has been suspended in most of the world due to health concerns,…
Photo: World Bank Authors: Johanne Buba, Hannah Uckat, Leonardo Iacovone, Denis Medvedev The COVID-19 pandemic took a heavy toll on the global economy, with world output falling by 3.5 percent year-on-year in 2020. Despite these large output losses, surveys from more than 60 countries conducted by the World Bank and partners between April and December 2020…
Photo credit: Dana Smillie / World Bank Authors: Margo Hoftijzer, Victoria Levin, and Michael Weber This blog is also available in French and Spanish. In our May 2020 blog, we predicted that TVET would particularly suffer from school closures as imparting and assessing practical skills is so central for TVET and so hard to do remotely.…
Photo credit: Paul Salazar / World Bank Authors: Michael Weber and David Newhouse Unlike the global financial crisis, both voluntary and mandated restrictions on mobility have directly affected labor markets. The scale of labor market disruption in developing countries has been massive. In its latest update, the ILO estimated a loss of 255 million…
Photo credit: World Bank / Ousmane Traore Authors: Girum Abebe and Christina Wieser To understand how the COVID-19 pandemic affects businesses in Ethiopia, the World Bank, in collaboration with the Job Creation Commission (JCC), has implemented a high-frequency phone survey of firms in the capital city of Addis Ababa. Using results from the phone…
Authors: Girum Abebe and Christina Wieser Beyond public health concerns and chilling epidemiological outcomes, the economic and social impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic have been unprecedented. According to the World Bank, for example, Africa will likely face recession for the first time in 25 years and the ILO estimates that . A sharp drop in…
Photo credit: Victor Idrogo / World Bank Authors: David Newhouse and Michael Weber The COVID-19 pandemic has wrought havoc on economies and workers worldwide — but the impacts are difficult to quantify, because the pandemic has made traditional face-to-face data collection impossible in most places. The World Bank projects that These projections, however, are…
Photo: Simone D. McCourtie / World Bank Authors: Sırma Demir Şeker, Efşan Nas Özen, and Ayşenur Acar Erdoğan COVID-19 has brought existing economic vulnerabilities into view globally. Turkey is no exception as the Turkish labor market already has significant challenges: exchange rate depreciation and inflation, low female labor force participation, high youth unemployment, and…