Which Workers are Most Exposed to covid-19 and Social Distancing Effects in a Dual Labour Market?

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.12804/revistas.urosario.edu.co/economia/a.10549

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Published: Jul 1, 2021
Issue: Vol. 24 No. 2 (2021): 24-2
Section Articles


Keywords: COVID-19 occupational characteristics informality work-from-home proximity

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Authors

Jeisson Cardenas
University of Warwick
Jaime Montana
Paris School of Economics and Turin University
Derek Bosworth
University of Warwick

Abstract

This paper provides evidence for the different potential effects of covid-19 on formal and informal employment, using the work-from-home (Dingel & Neiman, 2020; Saltiel, 2020) and the proximity occupation approaches (Mongey et al., 2020) in Colombia. We found that only 13 % of informal employment positions can be performed from home (remotely) and that the figure for formal employment is twice as large (20 %). We recoded the  raw occupational responses of the Colombian Household Survey to a granular level to directly
combine occupational information from two sources: O*net and step. We then calculated work-from-home estimates, extracting cohesive results from both sources. We investigated how personal and household characteristics relate to work-from-home and proximity and provide sound evidence for a larger effect on the informal population and its association with vulnerability (lower income and education levels, no internet access, poor
working conditions). Standard employment policies will not impact directly on the most vulnerable populations in developing countries where informal employment is the norm.

How to Cite
Cardenas, J., Montana, J., & Bosworth, D. (2021). Which Workers are Most Exposed to covid-19 and Social Distancing Effects in a Dual Labour Market?. Revista Economía Del Rosario, 24(2), 1–44. https://doi.org/10.12804/revistas.urosario.edu.co/economia/a.10549
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