FRIAS Kolloquium - Christel Kesler

Gender inequalities in the labor market in the wake of a global pandemic: Insights from comparative social policy

The COVID-19 pandemic upended labor markets and economic livelihoods throughout the world, but its effects were far from uniform. Some but not all countries saw disproportionate job loss and resignations among women, due to existing occupational segregation and ongoing challenges of work-family reconciliation in the face of childcare disruptions. Gender also intersected in noteworthy but again varying ways with other demographic distinctions, such as ethnicity and immigrant status. In this talk, I explore, across a number of advanced economies, major trends in labor market inequalities through the course of the pandemic and afterwards, and how social policies, especially those related to work-family reconciliation, may help to explain both inter-group and cross-national variation.