LABOR MARKET: COVID-19 PANDEMIC AND WORKING POVERTY

Tamila Arnania-Kepuladze, Dali Sologashvili, Giorgi Kepuladze

Abstract


Socio-economic inequality has always accompanied the development of human society. However, the problem of inequality could intensify in certain periods. Given study aims to understand why do people who get income, salary or wage remain to be poor? Why does working poverty exist? How various extraordinal phenomenon like COVID-19 pandemic influence employed population and heir material situation. The article determines four groups of poverty reasons: Society level objective reasons, Society level subjective reasons, Individual-level subjective reasons, and Individual-level objective reasons. Discussing the issues of the reasons for working poverty, the paper mentions such as Changes in labor market policies, Long-term structural changes in the economy of developed countries; Strengthening the globalization process and structural changes in the national economies; Low wage of working people caused by personal specifics of an employed person like his/her human capital i.e. education or qualification, ability to appropriated use own skills and knowledge and manage own life; Unequal socioeconomic position of different demographic groups of population; Household characteristics. Out-of-the-ordinary phenomena such as COVID-19 further complicate the situation with the working poor. The labor market also has reacted to the changes caused by the spread of COVID-19 by adaption of specific programs aimed to keep employment unchangeable, by protection against unemployment, changes of work regimes, changes in labor legislation, etc. Increasing employment is a necessary but not sufficient condition for overcoming working poverty. Therefore, overcoming in-work poverty is necessary along with the increase of the number of jobs to improve the quality of these jobs. Good public policies can limit and truly reverse the rise in working poverty.


Keywords


Labor Market, Working Poverty, In-Work Poverty, Employment, Unemployment, Wage, COVID-19, coronavirus crisis.

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References


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