Women twice as likely as men to be 'discouraged workers' after Covid-19 job loss
Australian women left jobless by the Covid-19 recession are more likely to have taken on caring and housework roles than their male counterparts and are less likely to be still actively looking for work.
That is the finding of a new Australian National University paper warning of an increase in “discouraged workers” who want paid jobs but are not actively looking and don’t show up in unemployment statistics.
The ANU Centre for Social Research and Methods, based on a survey of 3,249 people, found that from February to May the proportion of people in paid work fell from 62% to 57%.
Those who were unemployed but actively looking for work rose from 6.8% to 7.4% while those unemployed but not actively looking rose from 5% to 7.6%.
The results are likely to play into political debate as Scott Morrison has claimed that doubling unemployment benefits to $1,100 a fortnight has made it harder for employers to fill shifts – despite the fact there are 12 applicants for every job vacancy and employers have been flooded with applications.
Unions have accused Morrison of demonising jobseekers while failing to stimulate the economy and the small business ombudsman, Kate Carnell, has warned ending free childcare will contribute to Australia’s labour market woes.
In its latest survey, conducted between 29 June and 1 July, the ANU centre found improvements in the level of employment and an increase in average hours worked across the sample of a little over one hour per week.
Report co-author Nicholas Biddle said the increase in the number of unemployed people who are actively looking for work was “not significant”.
“But there was a large increase in the number of people who said they were unemployed but not actively looking for work,” he said.
“This fits with the idea of ‘discouraged workers’ – those who want to work but think there are not any suitable jobs available.”
Respondents were asked if they were undertaking paid work, education, were unemployed actively or not actively looking for work, permanently sick or disabled, retired, undertaking housework or caring, or other activity.
Of the males who lost their jobs between February and May, 32.4% were unemployed and actively looking for work compared with 4.6% of the females.
Women who had left employment were more than twice as likely to be unemployed and not actively looking (13.8%) than men (5.7%).
Women who stopped looking for work were three times as likely to have taken on caring and housework roles – half of women (49.9%) reported unpaid housework or caring as their main activity compared to only 17.3% of men.
“Males, on the other hand, appear to be slightly more likely to have moved into educational or home schooling roles, and are far more likely to be still actively seeking work,” Biddle said.
The ANU survey suggests those hardest hit by job losses and reduced hours were community and personal service workers, labourers, technicians and trade workers.
Those industries tend to employ young Australians, people born overseas and those who speak a language other than English.
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The ANU paper found decreases in employment had a “demonstrable impact on wellbeing” – with both men and women who lost work experiencing “significantly lower levels of life satisfaction”.
Women who were not actively looking for work were worst affected.
In the Eden-Monaro byelection, Labor campaigned on the uncertainty around future economic supports, with the $1,500 jobkeeper wage subsidy set to end in September.
Coalition MPs including Warren Entsch and Craig Kelly have warned the jobkeeper scheme could be encouraging people to refuse shifts, calling for a condition to be added to the program that workers cannot refuse to return to their jobs and receive the payment.
The Morrison government will announce the future of the program – and whether it will be replaced by industry-specific schemes or scaled back – when it delivers the budget update in the third week of July.
The government has indicated it will continue to support the hardest hit industries after September but has refused to suggestions it will grant a permanent $75-a-week increase in the rate of jobseeker unemployment benefits.
