COVID-19 and Precarious Employment: Consequences of the Evolving Crisis.
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Matilla-Santander N
PROVIDER: S-EPMC8114423 | biostudies-literature |
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
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Project description:This study aimed to investigate the association between changes in employment precarity and changes in health amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. We conducted an online survey of 623 U.S. adults at-risk for cardiovascular disease, which queried respondents on employment, food insecurity, and blood pressure measurements in the Fall of 2020 and retrospectively, in February 2020. Respondents were also queried on perceived stress in the Fall of 2020. We created a multidimensional precarious employment score (PES) using 13 survey indicators, that operationalized the following dimensions of employment precarity (PES range: 0-13): material rewards, working time arrangements, employment stability, workers' rights, collective organization, interpersonal relations, and training opportunities. Using adjusted linear regression models, we investigated the association between a change in the PES and 1) change in systolic blood pressure, 2) change in pulse pressure, 3) change in food insecurity, and 4) perceived stress. Models controlled for race/ethnicity, age, gender, and education. Results indicated that employment precarity was 13 % higher between February and Fall 2020, particularly among women and non-Hispanic Black respondents. A change in the PES was associated with a change in food insecurity ( β : 0.02; 95 % CI:0.01, 0.03) and higher perceived stress ( β : 0.39; 95 % CI:0.25, 0.53). The PES was not associated with a change in systolic blood pressure ( β : -0.22; 95 % CI:-0.76, 0.32) nor in pulse pressure ( β : -0.33; 95 % CI: -0.73, 0.07). Policy approaches to mitigate the growth in employment precarity, and in turn food insecurity and stress, warrant consideration to prevent widening of health inequities.
| S-EPMC9841738 | biostudies-literature
Project description:BackgroundThere are widespread concerns that workers in precarious employment have suffered the most in the COVID-19 pandemic and merit special attention. The aim of this rapid scoping umbrella review was to examine what evidence exists about how COVID-19 has affected the health of this highly vulnerable group, and what gaps remain to be investigated.MethodsFive databases were searched for systematic or scoping reviews from January 2020 to May 2021. The quality of the included reviews was determined using A MeaSurement Tool to Assess systematic Reviews.ResultsWe identified 6 reviews that reported 30 unique relevant primary studies. The included studies indicate that essential (non-health) workers are at greater risk of COVID-19 infection and case fatality than others in their surrounding community. The occupational risk of exposure to COVID-19 also seems to be greater among more precarious categories of workers, including younger workers and workers in low-income and low-skilled occupations. Further, hazardous working conditions faced by many essential workers appear to have amplified the pandemic, as several occupational sites became 'super-spreaders', due to an inability to socially distance at work and high contact rates among workers. Finally, employment and financial insecurity generated by the pandemic appears to be associated with negative mental health outcomes. The quality of the included reviews however, and their primary studies, were generally weak and many gaps remain in the evidence base.ConclusionsOur study highlights that COVID-19 is creating new health risks for precarious workers as well as exacerbating the pre-existing health risks of precarious employment.
| S-EPMC8576296 | biostudies-literature
Project description:We conducted an internet survey using Survey Monkey over six weeks to evaluate the impact of the government interventions on social contact patterns in Luxembourg. Participants were recruited via the science.lu website on March 25, April 2, April 16, May 1 during lockdown, and June 12 and June 25 after the lockdown to provide an estimate of their number of contacts within the previous 24 hours. During the lockdown, a total of 5,644 survey participants with a mean age of 44.2 years reported 18,118 contacts (mean = 3.2, IQR 1-4). The average number of contacts per day increased by 24% from 2.9 to 3.6 over the lockdown period. The average number of contacts decreased with age: 4.2 (IQR 2-5) for participants below 25 years and 1.7 (IQR 1-2) for participants above 64 years. Residents of Portuguese nationality reported a higher number of contacts (mean = 4.3, IQR 2-5) than Luxembourgish (mean = 3.5, IQR 2-4) or other foreign residents, respectively. After lockdown, 1,119 participants reported 7,974 contacts with 7.1 (IQR 3-9) contacts per day on average, of which 61.7% (4,917/7,974) occurred without a facemask (mean = 4.9, IQR 2-6). While the number of social contacts was substantially lower during the lockdown by more than 80% compared to the pre-pandemic period, we observed a more recent 121% increase during the post lockdown period showing an increased potential for COVID-19 spread. Monitoring social contacts is an important indicator to estimate the possible impact of government interventions on social contacts and the COVID-19 spread in the coming months.
| S-EPMC7410209 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Purpose The COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately affected the lives of people with disabilities (PWD). How the pandemic affects the employment of PWD and employers has yet to be determined. We aimed to investigate the employment consequences of the pandemic as experienced by PWD and employers. The research questions were: (1) What employment effects do PWD experience, and what business changes do employers encounter as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic? (2) What challenges have PWD encountered during the pandemic? Methods Cross-sectional online surveys of 733 PWD and 67 employers in the Midwestern United States. Results Compared to non-disabled peers, PWD encountered more challenges in employment during the pandemic. We found high percentages of both employers and PWD experiencing employment changes and business shutdown during the pandemic. For PWD whose employment was not affected, 14.6% of the participants (n = 107) expected a loss of income and worried about the economic uncertainty of the pandemic. Unemployment for PWD is high due to illness or disability, being laid-off or furloughed, business reductions, and not feeling safe to work. However, only about 18.6% of unemployed PWD (n = 16) received pay or benefits for the time they were not working even though more than half filed for unemployment benefits. Conclusions The pandemic adversely affected employment of PWD as reported by workers and employers. Findings parallel the experience of the non-disabled workforce, but reveal vulnerabilities that reflect disability consequences and the need for job accommodations. Results reveal emergent needs for policy supports to reduce the disparities experienced by PWD in the workplace.
| S-EPMC8761523 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Protecting wildlife and other natural resources requires engaging and empowering local communities, ensuring compliance with rules, and ongoing monitoring and research. At the frontline of these efforts are rangers. Despite their critical role in maintaining the integrity of parks and protected areas, rangers across the world are exposed to precarious employment conditions and hazardous work environments. We conducted an international scoping review to understand which employment and working conditions are examined in the context of the ranger occupation and to assess whether the concept of precarious employment is used in the conservation, criminological, and environmental sustainability literature on rangers. We reviewed publications from Web of Knowledge, Scopus, ProQuest, and Medline, and grey literature for relevant English language articles published between 2000 and 2021. Our findings are based on the analysis of 98 included studies. We found that the most commonly discussed aspect of rangers' employment and working conditions was the hazardous social and physical work environment, although this was often accompanied by severe income inadequacy, employment insecurity, and a lack of social security, regulatory support, and workplace rights. Such employment and working conditions can cause adverse impacts on rangers' mental and physical health, well-being, and safety, and are also detrimental to their ability to adequately protect biodiversity. We conclude by outlining the need for sustainable solutions and additional research based on established conceptualizations of the precarious employment concept and other related concepts. Lastly, we suggest that governments should acknowledge the importance of rangers through their recognition as essential workers and provide greater support to improve their employment conditions.Supplementary informationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10669-022-09845-3.
| S-EPMC8805139 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Providing targeted support to people who are mostly impacted financially is critical in managing the socio-economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic; however, governments face the challenge of pinpointing vulnerable workers. Building upon the multi-regional input-output model and a high-resolution employment profile, this research develops a new analytical model to recognize the vulnerable population in a crisis by identifying who they are, where they work and what sector they work for. The model was applied to Indonesia to assess tourism losses and found four regional hotspots where the employment vulnerability of women, youth and low-education workers was more than five times higher than the national average. Findings demonstrated that this model could assist with rapid and efficient targeted support for crisis management in the short term and continued investment for an equitable disaster recovery in the future.
| S-EPMC8499021 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The international scope of the 2020 COVID-19 crisis compelled a response from world leaders across the globe. However, the nature of these responses was far from universal. These circumstances present a unique opportunity to study how leader style influences, and is influenced by, a common crisis. To explore these relationships, the present effort used a content analysis of weekly COVID-19 statements from world leaders spanning the first 19 weeks of the crisis. Results suggest that leaders shifted toward increasingly pragmatic sensemaking approaches as COVID-19 infections increased and that sustained use of pragmatic leadership styles was associated with fewer infections in the long term. In contrast, sustained use of the charismatic sensemaking style was associated with higher observed infection rates.
| S-EPMC8963999 | biostudies-literature
Project description:BackgroundCurrent evidence suggests that precarious employment is a risk factor for poor mental health. Although the mechanisms underpinning this relationship are unclear, poor sleep has been proposed to have a role in this relationship. This study explored the mediating effects of poor sleep quality and duration on the relationship between precarious employment and mental health.MethodsData were obtained from wave 17 of the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia survey. A novel precarious employment score (PES) was developed using exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses (CFA) in 8127 workers (4195 female, aged 18-65). Structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to evaluate the mediating effect of sleep quality and duration on the relationship between precarious employment and mental health (SF-36 mental health subscale).ResultsThe PES identified 650 workers with a high level of precariousness, 2417 with a moderate level of precariousness, and 5060 workers with a low level of precariousness out of 8127 in total. There was a significant direct association between precarious employment and mental health; with higher precarity increasing the likelihood of poor mental health. The SEM results revealed that sleep quality partially mediated the association between precarious employment and mental health (Coefficient = 0.025, 95 % CI [0.015, 0.034], P ≤ 0.001). However, a mediation effect was not found for sleep duration.ConclusionEncouraging precarious employees to improve sleep quality may mitigate the adverse effects of precarious work on their mental health. Further objective measurement of sleep duration warrants a more accurate insight into this mediating effect in this group.
| S-EPMC10694582 | biostudies-literature
Project description:OBJECTIVES:Precarious employment (PE) is a determinant of poor health and health inequality. However, the evidence of health consequences and mechanisms underlying the associations, are still limited due to a lack of a comprehensive multidimensional definition and measurement instrument. The Employment Precariousness Scale (EPRES) is a Spanish, multidimensional scale, developed to measure degree of PE. The aim of this study was to translate the EPRES-2010 into Swedish, adapt it to the Swedish context and to assess the psychometric properties of the Swedish EPRES. METHOD:EPRES was translated, adapted and implemented for data collection within the research project PRecarious EMployment in Stockholm (PREMIS). During 2016-2017, questionnaire data were collected from 483 non-standard employees in Stockholm, Sweden, sampled with web-based respondent-driven sampling. Analyses included item descriptive statistics, scale descriptive statistics and exploratory factor analysis. RESULTS:The final EPRES-Se (Swedish version of the EPRES),consisted of six dimensions and 23 items. There was a high response rate to all items and response options. Global Cronbach's alpha was 0.83. Subscales 'vulnerability', 'rights' and 'exercise rights' had reliability coefficients between α=0.78-0.89 and item-subscale correlations between r=0.48-0.78. 'Temporariness' had poor reliability (α=-0.08) and inter-item correlation (r=-0.04), while 'disempowerment' showed acceptable psychometric properties (α=0.5; r=0.34). Exploratory factor analysis confirmed the original EPRES factor structure. CONCLUSIONS:'Vulnerability', 'wages', 'rights', 'exercise rights' and 'disempowerment' worked in the Swedish context; however, 'temporariness' would need revising before implementing the EPRES-Se in further research. Continued work and validation of EPRES-Se is encouraged. In order to enable international comparisons and multinational studies, similar studies in other European countries are also called for.
| S-EPMC6773301 | biostudies-literature
Project description:It is widely discussed that the pandemic has impacted educational inequalities across the world. However, in contrast to data on health or unemployment, data on education outcomes are not timely. Hence, we have extremely limited knowledge about pandemic-related learning losses at the national and cross-national levels. As it might take years to get suitable comparative data, this study uses the latest large-scale international achievement survey from before the pandemic, the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study 2019, to answer two research questions. First, which European countries are most likely to have experienced higher learning loss among their children? Second, which European countries have most likely experienced the greatest increases in learning inequalities? Results based on 4th graders’ school achievements indicate that educational inequalities between and within countries are likely to have augmented substantially throughout Europe. Some European countries are probably already facing an education crisis.
| S-EPMC9149663 | biostudies-literature