Workers face an unequal future when virus recedes

by Chris Stein

As the coronavirus worked its way across the United States, it cleaved the country’s workforce in two: those who have the ability to work from home, and those who do not.

From baristas to hotel workers to tourism operators, people whose job requires them to show up in-person were among the hardest hit in the waves of layoffs, and also those on the low end of the US pay scale.

Unemployment is now at a level not seen in since the Great Depression nearly a century ago, and moving higher, while the coronavirus is expected to threaten the country for months to come, factors analysts fear will only serve to deepen inequality for workers in the world’s largest economy.

“People who are well-off and highly skilled and work from home are going to demand that their employers make accommodations for them,” said Jesse Rothstein, a former chief economist at the Labor Department who now teaches at the University of California, Berkeley.

But “lower skilled workers… are taking on more risk without more pay.”

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell has described the pandemic as “a great increaser of inequality,” but experts say that is not inevitable, particularly if Congress passes new stimulus measures to support battered businesses and consumers.

“Every single cleavage we had before is widening,” said Claudia Sahm, a former principal economist with the Federal Reserve who is now with the Washington Center for Economic Growth.

“We have an opportunity to do something better than what we were doing before, but it will not just happen. It has to be a policy effort.” (AFP)