COVID-19 lockdowns had a devastating effect on employment for many across the United States, and it is not surprising that there were racial and gender disparities in these effects. However, unexpectedly, my colleagues and I found that Asians were the demographic group most affected by these policies, revealing a strong pattern of Asian unemployment during COVID-19 in the United States.
In a recent research note that will be published in the upcoming edition of Research in Social Stratification and Mobility (Kim, Kim, Tuttle, & Zhang, 2021), we analyze the net effect of lockdown procedures on the relative probability of job change.
In this research we specifically analyze the impact of COVID-19 on Asian employment in the United States, comparing lockdown and reopening periods.
Data and Methods
To do this, we use the Current Population Survey – Merged Outgoing Rotation Group (CPS-MORG), a national questionnaire-based dataset that interviews respondents multiple times.
With these data, we created two subsets: one comparing the relative probability of each racial group losing employment during the months of January to April (when lockdown measures first came into effect), and another comparing the likelihood of regaining employment during the months of May to August.
Findings during the “Lockdown” Period
During the first period, which we call the “lockdown” phase, we found that Asian men were 5.5 percentage points more likely to lose their jobs than white men, the group with the lowest overall probability of job loss during the pandemic.
After a deeper analysis, we found that this gap was much larger when we looked only at individuals without a college degree. In other words, Asians with less education were the most affected among all groups.
Findings for Women
Asian women overall were not statistically disadvantaged compared with white women, but when we analyze only those without a college degree, we found a similar pattern. That is, Asian women without college degrees were more likely to lose their jobs during the lockdown period than white women.
Recovery or Loss during the “Reopening”
No minority group regained employment at a rate comparable to white workers during the “reopening” period, including those most affected by the lockdowns. On the other hand, Black and Hispanic women were more likely to lose their jobs during this period.
Why this Impact on Asian Workers?
Often considered the “model minority,” the disadvantages faced by Asians were surprising. What could explain these differences?
We offer three possible explanations, all of which deserve further investigation.
Hypothesis 1: Racism and Stigmatization
The first possibility is an increase in anti-Asian racism during the pandemic. Previous studies have shown that diseases are often racialized, and racial groups associated with disease face additional discrimination (Eichelberger, 2007; Monson, 2017).
Since the first COVID cases were believed to have occurred in China, many public figures, including U.S. President Donald Trump called it the “Chinese virus,” the “Wuhan virus,” the “Kung Flu,” and many other racialized names.
Since COVID began to spread across the United States, the FBI has reported a dramatic increase in hate crimes against Asians (Choi & Kulkarni, 2020). However, causal links between this and COVID racialization have not been formally established.
Hypothesis 2: Self-Selection
A second possibility is self-selection. That is, maybe Asians were more likely to voluntarily leave their jobs than other racial groups.
Hypothesis 3: Changes in Consumption
Finally, a third possibility is that Asians may be more likely than other groups to avoid routine consumer behavior, such as shopping or dining at restaurants. Since Asians often live in enclave communities densely populated by other Asians, disproportionate declines in Asian-based consumption could be especially harmful for predominantly Asian communities.
Conclusion
Since the phenomenon of COVID-19 is still relatively new and far from finished, answers to these questions remain beyond our reach.
However, Asian unemployment during COVID-19 reveals deeper inequalities in the U.S. labor market that, until now, have received far less public and academic attention.
Summary
In summary, Asians were the group most affected by job loss during COVID-19 lockdowns, especially
among those without college education.
Related Articles
To explore other regional analyses of the effects of COVID-19, also see:
COVID in Mexico: Suru Institute
COVID and monopoly power: the case of Argentina
References
Choi, C., & Kulkarni, M. P. (2020). In six weeks, STOP AAPI HATE Receives Over 1700 Incident Reports of Verbal Harassment, Shunning and Physical Assaults. Chinese for Affirmative Action.
Eichelberger, L. (2007). SARS and New York’s Chinatown: the politics of risk and blame during an epidemic of fear. Social Science & Medicine, 65(6), 1284-1295.
Flood, S., King, M., Rodgers, R., Ruggles, S., & Warren, J. R. (2020). Integrated public use microdata series, Current Population Survey: Version 7.0 [dataset]. IPUMS, Minneapolis.
Kim, A. T., Kim, C., Tuttle, S. E., & Zhang, Y. (2020). COVID-19 and the decline in Asian American employment. Research in Social Stratification and Mobility, 71, 100563.
Monson, S. (2017). Ebola as African: American media discourses of panic and otherization. Africa Today, 63(3), 3-27.