Six Practical Tips For Job Seekers In The Mass-Murdering Covid Pandemic | CORPUSVEC SOVEREIGN TALENTS INSTITUTES

If you are looking for a job right now, you are probably anxious for things to get back to whatever version of “normal” comes after the pandemic. And if you do not like the job you have, you might feel guilty about considering changing employment during this global crisis.

Rest assured, there are millions of people in your same situation. Last spring, the onset of the coronavirus pandemic led to the highest unemployment rate ever witnessed in American history. And a lot of places are nowhere near a full recovery from that initial shock. 

“There are more people looking for jobs right now than there are actual job openings,” said Kevin Harrington, CEO of job search platform Joblist. “That’s not going to change overnight.”

But even if you’re feeling desperate about your employment options, you shouldn’t give up trying to find a job. Here are a few pandemic-era strategies you can adopt to make the most of your job search.

1. Prepare to be Flexible

Not seeing a lot of jobs in your field? It may be time to broaden your search.

A recent Joblist survey found that 65% of job seekers are now more likely to take a position outside their industry than they were before the pandemic, and 42% are more open to a part-time, gig or contract position. 

“Job switching is more common and accepted now than ever before,” Harrington said, advising people in need of work to consider short-term stopgaps while they seek stable long-term employment. “There’s going to be significant understanding from employers as you shift back into a full-time role.”

That particularly goes for people working in leisure and hospitality, fields that have been hit especially hard by the economic impact of the pandemic. During the height of the economic shutdown in April, nearly 40% of job losses came from these two industries. And many of those businesses are still trying to figure out paths to stability. 

“A lot of skills in hospitality are widely applicable to other jobs that may have had a surge in hiring,” Harrington said, like customer support and ecommerce logistics roles that rely on skills like organization, clear communication, and multitasking.

If you’re starting to look for jobs that are outside of your role or industry, you may want to ask for help preparing for the process. Cynthia Hayward, director of coaching and career transition services at CBIZ Inc., recommended tapping into your local community college, as most offer some sort of career coaching or resume review assistance at no cost. 

Hayward said that part-time jobs and temporary gigs can help you gain entry into an industry you’re interested in—plus, it can give you a sense of purpose while you look for a long-term role.

2. Reflect on Your Career Path

There may be a small silver lining for some job-seekers, Harrington said: the chance to think about how your skills, experience and interests could work outside your current or most recent role. You may discover that you’re able to seek a role that’s a better fit for the long-term career path you want to take. 

“If there was ever a time to have a gap or take some kind of sabbatical, go back to school, or change careers, now is the time,” Hayward said. If paying for training isn’t an option for you, look for free or low-cost programs in your area, or keep an eye out for employers willing to train new hires. 

Hayward explained that many job changes take place because one opportunity leads to another—but you may not think about how those roles add up until you’re well into a profession. This period may offer you the chance to plan your ideal next few steps for your long-term job goals and start working toward them.

While in the past a big career pivot could be seen as indecisive, recruiters and hiring managers are likely to be more accepting of job jumping and big vocational changes after the pandemic starts to wane. “A year from now…everyone will think it’s normal to have made a change at this time,” she said.

3. Lean on Your Network

Industry meetups and in-person networking happy hours may be on hold for now, but it’s still important to share your employment goals with others. 

Although you may be suffering from Zoom fatigue, it’s worth setting up informational phone or video-chat meetings as if you were asking someone in your network to meet for a cup of coffee. 

“Seventy to 75% of jobs aren’t published anywhere,” Hayward said. “Look out into your network, identify employers you admire, and network with people you know there. You may discover some inroads to new roles.” 

In another time and place you might have felt embarrassed to admit you were out of work or were looking for a new job. But in a strange pandemic economy, the more people who know you’re open to opportunities, the better your chances of getting your resume in front of a hiring manager.

4. Look Beyond Your Region

Don’t forget about increasing opportunities for remote work, especially in the fields of customer service, marketing and education.

“Your job market used to be 25-50 miles around where you lived,” Harrington said. With the rapid rise of remote work and more employers choosing to allow remote work beyond the pandemic, you may be able to consider positions at companies you once thought out of reach due to where you live.

Before the pandemic, about 4% of the U.S. workforce worked from home at least half the time. By summer 2020, more than 40% of the U.S. workforce was clocking in from home. 

While that rate of remote work is likely to decline as the economy continues to reopen, it’s likely that many companies will embrace remote work permanently in some capacity.

5. Get Ready for Zoom Interviews

Before you get a job, you’ll likely have to complete at least a couple interviews. And unless you’re preparing to work on the front lines during this pandemic, most interviews will be remote. You’ll need to sell your skills by phone or video chat.

“You don’t get to make that handshake impression,” when you participate in virtual or phone interviews, Hayward said. “So you’ve got to make sure the rest of your stuff is bulletproof.” That means updating and reviewing your resume, LinkedIn and social media profiles. 

It also means preparing for the technological requirements of a virtual interview. Recruit a friend to test your settings with you prior to a video interview to make sure your connection is strong and you’ve picked out a distraction-free spot to take the meeting. “Those first few minutes are critical,” Hayward said, so make sure your interview starts strong—not with technical difficulties.

6. Remember: Improvement is Coming

Harrington anticipates the job market will improve significantly by the second half of the year, once the vaccine has been distributed more widely. “Main Street” small and medium businesses will start hiring again—alongside large companies that have continued to hire through the pandemic—which will present greater diversity of job openings. That means job seekers in suburban and rural areas in particular could see a considerable increase in openings starting in summer 2021, he said.

And if you’re keeping your eyes peeled beyond your current field, you may find that an industry adjacent to your own may have more demand for talent right now—which could create opportunity for you. “Companies are still hiring, and there’s a hunger for highly skilled talent,” Hayward said.

Manage The Ups-and-Downs of Covid-19 | Twenty Imperatives To Maintain Careers Quantum Leaps In 2021

The beginning of 2021 sees no abating of the Covid-19 pandemic and one’s determination to meet set goals can detour from key priorities. Periodically, it pays to step back and consider a bird’s-eye view of your trajectory so you can stay on target. This allows you to take stock in where you were, where you are now and where you want to steer during the challenges in 2021. Here are Twenty Imperatives to guide you as you map a Careers Quantum Leap Pathway in 2021.

1. Signup For A Package Deal. If you sign up for success, you sign up for roadblocks. It’s a package deal. You probably have felt defeated, and you will again. As long as you’re still trying and haven’t quit, you haven’t failed. Do your best, but give yourself slack to stumble and make mistakes. Be chancy, break a few rules and leave your job better than your found it. Join the human race and accept the fact that just because you make a mistake or get behind doesn’t make you the mistake. After you slip-up, forget or miss the mark, fix it, forgive yourself and move on because you signed up for a package deal.
2. Stack “Cans” Instead Of “Cannot’s. Check the disgruntled attitude if you bring it to the frustrations of WFH. Complaining when things go south doesn’t fix anything and only makes matters worse. Learn to bounce back from setbacks and bad news by stacking your “cans.” Avoid blowing things out of proportion; look for gains in losses and the upside of a downside situation; focus on the solution, not the problem; pinpoint opportunity in challenge and step back from roadblocks and brainstorm how to turn them into steppingstones.
3. Adopt The Perspective Less Taken. There’s always two sides to every story. Your ability to put yourself in a coworker’s shoes and see her or his perspective is a powerful tool. The eighteen inches from your head to your heart is the longest journey you’ll ever take. But empathy connects you to the feelings of others, makes you a more compassionate colleague and frees you from your own narrow thoughts and snap judgments. It neutralizes anger and frustration and helps you recognize that everybody you encounter at work is struggling with their own inner burdens—the same as you are.
4. Put Down Your Gavel. You, like everybody you work with, have that kick-butt judge in your head that bludgeons you for slip-ups. It tells you how worthless, selfish or inadequate you are. Making judgments is how you make sense of the world, but it can sabotage your career especially in extraordinary times. Coming down hard on yourself after frustrations and defeat undermines your success. Put away your gavel. After a letdown, substitute your kinder, supportive voice and amp up your job satisfaction, performance and productivity.
5. Learn To Say No Instead Of Yo. If you’re the kind who agrees to every opportunity that comes along, you could be undermining your productivity. Learning to say no is a form of self-care. When you always say yes to requests, you automatically say no to yourself. And you’re not working freely, possibly overloading yourself and headed for burnout, which truncates your career. Recognize that saying no instead of yo is a strength, not a weakness. And if a colleague says no, accept no instead of push for yo.
6. Shy Away From Jumping To Conclusions. Sometimes you might think what your boss or team member thinks about you is what you think. That’s called mind-reading—jumping to negative conclusions with thoughts that pop into your head. When you do this, you sell yourself a bill of goods. You save yourself a lot of unnecessary misery by questioning your automatic thoughts that have little to do with truth and waiting until the hard evidence is in before drawing negative conclusions.
7. Stick Your Neck Out . Instead of fleeing from the pandemic’s unknown, stretch into the unfamiliar and unexpected. The nature of the Covid-19 is uncertainty. It’s one of life’s paradoxes. Stepping outside your comfort zone, risking your neck and embracing uncertainty infuse more oxygen into your profession. Pinpoint that place in your career where you’ve been hiding and stick your neck out. What edge can you go to WFH today? What unpredictable bridge can you jump off to sprout your wings? What limb can you reach to get to the fruit of the tree?
8. Be A Goodwill Hunter. Be as careful about what you say about coworkers as you are about what you say about yourself. Gossiping, badmouthing and back stabbing are the ingredients for career suicide. Goodwill while WFH is about being a good steward, committed to selfless service for the common good. Think about what you want colleagues to think and say about you and reciprocate the favor. Looking for and dispensing goodwill—respect, caring and positive regard—boosts morale, builds friendly and cooperative connections and increases job satisfaction and productivity especially in these extraordinary times.
9. Be For Yourself. Are you on your own side? Do you look out for your best interests? Can you advocate for your special needs WFH? It’s important to be for yourself—not against others, but for yourself. If not, then who will be for you? When you fall short of a goal (and you will), refrain from scolding yourself or putting yourself down. Scale career obstacles by being true to yourself, learn what challenge you can rise from and never, ever abandon yourself to participate in someone else’s underestimation of your ability.
10. Curb Your Perfection. In its clutches, perfection tightens you in a stranglehold, injects its rigidity into your bloodstream and chokes the flow of spontaneous and creative ideas. Un-curbed, it causes you to set unrealistic goals, try too hard and over focus on shortcomings. It blinds you to your strengths and from generating your best work. When you sidestep perfectionism and set realistic WFH standards for yourself, job performance and productivity skyrockets.
11. Shun People Pleasing. We all want to be acknowledged and appreciated for our work. But if you trim yourself to suit everybody else, you whittle yourself down to dust. You’re the sculptor of your career. Imagine a huge lump of clay in front of you as you clutch a sculpting knife. Instead of handing the knife to someone else, you carve your career to your own true form. Relieve yourself of the chronic habit of proving yourself first and pleasing yourself last. Get in the mode of pleasing yourself first and proving yourself second.
12. Get Cozy With Uncertainty. If you’re like most people, you count on certainty and predictability. During the pandemic, you want to know how things will happen in your career. When certainty is upended, it can be frightening. Your natural need for predictability doesn’t fit the nature of the unknown, which is full of ups-and-downs. The mindset of “maybe” loosens up the need to have your job tailored to your expectations. Getting comfortable with uncertainty prepares you for the inevitable curve balls that will surely be thrown your way.
13. Extinguish Your Blame Thrower. How often do you blame the WFH challenges or coworkers for your shortcomings? How many times have you fired your blame thrower on innocent bystanders? When things don’t go your way, do you look inside and check the expiration date for the true reasons? The mark of the consummate professional is someone who can take ownership for their slip-ups (without self-judgment), admit their responsibility to colleagues then course correct and move on.
14. Perform In Line With Your Values. Don’t do anything at work that you wouldn’t tell your loved ones. Even if it’s something no one will ever know, you will know. And you have to live with yourself in your own skin. Whatever your actions are at work, make sure they’re in line with your personal values in order to adapt to the new normal with confidence and peace of mind.
15. Acknowledge Your Positive Attributes.  It is important because we tend to ignore our positive attributes and clobber ourselves with negatives. It’s important for you to recognize your limitations without dropping your head in your hands. But you can’t have an honest picture of yourself if you don’t affirm the positive aspects. And that means your list of tallcomings equals your list of shortcomings.
16. Create Micro-Chillers. Always have a “to-be list” in the form of micro-chillers alongside your “to-do list.” A mere five minutes of solitude, reflection and meditative breathing offsets the frenzied workday, relieves stress, enhances mental clarity and loosens physical tensions. A quiet mind puts on the brakes of the comings-and-goings in your head so when you return to your desk, you’re filled with rich, innovative and productive ideas.
17. Send Self-Doubt Packing. The new normal is a time when doubt can take up residence in your head and eat you alive. Doubt casts a large shadow over truth. Unless you recognize it, doubt darkens your capabilities. Watch it with a dispassionate eye, much like you would observe a blemish on your hand. Hold it at arm’s length, and you will step out of doubt’s shadow into a clearer vision of the self-truths about your WFH possibilities.
18. Cultivate Resilience. You have the strength to withstand daily job challenges and obstacles—the kind journalist Judith Viorst wrote about: “Strength is the capacity to break a Hershey bar into four pieces with our bare hands and eat just one of the pieces.” In the same way an acorn contains within it a mighty oak, you contain deep within you roots of strength whether you recognize them or not. Get in touch with those roots of stamina so your acorn can sprout into a giant oak to withstand current challenges. And your deep roots can never be reached by a hard frost.
19. Cop An Attitude Of Gratitude. Whatever you focus on expands. Always wanting more increases the feeling that your work life is lacking, and you want more and more to satisfy the hunger. The secret sauce to job satisfaction is to want and express gratitude for what you already have. Naming all the things you’re grateful for—the people, situations and accomplishments that make your work life meaningful and worthwhile—suddenly expands with deeper appreciation, abundance and fulfillment.
20. Celebrate Ups And Downs Equally. Celebrate the accomplishments and accolades in your job. But don’t take the highs anymore seriously than the lows. And don’t take the lows anymore seriously than the highs. When you stay off the roller coaster which will surely come your way, and welcome the lows and highs equally, you don’t suffer the unpleasant effects of the lows. And you’re able to steer the course of your career in the direction you want to go and find the happiness and success you seek.

Three Tips On How To Stand Out In A January Job Search |Corpusvec TotalTalents Communications

January is usually one of the best months to launch a job search because many companies begin a fresh and more aggressive wave of hiring in January to match the business plans they set for the new year.  

In addition, unlike a fall job search that is sandwiched between job market slowdowns over the summer and holiday season, starting your job search in January gives you several months to make progress in networking and interviewing without losing momentum.

However, while those are the trends you can expect in a typical January job market, this past year has been anything but normal. The global pandemic and economic fallout have shaken up what are typically reliable hiring trends, making it even harder to determine what to expect from a January job search this year.

January Job Market Trends

While the rollout of a vaccine has renewed hope for a more robust job market in 2021, employment gains appear to be slowing, stemming from renewed restrictions and concern about how the ongoing spike in COVID-19 cases will impact an already battered economy. 

January hiring activity will vary widely by industry, with some industries such as technology or healthcare hiring at the same or even increased rates from previous years, while other industries such as restaurants, retail, travel and higher education will still bear the brunt of the downturn.

The size of the candidate pool vying for the same jobs will also be larger this January, with US unemployment levels at 6.7% up from 3.6% at this time last year. Overall, it’s a fair assumption that competition for jobs this month will be fierce.

How To Stand Out

If you are launching or continuing a JOBSEARCH in January, it is more important than ever to have a plan to stand out among the crowded field of candidates. Here are three tips to help you focus your attention this month on the best ways to attract and convert new job opportunities.

1. Concentrate your early efforts on a smaller list of companies

When you’re anxious to kick off your job search, you may instinctually begin by applying to any and every option you see on LinkedIn or other job sites. This often feels like the fastest and easiest way to get your résumé in front of recruiters and it provides an immediate spark of hope and anticipation.

However, by taking the time to first research and create a list of target companies that you want to work for, you will net a higher return on your efforts because applying aimlessly to jobs online has a notoriously low probability of producing a real job lead. This is especially true in the month of January, when most recruiters are swamped with new applicants.

Instead, start by drafting a list of up to ten companies you want to target in your first wave of job searching activity. To gather ideas for this list, research the top companies in your industry, field or location as well as lists of the best employers for categories that matter to you such as Most Innovative, Best for Working Parents, Most Inclusive, etc. Then, run your list by at least one or two mentors or industry contacts to get their perspective on the cultures you are targeting or to uncover any companies you may have accidentally overlooked.

This doesn’t mean that you have to ignore online postings all together, as they may help you identify other (especially smaller or less well-known) employers you may want to consider. Just make sure you are actually targeting those companies and building out your network there versus simply applying online and hoping you’ll stand out in the pack.

2. Don’t be afraid to refresh stale or dormant connections

Once you’ve determined which companies you plan to target first, you need to turn your attention toward finding networking contacts within each of your target companies.

It is through these networking activities that you will receive referrals that help you get on the radar of a recruiter or hiring manager, or gain the inside connection on a job before it is posted online.

In a perfect world, you would embark on your job search with the confidence that you have a large, diverse network primed for you to reach out to because you’ve been proactively maintaining those connections. But many people find themselves doubting the power of their network and fearing that many of their professional relationships have grown stale over time.

Reaching out to old contacts, especially those you have not kept in touch with, can feel intimidating. But January is one of the best months to reconnect with lost friends and colleagues because many people are also thinking about their own career path during this time of year and are often more eager to network as a result.

Don’t rule out asking anyone in your network for help making an introduction into one of your target companies simply because they aren’t in the same industry, live in a different location or lack seniority. While you may be correct in judging their professional network, they may instead have a family member or close friend that can help refer you.

Throughout January, work systemically to get on the radar of one to two hiring managers and one recruiter at each of your targets. But don’t overdo it: reaching out to too many people in the organization at the same time can backfire. Focus on a few people this month and wait to try additional contacts later.

3. The best time to shape a job to your preferences is after first-round interviews

This may surprise you, but it often happens that the great job that someone ultimately lands is not the one they were first contacted about.

At some point during your hiring process, a company may decide to create a new position for you or tweak the current opening to better fit your skills, compensation needs or career goals.

On top of the professional growth you hope to gain in your new job, you may also have personal circumstances that impact the parameters of your search, such as a need to work permanently (or for the foreseeable future) from home, an inability to relocate or a desire for a flexible schedule.

While these are all valid work life needs, you may not want to focus on them in your initial discussions with a recruiter or hiring manager unless the job has a component that you view as an absolute deal breaker.

But if there is even a 5% chance that you’d consider the job as described, make the decision to learn more about the opportunity, and give the company a little time to see why you’d be an asset to their business before expressing your concerns.

This is especially important during a busy hiring month like January, when recruiters can quickly move on to the next qualified applicant instead of taking the time to inquire internally if the job might qualify for a higher title or whether you could commute from another office location.

Leave your options open as much as possible during your first-round discussions, and then be sure to express any desires to alter the role before engaging in second-round interviews. By that point, the hiring manager should have some sense of what you are bringing to the table and will be able to consider what flexibility, if any, they have for the position.

The key to getting and staying on the radar for job opportunities in January is to have a personal contact to reach out to. This way, even if that job doesn’t move forward, you will be better positioned to follow up on future leads with that company.

While a January job market is full of potential, these are not the easiest economic conditions in which to look for a job. Yet, many people will indeed persevere and land great jobs over the next few months. With hard work and dedicated focus, you can be one of them.

Global Entrepreneurship Week | Meet the British Businesses that beat Pandemic Chaos as we celebrate Entrepreneurs around the world

It’s been a tough year for economies all around the world as coronavirus has taken lives, hit markets and forced long-standing businesses to close down for good.

But the events of 2020 have also prompted many entrepreneurs to build in resilience at the core of their businesses, whether that has meant completely pivoting their business proposition, product or service or how it’s delivered, or offering hybrid working options to adhere to social restrictions. 

Emma Jones, founder of small business support network Enterprise Nation, said: ‘Global Entrepreneurship Week has been celebrating the trend towards entrepreneurship that we’ve been seeing since the last recession. 

This week is Global Entrepreneurship Week, which was launched in 2007 and is usually marked by networking events and international competitions across 180 countries.  

 ‘While the pandemic has not dampened the entrepreneurial spirit at all, what we are seeing is a trend for baked-in resilience. Entrepreneurs are keeping their options open and they are selling in new ways.’ 

‘Food brands are side-stepping the market stall and pro-actively selling directly online via their own website and via more powerful markets like Amazon or Uber Eats to find broad exposure to customers,’ she said.

‘They are experimenting because no size fits all. The use of technology coupled with powerful global marketplaces gives firms the best chance of thriving and puts them in a much better position to be able to continue to trade into the future.’

To celebrate during a year that has been particularly testing, This is Money spoke to three people who didn’t let the pandemic get in the way of launching or expanding their business. 

‘Lockdown was a blessing in disguise’

Tim Rundle-Wood, 39 and from London, runs Twoodle Co, which creates and sells natural alternatives to candles, diffusers, soaps and more. 

He became interested in this after a personal tragedy, when his dog suffered toxic shock after sniffing a reed diffuser, which turned out to be full of toxic synthetic chemicals that can be fatal to children and pets. 

This August, he turned what was initially an online business from his spare room into a bricks and mortar proposition – ironically the opposite of what many business owners have been forced to do during the pandemic.   

‘I’d been working out of my spare room for about four years when last Christmas, I decided the time was right to move into a workshop,’ he said. ‘My team and I spent months trying to find the right place and eventually found somewhere. 

‘We were all ready to move in on 1 April and then lockdown happened and everything got put on hold.’ 

By June, when things started opening up again, Tim found the space had been given to someone else so had to start his search again.

But he said this ended up being a blessing in disguise as shop spaces in attractive areas were coming up and at better pricing. 

He added: ‘I saw my opportunity and took it and the response has been overwhelming. The locals have been so welcoming and supportive, as have other local businesses in the Brick Lane area. 

‘Having a physical shop brings you opportunities you just can’t get operating an online-only business and shows that omni-channel retail is the future. We also sell on Amazon and Etsy which accounts for a quarter of our turnover.’  

Tim said Enterprise Nation’s Clicks and Mortar campaign and Amazon’s Small Business Accelerator service have been hugely beneficial for growing his business.  

‘The rise in remote working was my calling’

Jessica Heagren had been working on her business idea for some time but it was only when the pandemic struck and more people were working from home that she found the prime time to launch.

Along with best friend and former colleague Nicola Good, Jessica runs That Works for Me, a network which connects small businesses with the skills they need via a marketplace of thousands of experienced professionals.

This ranges from social media managers to lawyers, and is largely made up of mums seeking flexible and remote work – like Jessica herself needed after leaving her full-time senior job in the City after having her second child.

That’s when it became apparent to her there was still a disconnect between the real lives of highly skilled parents and the world of work. 

Heagren runs That Works for Me, a network which connects small businesses with the skills they need via a marketplace of thousands of experienced professionals

She said: ‘In the corporate world of work, I knew where I was going, I had a career path. This vanished after having children. 

‘Sadly, even in 2020, the options for work are much more limited when you’re a parent, especially if you want to be around to watch your children grow up. 

‘I frequently saw highly-qualified and experienced people taking jobs well below their pay grade and ability. I met more talented people at baby sensory classes than I had in the board room.

‘At the same time, I saw small firms limiting themselves from accessing the expert help they needed to grow.’ 

Jessica realised during the pandemic, people needed flexibility more than ever and the nationwide realisation that remote working can work was the perfect opportunity to launch.

‘Small businesses need all the help they can get right now and people need work. In many ways it’s the ideal time to introduce them,’ she said.

‘Our plan is simply to grow. We still need to nail our sales pipeline and build some consistency, but otherwise we just want to be in front of more businesses that we can help.

‘The more people we can help find work that uses their “pre-children” skill-sets the better – it’s our mission to stop hard earned skills going to waste.’

That Works for Me now has 3,000 members, including more than 300 businesses, and a 90 per cent success rate at matching SMEs with talent.  

‘The uncertainty of the situation was my biggest fear’  

42-year-old Dominique Woolf of The Woolf’s Kitchen had spent years working in market research and other ‘less-than-inspiring’ jobs before she decided she wanted to do something for herself.

She took a course at Leith’s Cookery School run by celebrity chef Prue Leith and developed her sauces before experimenting with consumers and selling them at markets at the end of last year.

She was ready to launch in April this year but then lockdown struck. Rather than delaying the launch, she had to quickly think of ways to get the business running in a new unknown world. 

Money Dominique Woolf was due to launch her homemade sauces in April but the plan was postponed due to the nationwide lockdown

‘The sauces had already been made by my manufacturer and were sitting in their warehouse,’ recalls Dominique.

‘So I set up my own e-commerce website and started selling on Amazon as a way to reach more people and put some welly behind sales.

‘I also found some local independent retailers to stock the brand, and by June, they were seeing an increase in demand. Then my local pub contacted me to ask if they could sell it, and it only grew from there.’

This experience has taught Dominique to ‘network like crazy’ and that LinkedIn and Facebook are great places to start.

She added: ‘There are so many free resources available. Enterprise Nation has hundreds of fantastic and informative videos and webinars available. 

‘The uncertainty of the situation was my biggest fear. I had major brain fog for the first couple of months of lockdown and the idea of launching a business wasn’t even on my radar. 

‘I’m so glad I found my motivation and came back fully inspired and raring to go.’

The Future Of Work Post-Covid-19

 

Remember we were so worried about AI killing jobs only a year ago? Now that a coronavirus is killing people around the world, the future of work has turned in a new direction, becoming virtual and remote, rather than physical and local. The digital transformation of work has finally arrived. But will it last?

The future of work-life balance

 

It’s difficult to make predictions, especially about the future, but the data on the impact of the pandemic (so far) on where and how work is performed provides some clues. In two surveys of American workers conducted in early April and early May, Erik Brynjolfsson and colleagues found that of those employed pre-Covid-19, about half are now working from home. They also found that states with more people in management, professional and related occupations were more likely to see large shifts toward working from home and had fewer people laid off or furloughed.

Is this massive change in the lives of U.S. workers still in effect today? By tracking the data that hints at where work is done, we could understand better whether this was just a temporary blip or whether we are witnessing a permanent transformation. Enterprise analytics vendor AtScale is providing, as a public service, access to the relevant data and tools for its analysis. The data comes from a variety of sources including Google’s Global Mobility, The New York Times, the World Health Organization, Johns Hopkins University, Robert Koch Institute, the Italian Civil Protection Department, the Transportation Security Administration’s Checkpoint Travel Numbers, Open Table Reservations, the US Department of Transportations’ Monthly Travel Statistics and the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.

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The rise, fall and rise in Covid-19 cases are reflected in the data. “We are closely tracking the Google Mobility trends as they relate to both ‘Residential’ locations and ‘Workplaces,’ says AtScale’s Peter Dolan. “Even as visits to ‘Transit Stations’ and ‘Retail and Recreation’ locations have bounced back over time, the trend related visits to ‘Workplaces’ has actually reversed.” (See chart below).

Google Mobility Trends vs Covid-19 Cases

Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Current Economic Survey clearly shows the bifurcation of the U.S. economy caused by the impact of Covid-19 on different occupations. Says Dolan: “The Food and Accommodation industries were hit particularly hard by the pandemic and the accompanying lockdowns. The industry does seem to be on a gradual path to recovery, but attaining pre-pandemic employment levels could take some time. This is in contrast to the Finance and Insurance industries which have thus far been resilient to the layoffs and furloughs impacting other industries.”

As noted also by the surveys quoted above, the type of occupation has been correlated with allowing workers to work from home, and as a result (to a large degree), made these workers more immune to layoffs. The division of the U.S. economy into a digital vs. an analog sector was evident before the pandemic, but Covid-19 put it into sharp relief.

During the early stages of the outbreak’s economic fallout, 90% of the decrease in employment – or 2.6 million of the total loss of 2.9 million between February and March – arose from positions that could not be teleworked, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of federal government data. Economists at the University of Chicago have estimated that only 37% of jobs in the United States can be performed entirely at home. A 2017-2018 survey of a representative sample of American workers by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) found that 43.6% were able to telework.

But 33% of workers in occupations in which working at home is feasible, did not telework. Another way the BLS analysis put it is that the percentage of those who are in occupations in which telework is feasible and who did telework is about 10.8% of all U.S. workers. Another BLS survey, the 2019 National Compensation Survey, found that only 7% of civilian workers (private industry and state and local government workers) in the U.S. have access to a “flexible workplace” benefit, or telework.

Which means that before Covid-19, the widespread availability of telework technology and the feasibility of performing work remotely for many workers, did not convince employers that working from home is a good idea. The pandemic forced the issue, but with what results in terms of the attitudes of employees and employers?

An ESG survey found that 36% of knowledge workers who are “extremely concerned” about their personal health and safety due to Covid-19 say they would prefer to return to the office compared to 49% of respondents who are “not that concerned” or “not at all concerned” with their personal health risk. 57% would like to increase their level of remote work in the future and this percentage increases to 64% among those that are extremely concerned about Covid-19 health risks and drops to 51% among those workers who are not as concerned. An IBM survey found that of those currently working remotely, 80% indicate they would like to continue to work away from the office at least occasionally, while 58% would like this to be their primary way of working. Of those individuals who are now working remotely full-time, only one in ten say they want to return to their workplace exclusively.

An enaible survey of corporate executives (85% of respondents had more than 4 out of 5 people working remotely at the highest point before answering the survey) found that 84% are concerned about the ability of managers to manage remotely, 81% are concerned about a decrease in employee morale, 76% are concerned about a false read on productivity, 75% are concerned about home/life distractions, and 74% are concerned about a lack of visibility on employees.

A Kentik survey of networking professionals worldwide found that 47% reported feeling “more productive” while working from home during the Covid-19 pandemic, compared to pre-pandemic times. However, 20% reported feeling “less productive.” 33% said they have had “no change in productivity.” And 51% expressed concern for their work-life balance.

That concern is not new. Among parents with jobs, 56% told the Pew Research Center in 2015 that it was difficult to balance the responsibilities of their job and family. And in 2019, when Pew asked about specific challenges they may have faced at work because they were balancing work and parenting responsibilities, 54% of working mothers said they’ve needed to reduce their work hours or that they’ve felt like they couldn’t give 100% at work (51%). Smaller but still substantial shares of working fathers say the same: About four-in-ten say they’ve needed to reduce their work hours (44%) or that they couldn’t give 100% (43%).

Balancing work and life is similar to productivity, cost of commuting, impact on the environment, and workers’ health, in that they are all viewed as both potential costs and potential benefits of working from home.

Are employers—and employees—going to rise to the challenge and figure out the optimal way or ways to do work in the future? 30% of IT executives surveyed by ESG believe that the ability of workers to effectively incorporate online collaboration tools into daily work patterns will be the most significant lasting change of the Covid-19 pandemic from a technology perspective. 69% of respondents to a SalesForce/Tableau survey agree that “The pandemic will permanently change the nature of work.”

Says AtScale’s Dolan: “Our intention is to track housing trends to test the hypothesis that companies are increasingly shifting towards work from home cultures. Our expectation is that if employees are going to be working from home for the foreseeable future, homeowners and renters may take the opportunity to pay less for more living space away from the densely populated urban centers.” And he adds, “it will be interesting to see how the pandemic fundamentally alters or accelerates the shifting landscape of the United State’s economy.”

 

 

Japan’s middle class is ‘disappearing’ as poverty rises, warns economist | CORPUSVEC SOVEREIGN TALENTS

KEY POINTS

• As poverty rises in Japan, the country’s middle class is slowly eroding away, according to a recent report by Oxford Economics’ Shigeto Nagai.
• A “major driving force” determining the income distribution has been its “life-time employment system,” he said.
• The growth of part-time employment and lackluster inflation expectations have also contributed to the trend.
• Still, Nagai said Japan’s labor market is going through “lots of changes,” with start-ups and overseas companies offering higher pay for young talent.

A man wearing a facemask walks past a taxi along a street in Shinjuku district of Tokyo on June 24, 2020.

As poverty rises in Japan, the country’s middle class is slowly eroding away, according to a recent report by Oxford Economics’ Shigeto Nagai.

“After the bubble burst in the 1990s, income has declined across the income percentiles, and the share of low-income households has risen as those of middle- and high-income groups shrink,” Nagai, who is head of Japan economics at the firm, wrote in the report.

The ten years starting from the early 1990s have often been referred to as Japan’s “Lost Decade.” The period was marked by economic stagnation and deflation following a boom in the prior years.

“Although it’s true that inequality hasn’t widened and income isn’t concentrated in the top tiers, the share of low-income households has been rising at the expense of middle-income groups in a process of secular income decline across percentiles,” the economist said.

Japan’s poverty rate stands at 15.7%, according to the latest figures from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development. That metric refers to people whose household income is less than half of the median of the entire population.

“The middle class is disappearing in Japan, albeit gradually,” Nagai warned.

Japan’s ‘life-time employment system’

A “major driving force” determining the income distribution has been its “life-time employment system,” Nagai told CNBC. It has been around for decades and was established during the country’s high growth period in the 1950s and 60s, he said, when there was a “very serious shortage of labor.”

The system is mainly practiced by relatively established companies and has three pillars, according to the economist:

1. The “implicit guarantee” to take care of employees until retirement
2. Wages that are dictated by seniority
3. Company-based labor unions

In this relatively stable but rigid employment system, wages rise only gradually. Companies also place heavier emphasis on job security rather than compensating for short-term improvement in company performance or productivity, Nagai said.After the bubble burst in the 1990s, income has declined across the income percentiles, and the share of low-income households has risen as those of middle- and high-income groups shrink.HEAD OF JAPAN ECONOMICS, OXFORD ECONOMICS

The economist told CNBC that wage increments are decided by an annual spring negotiation known as Shunto, where the wages of unionized workers are decided by labor unions and management. What distinguishes this process from elsewhere is that the base-pay increase usually spreads across the entire seniority-based wage scale.

As a result, Nagai said, the system does not create a “top 1% earner” unlike Western compensation systems where top executives typically earn much more than other employees. In fact, the economist said that executive pay is “negligible” compared with places such as the U.S. He said, however, the elite in Japan have been “satisfied” with this flatter salary scale.

Rising part-time employment

For years, Japanese companies have also been converting regular workers — who could previously enjoy the comparatively privileged lifetime-employment system — to part-time workers.

This shift, according to Nagai, started in the early 2000s as companies attempted to “survive” the competition with rising emerging-market economies such as China, where labor costs are lower.

More recently, the increase in part-time workers may also be coming from greater labor-market participation among two demographics, Nagai suggested: women who need work, but may not be able to commit full-time due to childcare duties and seniors who are no longer able to enjoy retirement as their pension benefits are not large enough.

According to data from Japan’s statistics bureau, the number of non-regular employees rose 2.1% annually in 2019. That was far faster than 0.5% growth in regular employees.

“Although hourly wages have been rising faster for non-regular workers amid a shortage of
labour, they’re still paid much less compared to regular workers,” Nagai said. “In addition, the entry of women and the elderly into the labour market as part-timers has depressed hours per worker for several years.”

“The share of low-income households will keep rising as more part-timers work fewer hours,” he said.

Low inflation expectations

Meanwhile, lower inflation expectations have “really stabilized” in the country, Nagai said, arguing this has also contributed to the stagnation of wage increases. For years, the Bank of Japan has struggled to meet its ever-elusive 2% inflation target despite taking drastic measures such as bringing interest rates into negative territory.

The main beneficiaries of low interest-rate policies and aggressive quantitative easing are usually those who own real estate or stocks, Nagai said. The impact has been “relatively limited” due to the risk-averse nature of Japanese households, which generally do not invest in stocks and corporate bonds.

He said this could be another reason why monetary policy has had limited impact on income distribution.

Sluggish consumption

The economist said he was concerned that the disappearance of Japan’s middle class could lead to further stagnation in consumption.

Consumer spending slumped after a sales tax hike in October. It fell even further this year as lockdown measures intended to contain the coronavirus pandemic froze economies. Recent data from Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry showed May retail sales dropped 12.3% from last year.

Nagai said the “jury is still out” over the government’s consumption tax hike due to the unexpected impact of Covid-19. While the move had “certain justifications,” the economist acknowledged lower income groups are more sensitive to tax hikes.

The way out

A more dynamic human resource allocation could help lead Japan out of this situation, Nagai said.

The lifetime employment system has led to many people being underemployed, he said. At the same time, numerous young people are left “reluctantly” living with relatively low pay, despite higher contribution and productivity.

The “static” allocation of human resources has hampered efforts to get rid of the “deflationary equilibrium” in Japan, he said. While more graduates are now choosing start-ups instead of established companies, Nagai said it is still “not a major trend yet.”

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s government has tried to combat many of these issues, attempting to make the labor market more performance-based, Nagai said. But corporations and their management have been reluctant to change, impeding government efforts, he said.

“Reform of the established employment system will be a protracted process because it has for decades served as an integral part of the economy and society,” Nagai said. “Transforming the system will require concurrent reform of social insurance and tax systems.”

Under the Abe administration, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry has also worked to promote “economic metabolism” whereby losers exit and upstarts can bring “new energy,” the economist said.

While authorities have made a good effort, he said it is difficult for change to happen in such a short period of time.

For example, Nagai said Japan lacks Chapter 11-like bankruptcy procedures to give those who fail “another try.” He cited this as another example of limited flexibility in the Japanese economy, leaving people “very afraid” to make changes.

Still, Nagai pointed out that “lots of changes” are already underway in Japan, as the labor shortage has pushed companies to raise salaries to attract younger people. At the same time, there have been more start-ups and Chinese companies which “pay a lot” for young talent.

The number of people quitting their jobs early in their career to seek opportunities elsewhere is also “becoming more than negligible,” he said.

Such moves, in his opinion, would free up the labor market to enable more dynamic resource allocation while also contributing to wage inflation.

Japan’s middle class is ‘disappearing’ as poverty rises, warns economist | CORPUSVEC SOVEREIGN TALENTS

KEY POINTS

• As poverty rises in Japan, the country’s middle class is slowly eroding away, according to a recent report by Oxford Economics’ Shigeto Nagai.
• A “major driving force” determining the income distribution has been its “life-time employment system,” he said.
• The growth of part-time employment and lackluster inflation expectations have also contributed to the trend.
• Still, Nagai said Japan’s labor market is going through “lots of changes,” with start-ups and overseas companies offering higher pay for young talent.

A man wearing a facemask walks past a taxi along a street in Shinjuku district of Tokyo on June 24, 2020.

As poverty rises in Japan, the country’s middle class is slowly eroding away, according to a recent report by Oxford Economics’ Shigeto Nagai.

“After the bubble burst in the 1990s, income has declined across the income percentiles, and the share of low-income households has risen as those of middle- and high-income groups shrink,” Nagai, who is head of Japan economics at the firm, wrote in the report.

The ten years starting from the early 1990s have often been referred to as Japan’s “Lost Decade.” The period was marked by economic stagnation and deflation following a boom in the prior years.

“Although it’s true that inequality hasn’t widened and income isn’t concentrated in the top tiers, the share of low-income households has been rising at the expense of middle-income groups in a process of secular income decline across percentiles,” the economist said.

Japan’s poverty rate stands at 15.7%, according to the latest figures from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development. That metric refers to people whose household income is less than half of the median of the entire population.

“The middle class is disappearing in Japan, albeit gradually,” Nagai warned.

Japan’s ‘life-time employment system’

A “major driving force” determining the income distribution has been its “life-time employment system,” Nagai told CNBC. It has been around for decades and was established during the country’s high growth period in the 1950s and 60s, he said, when there was a “very serious shortage of labor.”

The system is mainly practiced by relatively established companies and has three pillars, according to the economist:

1. The “implicit guarantee” to take care of employees until retirement
2. Wages that are dictated by seniority
3. Company-based labor unions

In this relatively stable but rigid employment system, wages rise only gradually. Companies also place heavier emphasis on job security rather than compensating for short-term improvement in company performance or productivity, Nagai said.

After the bubble burst in the 1990s, income has declined across the income percentiles, and the share of low-income households has risen as those of middle- and high-income groups shrink.

HEAD OF JAPAN ECONOMICS, OXFORD ECONOMICS

The economist told CNBC that wage increments are decided by an annual spring negotiation known as Shunto, where the wages of unionized workers are decided by labor unions and management. What distinguishes this process from elsewhere is that the base-pay increase usually spreads across the entire seniority-based wage scale.

As a result, Nagai said, the system does not create a “top 1% earner” unlike Western compensation systems where top executives typically earn much more than other employees. In fact, the economist said that executive pay is “negligible” compared with places such as the U.S. He said, however, the elite in Japan have been “satisfied” with this flatter salary scale.

Rising part-time employment

For years, Japanese companies have also been converting regular workers — who could previously enjoy the comparatively privileged lifetime-employment system — to part-time workers.

This shift, according to Nagai, started in the early 2000s as companies attempted to “survive” the competition with rising emerging-market economies such as China, where labor costs are lower.

More recently, the increase in part-time workers may also be coming from greater labor-market participation among two demographics, Nagai suggested: women who need work, but may not be able to commit full-time due to childcare duties and seniors who are no longer able to enjoy retirement as their pension benefits are not large enough.

According to data from Japan’s statistics bureau, the number of non-regular employees rose 2.1% annually in 2019. That was far faster than 0.5% growth in regular employees.

“Although hourly wages have been rising faster for non-regular workers amid a shortage of
labour, they’re still paid much less compared to regular workers,” Nagai said. “In addition, the entry of women and the elderly into the labour market as part-timers has depressed hours per worker for several years.”

“The share of low-income households will keep rising as more part-timers work fewer hours,” he said.

Low inflation expectations

Meanwhile, lower inflation expectations have “really stabilized” in the country, Nagai said, arguing this has also contributed to the stagnation of wage increases. For years, the Bank of Japan has struggled to meet its ever-elusive 2% inflation target despite taking drastic measures such as bringing interest rates into negative territory.

The main beneficiaries of low interest-rate policies and aggressive quantitative easing are usually those who own real estate or stocks, Nagai said. The impact has been “relatively limited” due to the risk-averse nature of Japanese households, which generally do not invest in stocks and corporate bonds.

He said this could be another reason why monetary policy has had limited impact on income distribution.

Sluggish consumption

The economist said he was concerned that the disappearance of Japan’s middle class could lead to further stagnation in consumption.

Consumer spending slumped after a sales tax hike in October. It fell even further this year as lockdown measures intended to contain the coronavirus pandemic froze economies. Recent data from Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry showed May retail sales dropped 12.3% from last year.

Nagai said the “jury is still out” over the government’s consumption tax hike due to the unexpected impact of Covid-19. While the move had “certain justifications,” the economist acknowledged lower income groups are more sensitive to tax hikes.

The way out

A more dynamic human resource allocation could help lead Japan out of this situation, Nagai said.

The lifetime employment system has led to many people being underemployed, he said. At the same time, numerous young people are left “reluctantly” living with relatively low pay, despite higher contribution and productivity.

The “static” allocation of human resources has hampered efforts to get rid of the “deflationary equilibrium” in Japan, he said. While more graduates are now choosing start-ups instead of established companies, Nagai said it is still “not a major trend yet.”

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s government has tried to combat many of these issues, attempting to make the labor market more performance-based, Nagai said. But corporations and their management have been reluctant to change, impeding government efforts, he said.

“Reform of the established employment system will be a protracted process because it has for decades served as an integral part of the economy and society,” Nagai said. “Transforming the system will require concurrent reform of social insurance and tax systems.”

Under the Abe administration, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry has also worked to promote “economic metabolism” whereby losers exit and upstarts can bring “new energy,” the economist said.

While authorities have made a good effort, he said it is difficult for change to happen in such a short period of time.

For example, Nagai said Japan lacks Chapter 11-like bankruptcy procedures to give those who fail “another try.” He cited this as another example of limited flexibility in the Japanese economy, leaving people “very afraid” to make changes.

Still, Nagai pointed out that “lots of changes” are already underway in Japan, as the labor shortage has pushed companies to raise salaries to attract younger people. At the same time, there have been more start-ups and Chinese companies which “pay a lot” for young talent.

The number of people quitting their jobs early in their career to seek opportunities elsewhere is also “becoming more than negligible,” he said.

Such moves, in his opinion, would free up the labor market to enable more dynamic resource allocation while also contributing to wage inflation.

Covid-19 could upend plans for older workers who want to retire | CORPUSVEC SOVEREIGN TALENTS

KEY POINTS

• The economic downturn prompted by the coronavirus comes at a particularly bad time for older workers.
• New research takes a look at how well those individuals may fare when it comes to working from home or finding new employment.
• Results are so-so.  Older workers are just as able to work from home, but fewer than half have the opportunity to do so. Meanwhile, new jobs often don’t offer the pay or benefits they may be looking for.

The economic downturn prompted by the coronavirus has been harsh for many American workers.

About 47.2% of Americans are jobless, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Meanwhile, many of those who are employed have had to abruptly pivot to remote work and may face pay cuts.

The sudden changes can be a shock, particularly for older workers who are approaching retirement and hoping to get in a few last years of earnings to top off retirement savings and cover health insurance needs before reaching Medicare eligibility.

In recent research, the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College looked at a couple of key concerns that will impact older workers’ careers: their prospects for working from home, and whether there are adequate job opportunities for those who are searching.

Will the work-from-home trend hurt older workers?

Older workers may be the last to go back to work due to the health risk posed by Covid-19. So the Center for Retirement Research set out to find out how well equipped they are to handle working from home.

The results show their prospects are mixed.

Only about 45% of older workers have positions that allow them to work remotely.

The remaining 55% likely will have issues returning to work, facing a choice of either putting their health at risk or delaying going back and further depleting their financial resources.

More from Personal Finance:
Here’s how much Medicare could cost you in retirement
What to know if you plan to claim Social Security during Covid-19
Here’s an easy, low-cost way to build a retirement plan like the pros

The good news is that age alone shouldn’t diminish older workers’ ability to work from home, the research found. Workers who are older actually are increasingly likely to have jobs that can be done remotely.

“It’s positive that they don’t have a relative disadvantage in terms of working from home,” said Center for Retirement Research director Alicia Munnell.

But that ability to work from home isn’t spread out equally. Those who have higher earnings are more likely to be able to work remotely. Women also tend to be able to work from home more. That’s consistent with other research that has pointed to women making job flexibility a priority, according to the Center for Retirement Research.

The CARES Act has increased 401(k) loan withdrawal limit—Here’s what you need to know

Do older workers have enough job prospects?

There is some optimism when it comes to job prospects for older workers, separate research by the Center for Retirement Research found.

The researchers analyzed the job listings on RetirementJobs.com, a site specifically aimed at older workers. Some of the positions were also advertised on CareerBuilder.com, which “indicate a willingness to hire older — as well as younger — workers,” the research said.

But positions advertised directly on the site tend to have lower average wages and are less likely to mention benefits. Examples include delivery or retail positions.

In the best of times, finding a match between a fully developed older worker with preferences and skills and a slot is hard and takes time.

Alicia Munnell

DIRECTOR OF THE CENTER FOR RETIREMENT RESEARCH AT BOSTON COLLEGE

Consequently, the work advertised might be suitable for bridge jobs, but not substantial full-time work, the research said. The opportunities also could pose difficulties for those who are looking to get health-care coverage through their employment until they reach Medicare eligibility age.

“It was encouraging if you took the site as a whole, because there were so many of these jobs where employers were open to older workers,” Munnell said. “But it’s less heartening if you look at the ones that are aiming for specifically for older workers.”

Haves versus have-nots

In looking at the research, a new group of haves and have nots emerge: those who have jobs and those who do not, Munnell said.

The big question is whether those who do not have jobs will find adequate opportunities to shore up their income in the coming months.

“In the best of times, finding a match between a fully developed older worker with preferences and skills and a slot is hard and takes time,” Munnell said. “When you have high levels of unemployment, it’s going to take a lot more time.”

It’s not exactly a repeat of the financial crisis of more than a decade ago, when everyone saw their retirement investments depleted and older workers were forced to work longer.

Laid off workers raiding their retirement funds

This time, personal retirement investments have likely rebounded with the market. Still, many older workers will need to work longer.

Before the pandemic, 50% of workers were at risk of not being able to maintain their standard of living in retirement. Now, high unemployment could make that worse.

One side effect may be that more people will claim Social Security early at age 62, just as they did in the financial crisis, due to the difficulty finding work, Munnell said.

“I expect it to spike up again in 2020 and ’21, just because people are going to just find it virtually impossible to find new work,” Munnell said.

Covid-19 could upend plans for older workers who want to retire | CORPUSVEC SOVEREIGN TALENTS

KEY POINTS

• The economic downturn prompted by the coronavirus comes at a particularly bad time for older workers.
• New research takes a look at how well those individuals may fare when it comes to working from home or finding new employment.
• Results are so-so.  Older workers are just as able to work from home, but fewer than half have the opportunity to do so. Meanwhile, new jobs often don’t offer the pay or benefits they may be looking for.

The economic downturn prompted by the coronavirus has been harsh for many American workers.

About 47.2% of Americans are jobless, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Meanwhile, many of those who are employed have had to abruptly pivot to remote work and may face pay cuts.

The sudden changes can be a shock, particularly for older workers who are approaching retirement and hoping to get in a few last years of earnings to top off retirement savings and cover health insurance needs before reaching Medicare eligibility.

In recent research, the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College looked at a couple of key concerns that will impact older workers’ careers: their prospects for working from home, and whether there are adequate job opportunities for those who are searching.

Will the work-from-home trend hurt older workers?

Older workers may be the last to go back to work due to the health risk posed by Covid-19. So the Center for Retirement Research set out to find out how well equipped they are to handle working from home.

The results show their prospects are mixed.

Only about 45% of older workers have positions that allow them to work remotely.

The remaining 55% likely will have issues returning to work, facing a choice of either putting their health at risk or delaying going back and further depleting their financial resources.

More from Personal Finance:
Here’s how much Medicare could cost you in retirement
What to know if you plan to claim Social Security during Covid-19
Here’s an easy, low-cost way to build a retirement plan like the pros

The good news is that age alone shouldn’t diminish older workers’ ability to work from home, the research found. Workers who are older actually are increasingly likely to have jobs that can be done remotely.

“It’s positive that they don’t have a relative disadvantage in terms of working from home,” said Center for Retirement Research director Alicia Munnell.

But that ability to work from home isn’t spread out equally. Those who have higher earnings are more likely to be able to work remotely. Women also tend to be able to work from home more. That’s consistent with other research that has pointed to women making job flexibility a priority, according to the Center for Retirement Research.

The CARES Act has increased 401(k) loan withdrawal limit—Here’s what you need to know

Do older workers have enough job prospects?

There is some optimism when it comes to job prospects for older workers, separate research by the Center for Retirement Research found.

The researchers analyzed the job listings on RetirementJobs.com, a site specifically aimed at older workers. Some of the positions were also advertised on CareerBuilder.com, which “indicate a willingness to hire older — as well as younger — workers,” the research said.

But positions advertised directly on the site tend to have lower average wages and are less likely to mention benefits. Examples include delivery or retail positions.

In the best of times, finding a match between a fully developed older worker with preferences and skills and a slot is hard and takes time.

Alicia Munnell

DIRECTOR OF THE CENTER FOR RETIREMENT RESEARCH AT BOSTON COLLEGE

Consequently, the work advertised might be suitable for bridge jobs, but not substantial full-time work, the research said. The opportunities also could pose difficulties for those who are looking to get health-care coverage through their employment until they reach Medicare eligibility age.

“It was encouraging if you took the site as a whole, because there were so many of these jobs where employers were open to older workers,” Munnell said. “But it’s less heartening if you look at the ones that are aiming for specifically for older workers.”

Haves versus have-nots

In looking at the research, a new group of haves and have nots emerge: those who have jobs and those who do not, Munnell said.

The big question is whether those who do not have jobs will find adequate opportunities to shore up their income in the coming months.

“In the best of times, finding a match between a fully developed older worker with preferences and skills and a slot is hard and takes time,” Munnell said. “When you have high levels of unemployment, it’s going to take a lot more time.”

It’s not exactly a repeat of the financial crisis of more than a decade ago, when everyone saw their retirement investments depleted and older workers were forced to work longer.

Laid off workers raiding their retirement funds

This time, personal retirement investments have likely rebounded with the market. Still, many older workers will need to work longer.

Before the pandemic, 50% of workers were at risk of not being able to maintain their standard of living in retirement. Now, high unemployment could make that worse.

One side effect may be that more people will claim Social Security early at age 62, just as they did in the financial crisis, due to the difficulty finding work, Munnell said.

“I expect it to spike up again in 2020 and ’21, just because people are going to just find it virtually impossible to find new work,” Munnell said.

Economists warn of U.K. jobs crisis ahead of crucial budget | CORPUSVEC SOVEREIGN TALENTS

KEY POINTS

• The “Summer Economic Update,” a de facto mini-budget, is expected to include tax cuts and new spending pledges in a bid to stimulate demand as the U.K. economy begins to reopen.
• Credit Suisse has projected that ending the country’s furlough scheme could result in unemployment rising from 3.9% to 10%, or 3.5 million people, in the second half of the year.
• “Ending the furlough scheme in October is like building a bridge that goes three quarters of the way across a river,” said Mike Bell, global markets strategist at JPMorgan Asset Management.

Shoppers wearing protective face masks walk through the rain on Oxford Street in London on June 18, 2020, as some non-essential retailers reopen from their coronavirus shutdown.

U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak will deliver a fresh set of policy initiatives on Wednesday as Britain looks to spark an economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic.

The “Summer Economic Update,” a de facto mini-budget, is expected to include tax cuts and new spending pledges in a bid to stimulate demand as the U.K. economy begins to reopen.

In his March budget, Sunak announced a £30 billion ($39 billion) spending package to tackle the immediate health and labor market impact of the pandemic and the nationwide lockdown it forced. Markets have since become accustomed to significant support announcements from the chancellor, and additional assistance from the Bank of England’s monetary policy bazooka.

However, with markets stabilized, lockdown mostly lifted and the virus seemingly under control in the country, few are expecting the kind of fiscal fireworks Sunak has delivered in the past.

WATCH NOWVIDEO01:43 UK facing the toughest labor market for a generation, LinkedIn manager says

“Instead, expect Sunak to announce targeted measures to lift the flagging parts of the economy and those areas that may struggle under the continued social distancing measures,” Berenberg Senior Economist Kallum Pickering said in a note Tuesday. For example, on Sunday the government announced a £1.6 billion package to support the arts sector.

The U.K. economy has contracted sharply since the beginning of the pandemic, with April’s 20.4% fall in gross domestic product the steepest monthly decline on record. Meanwhile borrowing surged to £103.7 billion ($128.9 billion) in the April-May period, meaning public sector debt surpassed GDP for the first time since 1963.

However, central to the country’s ability to weather the economic storm so far has been the furlough scheme, which has supported more than 30% of the nation’s jobs and meant that the steep drop in output has not filtered through to the labor market as yet. The program has been credited with preventing the country’s looming recession from morphing into a deep and prolonged depression.

Impending ‘jobs crisis’

Sunak has previously indicated that the furlough scheme is likely to be tapered from August and end in October, but Credit Suisse has projected that this could result in unemployment rising from 3.9% to 10%, or 3.5 million people, in the second half of the year.

In a note Monday, the bank’s economists suggested it was unlikely that the 9.3 million furloughed workers would be reabsorbed into the jobs market, with the end of furlough bringing about another wave of redundancies.

“This is because, beyond the near-term pickup, we think there is a risk that the recovery slows down as consumer caution due to the persistence of the virus and social distancing restrict domestic demand and Brexit risks weigh on sentiment” the note said.

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Credit Suisse urged Sunak to either extend the furlough scheme beyond October or replace it with a scheme that subsidizes wage costs or cuts National Insurance contributions for the sectors likely to be hardest hit, like retail, travel and hospitality.

Mike Bell, global markets strategist at JPMorgan Asset Management, told reporters at a virtual roundtable Tuesday that the British economy was “propped up in a state of suspended animation” by the furlough scheme. He warned that many of the currently furloughed workers would end up unemployed once the scheme is lifted as a number of sectors struggle to recover.

“Ending the furlough scheme in October is like building a bridge that goes three quarters of the way across a river,” Bell said. He stressed that the signals of economic recovery in the U.K. do not account for the potential fall in consumer spending and economic activity, should furloughed jobs end up being lost.

Potential policy moves

Temporary National Insurance cuts are among the potential policy initiatives floated in advance of Sunak’s speech, along with subsidies for businesses hiring trainees. Other possible announcements include a temporary cut to VAT (currently at 20%), a reduction or scrapping of the property tax known as stamp duty for properties worth up to £500,000, and temporary exemptions to business property taxes.

Some newspaper reports over the weekend suggested that various initiatives could be announced on Wednesday but implemented in the Fall budget, which Berenberg’s Pickering suggested would be counterproductive, particularly in relation to the stamp duty cut.

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“Rather than stimulating a housing market recovery, it would delay it by incentivizing people to wait until the tax cut before buying a house,” he said, arguing that any policies announced Wednesday should be rolled out as soon as possible.

“The risks of a policy mistake are asymmetric – with greater costs associated with doing too little rather than too much,” he added.

Berenberg estimates that U.K. output is currently around 15% below its pre-recession peak, given data points like May’s 10% rebound in retail sales and more optimistic survey data. But it does not expect GDP to return to the level seen in the fourth quarter of 2019 until early 2023.

“The uncertainty about the precise shape of the recovery, as well as continued downside risks coming from a second wave of the virus and a disorderly exit from the single market at the end o