Pandemic triggers gender recession: Women accounted for every American job loss last month

WASHINGTON (SBG) — The pandemic has upended life for millions, but the strongest impact may be on women. They are losing jobs at an alarming rate during the crisis; many are choosing to step away from work as they juggle childcare and home-schooling, and the emotional toll is rising. Experts say the effect of a gender recession won't disappear when the coronavirus crisis ends. Instead, they tell Spotlight on America the impacts could last for decades.

University of Arkansas Professor Gema Zamarro, Ph.D., is just like millions of moms living through a global pandemic. While she plays at-home teacher to her two children, ages 8 and 9, she's logging in at odd hours, still supervising her kids while working her full-time job. She understands the hardship being faced all over the country. "It's been really challenging to be honest," Zamarro told Spotlight on America of the balancing act. "We are fortunate. We have jobs that have a lot of flexibility and we can make it work. But not everybody has that option, unfortunately."

Zamarro has a unique insight into the situation for women because she's researching the impact of the pandemic on families, as part of a partnership with the University of Southern California. Her analysis from data collected as part of a USCstudy, "Understanding Coronavirus in America", indicates there are several reasons COVID-19 has disproportionately impacted women. Among them:

• JOB LOSSES: The pandemic affected businesses that employ women, like restaurants, hotels and hospitality.

• CHILD CARE RESPONSIBILITIES: As schools and daycares shuttered amid the coronavirus crisis, mothers were left with more responsibilities. Women carry a heavier load than men in providing childcare and education support to their children during the pandemic, even while maintaining full-time jobs themselves. In December 45% of working mothers surveyed said they were the sole providers of care to children, up from 33% in April. By early June, 64% of college-educated mothers reported that they had reduced their working hours at some point since March.

• EMOTIONAL DISTRESS: At the start of the pandemic, nearly 50% of women with children reported having psychological distress, compared with about 20% of fathers.

"We are seeing all these hidden consequences in terms of either reducing working hours to try to take care of their children or some women seeing they have to leave the labor force, or they lost their jobs," Professor Gema Zamarro told Spotlight on America. "It makes me very sad."

Spotlight on America discovered the job losses are happening in staggering numbers. The latest federal jobs statistics from December shows 140,000 jobs lost last month. According to an analysis from the National Women's Law Center, women accounted for every job lost. That triggered outrage, even from members of Congress, including Representative Katie Porter, D-Cal., who tweeted about it and drafted a plan detailing policy action that could better support women impacted by this crisis.

The alarming trend will have an impact not just in the short term, but possibly for decades to come, according to Jeni Klugman, Ph.D., with the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security. She says women who are forced out or choose to leave jobs because of the pandemic may face a number of serious consequences, including:

• Losing out on opportunities for future career advancement
• Erosion of critical savings that put them at financial risk
• Missing out on pension and social security contributions that can impact retirement

"There is good evidence from previous recessions that those who lose their jobs or find it more difficult to enter the labor force, suffer a shock," Jeni Klugman told Spotlight on America. "So there’s an immediate shock, but the recovery is much slower, so they may never get back onto the same trajectory that they would have otherwise been on."

As instability remains, Klugman believes certain steps could help women feeling the impact of the female recession. She pointed to the need for better income protections and subsidies, broader parental leave policies and childcare support, bigger efforts to keep kids in schools, and a brighter light shining on the challenges women are facing. Both Klugman and Zamarro highlighted the impact of the pandemic on women of color, specifically those in the prime working ages of 25-54, which data shows are taking the hardest hit.

But while women try to balance it all, Klugman believes platforms like Zoom and Skype may actually help bring about change, by being a window into how moms are juggling their tasks. "There's much greater transparency, not only about the roles that working mothers play but working fathers as well; that they have children, that they have other responsibilities as well," Klugman told us. "That could help to accelerate changes over time."

For now, as the pandemic rages on, women like Gema Zamarro are making it work. For her family, that means a Sunday meeting with her husband, where a calendar is scribbled with notes for the week. Colored markers denote a shifting schedule that centers around calls, meetings, and family time. Zamarro admits they don't sleep much, but knows she's fortunate to have flexibility in a world where an increasing number of women face unrelenting challenges to keep their world spinning amid the coronavirus crisis.