IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v18y2021i8p3894-d531990.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Impact of COVID-19 on Healthcare Labor Market in the United States: Lower Paid Workers Experienced Higher Vulnerability and Slower Recovery

Author

Listed:
  • Neeraj Bhandari

    (Department of Healthcare Administration and Policy, School of Public Health, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV 89119, USA)

  • Kavita Batra

    (Office of Research, School of Medicine, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV 89102, USA)

  • Soumya Upadhyay

    (Department of Healthcare Administration and Policy, School of Public Health, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV 89119, USA)

  • Christopher Cochran

    (Department of Healthcare Administration and Policy, School of Public Health, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV 89119, USA)

Abstract

The resilience of the healthcare industry, often considered recession-proof, is being tested by the COVID-19 induced reductions in physical mobility and restrictions on elective and non-emergent medical procedures. We assess early COVID-19 effects on the dynamics of decline and recovery in healthcare labor markets in the United States. Descriptive analyses with monthly cross-sectional data on unemployment rates, employment, labor market entry/exit, and weekly work hours among healthcare workers in each healthcare industry and occupation, using the Current Population Survey from July 2019?2020 were performed. We found that unemployment rates increased dramatically for all healthcare industries, with the strongest early impacts on dentists’ offices (41.3%), outpatient centers (10.5%), physician offices (9.5%), and home health (7.8%). Lower paid workers such as technologists/technicians (10.5%) and healthcare aides (12.6%) were hit hardest and faced persistently high unemployment, while nurses (4%), physicians/surgeons (1.4%), and pharmacists (0.7%) were spared major disruptions. Unique economic vulnerabilities faced by low-income healthcare workers may need to be addressed to avoid serious disruptions from future events similar to COVID-19.

Suggested Citation

  • Neeraj Bhandari & Kavita Batra & Soumya Upadhyay & Christopher Cochran, 2021. "Impact of COVID-19 on Healthcare Labor Market in the United States: Lower Paid Workers Experienced Higher Vulnerability and Slower Recovery," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(8), pages 1-17, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:8:p:3894-:d:531990
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/8/3894/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/8/3894/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Erica L. Groshen, 2020. "COVID-19’s impact on the U.S. labor market as of September 2020," Business Economics, Palgrave Macmillan;National Association for Business Economics, vol. 55(4), pages 213-228, October.
    2. Xiaobing Shuai & Christine Chmura & James Stinchcomb, 2021. "COVID-19, labor demand, and government responses: evidence from job posting data," Business Economics, Palgrave Macmillan;National Association for Business Economics, vol. 56(1), pages 29-42, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Matthew Zingoni, 2022. "A Matter of Mindset: The Benefit of a Growth Mindset After a Career Shock," European Journal of Studies in Management and Business, EUROKD, vol. 23, pages 31-40.
    2. Ion Popa & Simona Cătălina Ștefan & Ana Alexandra Olariu & Ștefan Cătălin Popa & Cătălina Florentina Popa, 2022. "Modelling the COVID-19 Pandemic Effects on Employees’ Health and Performance: A PLS-SEM Mediation Approach," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(3), pages 1-17, February.
    3. Qi Zhang & Xinxin Zhang & Qi Cui & Weining Cao & Ling He & Yexin Zhou & Xiaofan Li & Yunpeng Fan, 2022. "The Unequal Effect of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Labour Market and Income Inequality in China: A Multisectoral CGE Model Analysis Coupled with a Micro-Simulation Approach," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(3), pages 1-21, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. M. V. Kurbatova & I. V. Donova, 2023. "Labor Markets in Resource-Type Regions: Shocks of 2020," Regional Research of Russia, Springer, vol. 13(2), pages 252-259, June.
    2. Kakinaka, Shinji & Umeno, Ken, 2022. "Cryptocurrency market efficiency in short- and long-term horizons during COVID-19: An asymmetric multifractal analysis approach," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 46(PA).
    3. Sandra M. Leitner & Oliver Reiter, 2024. "The response of labour demand to different COVID-19 containment measures: evidence from online job postings in Austria," Journal for Labour Market Research, Springer;Institute for Employment Research/ Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), vol. 58(1), pages 1-23, December.
    4. You, Wen & Davis, George C. & Yang, Jinyang, 2022. "Viewpoint: An assessment of recent SNAP benefit increases allowing for money and time variability," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 106(C).
    5. Łukasz Arendt & Eugeniusz Kwiatkowski, 2023. "Kontrowersje wokół wpływu nowoczesnych technologii na zatrudnienie i bezrobocie," Ekonomista, Polskie Towarzystwo Ekonomiczne, issue 2, pages 195-216.
    6. Sachiko Kazekami, 2022. "Regional differences in the epidemic shock on the local labor market and its spread," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 36(1), pages 115-144, March.
    7. Erica L. Groshen & Harry J. Holzer, 2021. "Labor Market Trends and Outcomes: What Has Changed since the Great Recession?," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 695(1), pages 49-69, May.
    8. Otterby, Dawn & Crawley, Andrew & Gabe, Todd, 2023. "Effects of the Minimum Wage on U.S. County Labor Markets," MPRA Paper 116162, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:8:p:3894-:d:531990. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.