UK Job Market Analysis: The Effects of the Coronavirus Pandemic

This report analyzes the significant impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the UK job market. It explores the rise in unemployment, particularly among self-employed individuals, and the varying effects across different regions. The study examines the shift towards remote work, facilitated by technology, and the challenges and opportunities this presents for organizations and employees. It also details the government's response, including job support schemes, and the impact on various sectors, such as the travel and retail industries. The report highlights the role of technology, including elearning and ICT, in adapting to the crisis and the long-term implications for employment patterns and economic growth. Furthermore, it discusses the impact of the pandemic on the youth and the measures taken to support the workforce, including the self-employed, and the role of pressure groups in advocating for their interests.

How Corona Virus affected
jobs in UK

Table of Contents
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
Impact of coronavirus affecting jobs in different parts of UK. ...................................................3
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................5
MAIN BODY
Impact of coronavirus affecting jobs in different parts of UK.
Coronavirus have impacted the jobs in UK very adversely and there have been seen a rise
in unemployment during this pandemic. This pandemic have forced the organizations and

various workplace to fire employees as they are able to bare the expenses and are not capable
enough to pay them salaries. There have been felt different impacts on employment across UK.
The self employed people have got the hardest hit by this coronavirus in and the percentage of
self-employed in UK are comparatively higher than other places. But some people have also got
the jobs and are comfortably making their ends meet and pay their bills. In Worthing and
Brighton one in every five people are self-employed but it is different scenario in case of
Gloucester and Hull as only 7% or less population accounts for self-employment (Fernandes,
2020). In cities of North and Midlands they have lower rates of Self-employed people and those
who come in the list have a Precarious situation. Due to this pandemic there seen an increase in
the use of technology in working from home. As technology has made this hard times in
pandemic easier for the people and helped the people to work from home by connecting to their
computers. The technology has saved many jobs during this pandemic as increase in
telecommunication infrastructure, opening of various digital platforms, security measures related
to technology and workplace culture and increasing awareness levels, have opened up new
dimensions that has encouraged the people to work from home. When working from home many
employees are unaware of the information circulated at the workplace therefore during this
pandemic, organisation are focusing on making certain rules and effective laws related to work
from home. When people working from home there are various challenges the organization faces
such as floating of information and effective communication, tracking the employee's
productivity (Montenovo. and et.al 2020). The employees also learn many things while working
form home such as balancing their lifework and it has been seen during this pandemic that
people end up doing work for greater hours than they usually do therefore the organization
should try to organize and devise their policies and practices that enable the employees follow a
balanced work regime. The technology has enable the organization during this pandemic to
continue with their working giving the provision of video calls, conferences on online platform.
UK's organization is using employee tracking software for activity monitoring, time tracking and
GPS tracking for the employees who are working fro home. As the issue of data security may
also arise when the employees are working form home therefore this also increased the use of
technology in home working by installing the anti-virus and firewall software on the system
which are being used by the employees when working form home (Waizenegger. and et.al.,
2020). In UK initially only essential jobs such as people in electricity jobs, food related jobs

were working and all the other type of employment. As there was no jobs no working therefore
the spending of the people in UK also reduced and this adversely impact the UK economy.
In London there have been seen a downfall in economic activity and job posting were also less as
compared to the previous years, but London was less affected as compared top other parts of UK.
Burberry group a global luxury brand of UK has also showed concerns over their falling sales
and they also shut down certain stores and operational hours for other stores were also limited
hours.
Also the employers are encouraging employee to work from home with adequate arrangements
and technology and the industries which is not much affected by this pandemic are the
employment of information and communication technology. As other industries are shifting from
work from home concept and in working from home it requires specialized software therefore
the demand of ICT have increased. And in future also its demand will be on boost. The need for
faster data access and automation will increase in future and also the 5G network will get a huge
importance. This pandemic have changed the UK's working pattern and shift many employments
and jobs to wireless technology. Most of the jobs became online during the pandemic.
The employment in the teaching field shifted from physical classes to online platforms. The
teacher started preparing lectures from home.
The coronavirus have changes the working pattern of the people in UK. Employment rates have
reduced to a greater extent and many employment laws have been altered after this outbreak of
coronavirus. Impact of coronavirus have driven usage of the following technologies such as: e-
learning along with IT industry other industries of UK such as telecommunication, education,
healthcare have also adopted the digital technologies.
But this have also impacted the adversely as around 7.6 million jobs are at risk due to
coronavirus and UK has observed the lowest incomes during pandemic. Around 20% of the UK
working age people had been furlough. And the unemployment has created various other issues
such as anxiety among the working class. To overcome this unemployment status and support
various jobs , the government of UK is taking various measures such as new Job Support
Scheme. The objective of this scheme is to protect viable jobs for qualifying for this scheme the
employees must be on the payroll system of employer (Barr, 2020). The employer will also get
the benefit and right to claim the job retention bonus in which the government will pay them
some amount for every employee furlough under CJRS. Also the people on the payroll have

reduced by 81000 during this pandemic. The hardest hit of this coronavirus is on the youth as
most of the youth were employed in various industries. The use of computer and telephone and
other technologies have increased in different parts of UK. Also many companies have shifted to
flexible working and dynamic approaches to survive in this crisis and employers are also sending
the employee home and encouraging them to transitioning to home working for a matter of days.
Also employment laws and rights will also be determined for the people working form home
and the company should also make efforts in fostering company culture and a sense of
cohesiveness by considering the ways it can be done remotely. UK government has introduced
various schemes for the employees,workers and businesses and no such scheme is being
introduced for self-employed people therefore there have been an uncertainty on the part of
people who are self-employed. But these people have got one relief in the sense that they are
entitled to claim statutory sick pay(SSP) (Mahase, 2020). In case of self-employed people
pressure groups plays an important role as they can force government to take action in favour of
self-employed people. This coronavirus outbreak is really an uncertainty for self-employed
people and this situation has also increased the use of technology in home working in UK
(Bryson. and Dale-Olsen, 2019).
Coronavirus or COVID-19 is a global level pandemic which is very dangerous for living being
and because of which governments all across the globe have to implement total lockdown and
due to which travelling got limited. Since international and local travelling is reduced due to
which travel industry like hotels and small businesses has been affected in a negative way
because their sales are reduced (Arthur, 2020). Therefore in order to maintain company's
substantiality different companies have to take different consecutive steps in which workforces
have been reduced by which companies have managed to reduce their expenditure. But due to
this job losses can be seen at a massive level, which has increased the unemployment rates of UK
and also it has made a direct negative impact on country's gross domestic growth because of
which government has to take several consecutive steps through which economic growth can be
maintained. This is important because since employees have lost their jobs because of which
their buying capabilities are reduced and because of which organizational sales of different
countries is also reduced by which it has created a loop. However government has taken several
steps and provided different types of benefits to several organizations because of which they are
able to maintain their organizational activities and also government is providing special benefits

to start-ups by which a boost can be given to employment rate and economic growth of the
country (Coyle and Nguyen, 2020). The impact of COVID-19 is also very serious on UK
because companies are already affected due to the negative impact of Brexit in which UK's
decision of leaving EU has established taxes for companies in the areas which were freely
available before Brexit. Thus organizational companies have to reduce pricing on products and
reduced the customer count drastically because travelling is affected, however this has motivated
organizations to increase their engagement in online activities. By this activity companies are
able to provide products to the desired location of customers. Through this utilization of
technological advancement several organizations like retail industry of UK is able to maintain
their organizational sales and has also provided new ways of employment in which companies
are increasing their engagement in technological advancements by which they are able to
increase the effectiveness of marketing strategies. Therefore it can be evaluated that even though
COVID-19 has reduced the organizational sales and has limited travelling but still with the
effective use of technological advancements like online selling through company website and
social media advertisement companies are able to maintain customer engagement and has also
reduced the chances of brand switching because it is able to fulfil customer requirements (Bell
and Blanchflower, 2020). With that through this effective utilization of technological
advancements company customer relation is also increased by which chances for getting new
employment are increased and high level of cost-efficient boost up is provided to several start-
ups because of technological availabilities and its easy reach to customers.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Arthur, R., 2020. Studying the UK Job Market During the COVID-19 Crisis with Online Job
Ads. arXiv preprint arXiv:2010.03629.
Barr, N., 2020. Britain’s job support schemes: right direction, more to do. LSE Covid 19 Blog.
Bell, D.N. and Blanchflower, D.G., 2020. US and UK labour markets before and during the
Covid-19 crash. National Institute Economic Review. 252. pp.R52-R69.
Bryson, A. and Dale-Olsen, H., 2019. The Role of Employer-provided Sick Pay in Britain and
Norway. In Health and Labor Markets. Emerald Publishing Limited.
Coyle, D. and Nguyen, D., 2020. Valuing goods online and offline: the impact of Covid-19 (No.
ESCoE DP-2020-10). Economic Statistics Centre of Excellence (ESCoE).
Fernandes, N., 2020. Economic effects of coronavirus outbreak (COVID-19) on the world
economy. Available at SSRN 3557504.
Mahase, E., 2020. Covid-19: UK budget gives£ 94 a week statutory sick pay to self-isolators and
their carers.
Montenovo, L. and et.al 2020. Determinants of disparities in covid-19 job losses (No. w27132).
National Bureau of Economic Research.
Waizenegger, L. and et.al., 2020. An affordance perspective of team collaboration and enforced
working from home during COVID-19. European Journal of Information Systems.
29(4). pp.429-442.