Has work changed forever: accelerating trends
Not everything that’s changed about work through the pandemic is unprecedented or, perhaps, unexpected. In some cases it has been an accelerant for trends that were already underway.
High street retail had been withering for many years, overtaken by internet shopping, and we’ve seen large scale job losses through closures such as Debenhams in the UK. The pandemic did inspire some renewed interest in local shopping and supporting independent retailers, but this is unlikely to make up for the nearly 200,000 retail jobs lost between March 2020 and March 2021. If office workers continue to work away from their offices in significant numbers, town centre employment might struggle to get back to previous levels, not just in retail but also cafes, bars and services like gyms and dry cleaners.
Work has also been increasingly digital and in some cases automated for some time, and of course this has been endlessly analysed. What seems clear now is that the pandemic has not only accelerated some existing shifts towards technology, but also intensified some of the unequal impacts of these changes.
A study by McKinsey found businesses had speed up existing plans for increasingly digitised customer interaction and internal operations by several years, and that most businesses did not intend to roll back on what had initially perhaps been temporary crisis measures. Of course some industries are affected more than others, but the increase in digital customer interactions and the more fundamental change to how products and services are designed and delivered, mean that jobs have also changed significantly.
While the move to more home or remote working has been a benefit for some, in some cases it has put jobs at risk. If a job can be done at home, why can’t it be done somewhere else entirely, in another country perhaps, where wages are lower? There are companies that made people redundant in the height of the pandemic in 2020, and now that business is picking up again aren’t rehiring but outsourcing tasks to a cheaper labour force abroad, without the same levels of worker rights. Given the majority of people able to work from home are in white-collar, better paid work, this represents a significant spilling over of trends that up until now have almost entirely affected low paid workers.
How widespread this practice becomes, and which sectors and job roles it affects the most, need to be examined. A recent study by the Institute for the Future of Work found that algorithmic systems and employment practices we most commonly associate with gig work such as food delivery have expanded to other industries and workers during the last year. These workers experience reduced autonomy, concerns about privacy, little understanding of how data is used to monitor their activities and performance, and jobs that are more difficult to earn a secure living from due to things like unpredictable shifts. Recent legal cases in the UK and elsewhere have highlighted the lack of protection for gig workers in employment law, and although many have successfully secured concessions, the spread of these practices to new jobs and sectors only strengthens the case for an urgent reassessment.
While automation of some face-to-face tasks and interactions has helped workplaces to be safer during the global health crisis, the long term impacts of the speeding up of automation look likely to fall hardest on those already disadvantaged in the labour market. A US study found that women with lower levels of qualifications were most at risk of their jobs being affected by automation, and this held true for 26 different countries. These women are already likely to be disadvantaged through gender pay gaps, less access to higher skilled and higher paid work, and a higher likelihood of balancing work with caring responsibilities.
The signs are that emergency responses like remote working and automation of customer-facing tasks introduced in early and mid 2020 have now been in place for sufficient time, and demonstrated sufficient benefits for business, to make them permanent. The push-back by gig workers on their employment rights pre-dates the pandemic, but it may be an important model of collective action that paves the way for many other workers as they come to terms with their new ways of working.
The increased pace of change described here gives those affected less time to find new jobs, to reassess their career, or retrain, thereby making unemployment and poverty more likely. In my next two posts I’ll look more at the unequal impacts of the pandemic on workers, and the options for those who find themselves in need of support to change direction.
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(c) Anna Dent 2021. I provide research, writing, expert opinion and project development in Good Work and the Future of Work / In-Work Poverty and Progression / Welfare benefits / Ethical technology / Skills / Inclusive growth