Throughout the pandemic, Strada Education Network has been publishing weekly COVID-19 Work and Education Survey data from a nationally representative survey to understand the impact of COVID-19 on jobs, wages and education. The survey has had more than 11,000 responses between March 25 and June 11. Overall takeaways from the collected data show that COVID-19 has disproportionately affected non-white populations regarding job insecurity and job loss. Other trends show that a large number of workers across job fields need more education and want these programs to be available online. These findings and others are explored below.
When looking across the entire timeline of data collection, some key issues have generally stayed consistent:
- About half of all respondents are worried about losing their jobs.
- About a third of respondents have said that if their job is lost then they would need to have more education to replace it.
- Around a third answered that they would look to change careers if they did lose their job.
- Approximately half of all the respondents have lost a job, income or hours during the crisis.
When looking at the data through the lens of race and ethnicity, only about half of all white American respondents feared they would lose their job, whereas 67% of Black Americans, 69% of Asian Americans and 72% of Latino Americans responded that they were worried about their jobs. Latino workers were also shown to have the highest percentage (65%) who have lost a job, income or hours. Other findings show Black and Latino Americans are more likely than White Americans to have changed or canceled their education plans, but are more likely to enroll in education and training programs in the near future.
Finally, for future education plans and jobs, about a third of all respondents said they had to cancel their education plans, and when looking at the 18 to 24 age group, this number increases to over half. Furthermore, one out of three workers said they would change their field of work if they lost their job, and this is especially prevalent in workers in manufacturing, finance and information technology fields. For workers looking to change jobs, the fields they are most likely to transition into are business, information technology and finance. In order to change careers, more upskilling and reskilling programs will be needed, yet less than half of the respondents said they had access to necessary education and training. When getting the necessary training, workers strongly prefer non-degree programs over degree programs.
These trends can help education leaders and policymakers understand the education gaps workers are facing in this crisis and help provide more access to education and training programs to those who need upskilling and reskilling for future work.
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