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Couples' changing work patterns in the United Kingdom and the United States during the COVID‐19 pandemic Qian, Yue; Hu, Yang

Abstract

Going beyond a focus on individual‐level employment outcomes, we investigate couples' changing work patterns in the United Kingdom (UK) and the United States (US) during the COVID‐19 pandemic. Analyzing longitudinal panels of 2186 couples from the Understanding Society COVID‐19 Survey (UK) and 2718 couples from the Current Population Survey (US), we assess whether the pandemic has elevated the importance of human capital vis‐à‐vis traditional gender specialization in shaping couples' work patterns. The UK witnessed a notable increase in sole‐worker families with the better‐educated partner working, irrespective of gender. The impact of the pandemic was similar but weaker in the US. In both countries, couples at the bottom 25% of the prepandemic family income distribution experienced the greatest increase in neither partner working but the least growth in soleworker arrangements. Through a couple‐level analysis of changing employment patterns, this study highlights the importance of human capital in shaping couples' paid‐work organization during the pandemic, and it reveals the socioeconomic gradient in such organization.

Item Metadata

Title
Couples' changing work patterns in the United Kingdom and the United States during the COVID‐19 pandemic
Creator
Qian, Yue; Hu, Yang
Date Issued
2021
Description
Going beyond a focus on individual‐level employment outcomes, we investigate couples' changing work patterns in the United Kingdom (UK) and the United States (US) during the COVID‐19 pandemic. Analyzing longitudinal panels of 2186 couples from the Understanding Society COVID‐19 Survey (UK) and 2718 couples from the Current Population Survey (US), we assess whether the pandemic has elevated the importance of human capital vis‐à‐vis traditional gender specialization in shaping couples' work patterns. The UK witnessed a notable increase in sole‐worker families with the better‐educated partner working, irrespective of gender. The impact of the pandemic was similar but weaker in the US. In both countries, couples at the bottom 25% of the prepandemic family income distribution experienced the greatest increase in neither partner working but the least growth in soleworker arrangements. Through a couple‐level analysis of changing employment patterns, this study highlights the importance of human capital in shaping couples' paid‐work organization during the pandemic, and it reveals the socioeconomic gradient in such organization.
Subject
Couple; COVID-19; Cross‐national; Gender; Human capital; Pandemic; Work
Genre
Article
Type
Text
Language
eng
Date Available
2023-01-25
Provider
Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
Rights
Attribution 4.0 International
DOI
10.14288/1.0423562
URI
http://hdl.handle.net/2429/83748
Affiliation
Arts, Faculty of; Non UBC; Sociology, Department of
Citation
Qian, Y., & Hu, Y. (2021). Couples' changing work patterns in the United Kingdom and the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic. Gender, Work & Organization, 28( S2), 535– 553.
Publisher DOI
10.1111/gwao.12661
Peer Review Status
Reviewed
Scholarly Level
Faculty
Rights URI
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Aggregated Source Repository
DSpace

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Attribution 4.0 International