Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose;
(2020)
Inequality, unemployment and precarity.
UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose: London, UK.
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Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic is causing an economic crisis that the world has not witnessed since the Great Depression of the 1930s. The projected loss of jobs is expected to be at least 230 million worldwide in the second quarter of this year. Even those who maintain their jobs, face dramatically deteriorating working conditions: essential frontline workers in healthcare and food provisioning sectors are severely exposed to the virus. Many of these workers are in lower paid sectors and steps should be taken by governments to improve their working conditions and ensure they are appropriately remunerated both now and going forward. Governments should ensure income and basic necessities for all citizens to allow them to self-isolate during the pandemic. Universal basic income – permanent cash transfers to all citizens – along with generous unemployment benefits and job guarantee programmes have equity and macroeconomic advantages for the medium and long term. Workers can retain employment through government wagecompensation for firms. Corporate bailouts should be used to restructure the economic system with a new directionality and conditioned on keeping workers employed. Such a forward-looking approach allows the setting of principles for the post-crisis economy: public policy should focus on reshaping institutions towards a full employment strategy. Attention should be shifted from balancing budgets to balancing the economy by achieving societal missions. In emerging economies, there is an urgent need to provide debt relief to allow them to focus on their long-term inclusive growth strategy.
| Type: | Working / discussion paper |
|---|---|
| Title: | Inequality, unemployment and precarity |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| Publisher version: | https://www.ucl.ac.uk/bartlett/public-purpose/publ... |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | This version is the version of record. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher’s terms and conditions. |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of the Built Environment UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of the Built Environment > Inst for Innovation and Public Purpose |
| URI: | https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10195798 |
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