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Couples' changing work patterns in the United Kingdom and the United States during the COVID‐19 pandemic

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...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Qian, Yue, Hu, Yang
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: John Wiley and Sons Inc. 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8250666/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34230781
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/gwao.12661
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author Qian, Yue
Hu, Yang
author_facet Qian, Yue
Hu, Yang
author_sort Qian, Yue
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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 sole‐worker 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.
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spelling pubmed-82506662021-07-02 Couples' changing work patterns in the United Kingdom and the United States during the COVID‐19 pandemic Qian, Yue Hu, Yang Gend Work Organ Original Articles 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 sole‐worker 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. John Wiley and Sons Inc. 2021-03-31 2021-07 /pmc/articles/PMC8250666/ /pubmed/34230781 http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/gwao.12661 Text en © 2021 The Authors. Gender, Work & Organization published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article under the terms of the http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Original Articles
Qian, Yue
Hu, Yang
Couples' changing work patterns in the United Kingdom and the United States during the COVID‐19 pandemic
title Couples' changing work patterns in the United Kingdom and the United States during the COVID‐19 pandemic
title_full Couples' changing work patterns in the United Kingdom and the United States during the COVID‐19 pandemic
title_fullStr Couples' changing work patterns in the United Kingdom and the United States during the COVID‐19 pandemic
title_full_unstemmed Couples' changing work patterns in the United Kingdom and the United States during the COVID‐19 pandemic
title_short Couples' changing work patterns in the United Kingdom and the United States during the COVID‐19 pandemic
title_sort couples' changing work patterns in the united kingdom and the united states during the covid‐19 pandemic
topic Original Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8250666/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34230781
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/gwao.12661
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