Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Nature of Work among Those with Mental Illness

The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted the U.S. labor market in three ways. First, it shifted the location of work for those whose jobs could be done remotely (1). Remote workers tend to be higher earning, more educated, and non-Hispanic White, compared with the labor market at large. Second, the pandemic increased the health risks of employment for workers with essential jobs that could not be done remotely—about 42% of all workers (2). These workers are disproportionately lower earning, less educated, and non-White. Finally, for the many workers whose jobs were not deemed essential and could not be performed remotely, COVID-19 often led to job loss. Between February and December 2020, millions of people became unemployed or left the U.S. labor force.

Workers with mental illnesses before the COVID-19 pandemic may have suffered disproportionately from the pandemic’s labor market disruptions, in terms of both their health and their employment, yet the extent of these impacts remains unclear. Evidence indicates that workers with mental illness are less likely than those without mental illness to have secondary and postsecondary education and are less likely to hold high-paying jobs. These workers are overrepresented in occupations that require manual skills and underrepresented in occupations that require nonroutine cognitive skills (3). These patterns suggest that workers with preexisting mental illnesses may be less likely than others to be employed in jobs where remote work is feasible and, therefore, face occupational health risks (whether they are frontline essential workers or nonessential workers) or unemployment (if they are nonessential workers subject to closures, shutdowns, or staff reductions) during the pandemic.

Continue reading the entire piece here at Psychiatry Online

______________________

Carolyn Gorman is a Paulson Policy Analyst at the Manhattan Institute.

Photo by Andriy Onufriyenko/Getty Images