Evidence Review of Covid-19 and Women’s Informal Employment: A Call to Support the Most Vulnerable First in the Economic Recovery

Abstract

More than a year has elapsed since COVID-19\nplunged the world into uncertainty. Month after\nmonth, cascades of reports continue to expose\nthe pandemic’s devastating and widespread\nimpact on women’s livelihoods. Women the world\nover have been impacted, yet women in informal\nemployment, with little to no social and labour\nprotections, have been disproportionately\nravaged.\nIn low- and lower-middle income countries,\ninformal employment is the norm for women. In\nAfrica and India, roughly 90 percent of employed\nwomen are informal workers. According to one\nIndia study, in the wake of COVID-19, 83 percent\nof women informal workers faced a severe\nincome drop, with half relying on grants for food\nsecurity. Similarly, an April 2020 survey covering\n12 cities around the world conducted by Women\nin Informal Employment: Globalizing and\nOrganizing (WIEGO), a global network focused on\nwomen in informal employment, found that\nduring the peak COVID-19 lockdown period in\neach city, women informal workers’ earnings, on\naverage, were only about 20 percent of their\npre-COVID-19 levels (compared with men who\nwere earning about 25 percent of their prepandemic earnings).