Zoomshock: The Geography and Local Labour Market Consequences of Working from Home

Abstract

The increase in the extent of working-from-home determined by the COVID-19 health crisis has led to a substantial shift of economic activity across geographical areas; which we refer to as a Zoomshock. When a person works from home rather than at the office, their work-related consumption of goods and services provided by the locally consumed service industries will take place where they live, not where they work. Much of the clientèle of restaurants, coffee bars, pubs, hair stylists, health clubs, taxi providers and the like located near workplaces is transferred to establishment located near where people live. In this paper we measure the Zoomshock at a very granular level by estimating the change in the number of people working in UK neighbourhoods due to home-working.

Keywords: COVID-19, lockdown, work-from-home, local labour markets, teleworking

JEL Classification: R12, J01, H12