The Labor Market Impact of Covid-19 on Asian Americans

Abstract

Asian Americans faced a disproportionately larger surge in unemployment rates than other racial and ethnic groups during the Covid-19 pandemic. While existing literature typically examines labor demand channels to explain this, we instead explore a labor supply channel. Our hypothesis is that Asian Americans are more cautious about Covid-19 infections and thus more selective about job opportunities, contributing to their higher unemployment rate than other groups. Analysis of cellphone data during the pandemic indicates that non-work mobility significantly decreased in areas with larger Asian populations, supporting our hypothesis.

Keywords: Employment, Employment Creation, Human Capital, Retirement, Labor Discrimination, Labor Inequality, Labor Market Data, Health, Education, and Welfare

JEL Classification: J2, J7, I0