World Economic Forum: 1 in 4 women are considering stepping back from their career because of COVID-19. “By now it’s well-established the Covid-19 crisis is hitting women particularly hard. Working mothers bear the brunt of the childcare responsibilities brought on by shuttered daycare centers and Zoom classrooms, while Black women are stricken with the added toll the pandemic has taken on their communities. A new report quantifies the extent of the problem: One in four women are considering leaving their jobs, cutting back hours, or otherwise scaling back work as a result of the pandemic and its fallout.”
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Fast Company: This site has over a dozen free tools to keep you from burning out
Fast Company: This site has over a dozen free tools to keep you from burning out. “When you’re working from home, it’s all too easy to develop some bad habits. Maybe you’re staring at the screen for too long without interruption, or hunching over your laptop with little regard for posture. Or perhaps you’re just working too much in the first place. A new website called Working Den wants to help with all that, offering a free suite of tools that promote a healthier remote work routine. ”
PR Newswire: FileUnemployment. org Launches ‘DataView’- A Comprehensive Unemployment Database (PRESS RELEASE)
PR Newswire: FileUnemployment. org Launches ‘DataView’- A Comprehensive Unemployment Database (PRESS RELEASE). “FileUnemployment.org has further expanded its footprint as a reputable unemployment database by unveiling DataViewTM, a graphical representation of numerical data on US unemployment. Various sets of databases are presented in an attractive graphical format that’s easy to conceptualize. There are also interpretations of the most important trends for the less numerically inclined.”
Gizmodo: The Google Assistant Is Getting a Routine to Make Working From Home Easier
Gizmodo: The Google Assistant Is Getting a Routine to Make Working From Home Easier. “The recent mass shift to working from home hasn’t been easy for a lot of folks, so in order to help people manage their time a little better, the Google Assistant is getting a new Workday Routine feature.”
Route Fifty: Generation Work-From-Home May Never Recover
Route Fifty: Generation Work-From-Home May Never Recover. “If the Covid‑19 experiment has proved anything, it’s that employees can be productive without being physically present, so why not jettison expensive corporate leases and free everyone from commutes? But the longer people spend editing spreadsheets or taking conference calls at the kitchen table, the more obvious it is that workers lose far more than physical space when they lose their office.”
Carolina Public Press: Many NC employers, jobs not coming back when pandemic ends
Carolina Public Press: Many NC employers, jobs not coming back when pandemic ends. “North Carolina’s unemployment rate peaked at 12.9% in April. Though it dropped to 7.5% in June, it ticked up a percentage point in July, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Many of the missing jobs are in the service industry — and those whose work requires face-to-face contact are suffering the most.”
Phys .org: Amazon survey finds more than half of US workers say coronavirus has left them underemployed
Phys .org: Amazon survey finds more than half of US workers say coronavirus has left them underemployed. “More than half of the U.S. workers seeking work say their job hunt is due to the coronavirus pandemic. That’s a key finding of a new survey by e-commerce giant Amazon, which found that a quarter of U.S. workers are looking for new employment, while 27% say that at least some of their skills won’t be of use in the job market in the next five years.”
Neowin: Vivaldi browser introduces a Break Mode to help users unplug from work
Neowin: Vivaldi browser introduces a Break Mode to help users unplug from work. “Vivaldi, the web browser available for Windows, macOS, and Linux, has introduced a new feature in its latest update – version 3.3 – to pause the internet. The Break Mode helps users unplug from continuous work and is aimed at improving work-life balance, especially in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic that has necessitated many people across the world to work from home where the lines of personal and professional time are often blurred.”
Analysis: More People Got Back to Work in August, but Outlook Dims for Those Still Looking for Jobs (Morning Consult)
Morning Consult: Analysis: More People Got Back to Work in August, but Outlook Dims for Those Still Looking for Jobs. “Recent improvements in the demand for labor are creating two distinct employment paths as the economy recovers. On the one hand, a growing share of workers who are now back to work feels secure in their jobs and does not expect to suffer a loss of employment income over the next four weeks. On the other hand, unemployed workers are losing hope of returning to their prior jobs, and 50% of unemployment insurance recipients are unable to cover their basic expenses with the money they receive from UI benefits.”
Washington Post: We’re doing our best with Zoom. But we’ll still need offices — and each other.
Washington Post: We’re doing our best with Zoom. But we’ll still need offices — and each other.. “It’s been more than five months since any of us who edit, produce or write for this Opinions section worked in the same room together. Hopefully you, dear reader, have noticed no ill effects. And if you have not, then newspapers that have recently announced the permanent closure of their bricks-and-mortar newsrooms must be on to something, right? Wrong. Very wrong.”
The Next Web: Here are the 3 biggest trends shaping the future of work
The Next Web: Here are the 3 biggest trends shaping the future of work. “If companies had faces, the months of lockdown would show a decade’s worth of age. Not only has the pandemic completely upended how we work; it’s forced us to re-examine our roles as employers and employees, our goals, our values, and how we merge work and home life. But as they say, with age (and wrinkles) comes wisdom. We’ve written at length about how businesses have responded to the global crisis. Now the question we’re asking ourselves is: What will this change in the long run? Are we looking at fundamental, system-wide changes in the way we work, or will things creep back to the way they were?”
New York Times: Parents Got More Time Off. Then the Backlash Started.
New York Times: Parents Got More Time Off. Then the Backlash Started.. “When the coronavirus closed schools and child care centers and turned American parenthood into a multitasking nightmare, many tech companies rushed to help their employees. They used their comfortable profit margins to extend workers new benefits, including extra time off for parents to help them care for their children. It wasn’t long before employees without children started to ask: What about us?”
AP: Child care crisis pushes US mothers out of the labor force
AP: Child care crisis pushes US mothers out of the labor force. “Research is increasingly pointing to a retreat of working mothers from the U.S. labor force as the pandemic leaves parents with few child care options and the added burden of navigating distance learning. The trend threatens the financial stability of families in the near-term. In the long-term, the crisis could stall — if not reverse — decades of hard-fought gains by working women who are still far from achieving labor force parity with men.”
Library of Congress: American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress Launches Podcast ‘America Works’
Library of Congress: American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress Launches Podcast ‘America Works’. “Each 10-minute episode of ‘America Works’ introduces listeners to an individual worker whose first-person narrative adds to the wealth of our shared national experience. On Thursday, Sept. 3, the first four episodes will become available on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher and at loc.gov/podcasts. A new episode will be released weekly and featured on the Library’s social media channels beginning Thursday, Sept. 10.”
The Atlantic: The Workforce Is About to Change Dramatically
The Atlantic: The Workforce Is About to Change Dramatically. “You live where you work is a truism as ancient as grain farming; which means it’s as ancient as the city itself. But the internet specializes in disentangling the bundles of previous centuries, whether it’s cable TV, the local newspaper, or the department store. Now, with the pandemic shuttering the face-to-face economy, it seems poised to weaken the spatial relationship between work and home. When the pandemic is over, one in six workers is projected to continue working from home or co-working at least two days a week, according to a recent survey by economists at Harvard Business School.”