The impact of the Covid‑19 pandemic on worker careers: do different job opportunities matter?

This paper exploits that the Covid‑19 pandemic came as an unexpected shock that temporarily reduced the ratio of vacancies to seekers. We use this unique setting to understand the importance of job opportunities for the impact of unemployment on workers’ careers. Compared to individuals who became unemployed under more benign conditions, we find greater and lasting adverse effects on earnings. We provide evidence that lower job opportunities lead unemployed individuals to take up jobs that are further down the occupation‑specific wage distribution. Finally, we substantiate the importance of job prospects by using exogenous variation in the pandemic’s effect on occupations.