The impact of anti-COVID-19 restrictions and transitory unemployment insurance policies on unemployment in Russia
ISSN: 0144-3585
Article publication date: 22 May 2023
Issue publication date: 2 January 2024
Abstract
Purpose
During the COVID-19 pandemic, transitory unemployment insurance (UI) policies substantially increased unemployment benefits (UBs) and the number of eligible groups in Russia. The procedure for registering as unemployed was moved to an online platform. The present paper aims to distinguish the effect of anti-COVID-19 restrictions on unemployment from that of the transitory unemployment insurance policies.
Design/methodology/approach
Using 553,627 approved claims for unemployment benefits from the Russian Public Employment Service (PES) administrative records (June 2019–December 2020), monthly data on the number of individuals registered as unemployed are aggregated in a pseudo panel. A double-difference approach is employed to identify the effects of the social interaction intensity and teleworkability (TW) of the latest occupation on unemployment. The first is associated with a direct effect of anti-COVID-19 restrictions and the latter with the simplified application procedure.
Findings
The face-to-face (F2F) intensity of the latest occupation did not lead to any increase in the number of unemployed persons as could be expected in response to anti-COVID-19 restrictions. Job TW had two opposite effects on unemployment: it decreased individuals' risk of job loss and increased their likelihood of claiming unemployment benefits. Surprisingly, however, in line with the typical response of the Russian labour market to downturns, the latter dominated. The largest response was found among men and individuals with primary education.
Originality/value
This study is the first to attempt to distinguish the effect of anti-COVID-19 restrictions from that of the transitory UI policies on unemployment in Russia.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The author would like to express gratitude to two anonymous reviewers for the thoughtful and valuable comments that helped in improving the paper. The author’s thanks are to the Research Data Infrastructure (INID) (https://www.data-in.ru/) for providing access to administrative data from PES. The author is grateful to Dr. Anna Lukyanova of the Centre for Labour Market Studies at HSE University and the participants of the joint seminar of the Laboratory for Labour Market Studies and the IOS-IZA-HSE University International Labour Seminars, as well as to Dr. Victor Liashok, as a reviewer, for a fruitful discussion of the first results of the research. The author thanks Prof. Elena Vakulenko for helping with an expert F2F and TW categorization of occupations that illustrated a potential bias of the estimates taking that the employed F2F and TW categorization was not designed for the Russian labour market. The author also expresses gratitude to Irina Eremina who helped in compiling data.
Citation
Kotyrlo, E. (2024), "The impact of anti-COVID-19 restrictions and transitory unemployment insurance policies on unemployment in Russia", Journal of Economic Studies, Vol. 51 No. 1, pp. 111-125. https://doi.org/10.1108/JES-12-2022-0615
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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