32
© OECD 2021
The State of Global Education: 18 Months into the Pandemic
loans could be converted into a grant under certain
conditions with flexible criteria for students employed in
sectors at the frontlines during the pandemic. In Chile,
Italy and Japan, students were also supported with
additional tuition fee waivers (OECD, 2021
[21]
).
Despite new policies to facilitate the payment of tuition
or the repayment
of public student loans, tertiary
students still face challenges in meeting the financial
commitments relating to their studies. For instance,
between 19 August and 31 August 2020, some 31%
of adults above 18 years of age with household
members that had planned to enrol for classes in a
postsecondary education institution in the fall 2020
in the United States reported that the plans had been
cancelled for at least one household member. The
second most frequently cited reason for cancelling
after health concerns relating to COVID-19 was not
being able to pay for educational expenses following
changes in their income level due to the COVID-19
crisis (US Department of Commerce, Census Bureau,
2021
[22]
).
© OECD 2021
33
6
Consequences of COVID-19 on labour
market opportunities and the transition from
education to work
Unemployment rates increased between 2019 and 2020
In early 2020, COVID-19 infection and lockdown
measures interrupted international supply chains,
leading to a severe “supply shock”
which affected
many countries. At the same time, confinement
measures as well as the economic and job crisis
stemming from the pandemic led to a “demand shock”,
with lower demand for products and services. The
massive economic shock not only affected countries
where governments responded with restrictive
measures (e.g. lockdown), but also those relying more
on social conformity and/or social capital rather than
on enforced confinement (OECD, 2020
[23]
).
In some of the most affected countries, unemployment
rates skyrocketed within the first few weeks of the
pandemic.
For instance, in the United States, the
unemployment rate jumped from 3.5% in February
2020 to 14.7% in April 2020, in Canada from 5.7%
to 13.1%, and in Colombia from 12.3% to 21.0% over
the same period. In many countries, unemployment
rates reversed after the peak, but remained at a slightly
higher level than they were at the beginning of the year
(OECD, 2020
[23]
).
The impact of COVID-19 on the labour market has been more evenly
distributed across adults of different educational attainment than
during the global financial crisis
Educational attainment
On average across OECD countries, the
unemployment rate among 25-34
year-olds with
below upper secondary attainment was 15.2% in
2020, showing an increase of about 2 percentage
points in one year’s time. However, unlike the 2008
crisis, there is no clear pattern of which education
34
© OECD 2021
The State of Global Education: 18 Months into the Pandemic
levels were the most affected by the crisis in 2020
compared to 2019. In general, those with upper
secondary or higher levels of educational attainment
were affected in often-equal proportions by the
increase in unemployment rates between 2019 and
2020. However, in a few countries, such as Austria,
Latvia, Lithuania and Sweden,
the unemployment rate
for 25-34 year-old adults who have not attained
upper secondary education increased by at least
5 percentage points between 2019 and 2020, while
it remained generally stable over this period for other
levels of education (the increase is less than
3 percentage points). France, Greece and the Slovak
Republic show the opposite pattern: in these countries,
the unemployment rate among 25-34 year-olds with
below upper secondary attainment fell by at least
4 percentage points between 2019 and 2020
(Figure 11). However, these figures should be
interpreted with caution, as
these three countries have
seen the inactivity rate of those who have not attained
upper secondary education increase over the same
period (OECD, 2021
[21]
).
The availability of job retention schemes in many
countries limited the impact of the economic crisis on
unemployment rates in 2020. Job retention schemes,
such as the “Kurzarbeit” in Germany, the “Activité
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