8.8% working hours lost globally in 2020: ILO

International Labour Organisation (ILO) in its annual report has estimated that some 8.8 percent working hours, equivalent to 255 million full-time jobs, were lost globally in last year due to the outbreak of the coronavirus.

This is approximately four times higher than the number of those lost jobs during the 2009 global financial crisis, ILO said in its latest annual report published on Monday.

These lost working hours are accounted for either by reduced working hours for those in employment or “unprecedented” levels of employment loss, hitting 114 million people, it said.

Tentative signs of recovery are emerging in global labour markets, following unprecedented disruption in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic, it said in the report.

Importantly, around 71 percent of these employment losses (81 million people) came in the form of inactivity, rather than unemployment, meaning that people left the labour market because they were unable to work because of pandemic restrictions or simply ceased to look for work.

These massive losses resulted in 8.3 percent decline in global labour income which is equivalent to US$3.7 trillion or 4.4 percent of global Gross Domestic Product (GDP).