title: The impact of epidemics on labor market: identifying victims of the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome in the Korean labor market.
abstract: The vulnerability approach suggests that disasters such as epidemics have different effects according not only to physical vulnerability but also to economic class (status). This paper examines the effect of the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome epidemic on the labor market to investigate whether vulnerable groups become more vulnerable due to an interaction between the socio-economic structure and physical risk.
  
  
  
  This paper examines the effect of the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome epidemic on the labor market by considering unemployment status, job status, working hours, reason for unemployment and underemployment status. In particular, the study investigates whether the U-shaped curve becomes a J-shaped curve due to the interaction between medical vulnerability and labor market vulnerability after an outbreak, assuming that the relative vulnerability in the labor market by age shows a U curve with peaks for the young group and middle aged and old aged groups using the Economically Active Population Survey. We use the difference in difference approach and also conduct a falsification check and robustness check.
  
  
  
  The results suggest that older workers faced a higher possibility of unemployment after the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome outbreak. In particular, they experienced higher involuntary unemployment and underemployment status as well as decreased working hours. It was confirmed that the relative vulnerability of the labor market for older workers was higher than for the other age groups after the epidemic outbreak due to the double whammy of vulnerability in the medical and labor market. The vulnerability in the young group partially increased compared to the 30s and 40s age groups due to their relative vulnerability in the labor market despite being healthy. We find that assuming the relative vulnerability in the existing labor market shows a U shape with age increase, the U-shaped curve became J-shaped after the outbreak.
  
  
  
  Disasters like epidemics can occur unexpectedly and affect certain groups more than other. Therefore, medical protection should be enhanced for groups vulnerable to disease and economic measures are also required for the protection of their livelihoods in the labor market to prevent unemployment stemming from inequality.
authors.affiliation: HRD Center, Sungkyunkwan University, 25-2 Sungkyunkwan-ro, Jongno-gu, Seoul, 110-745, Republic of South Korea.
authors.forename: Ayoung
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.affiliation: Department of Economics, Sungkyunkwan University, 25-2 Sungkyunkwan-ro, Jongno-gu, Seoul, 110-745, Republic of South Korea. trustcho@skku.edu.
authors.forename: Joonmo
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Cho
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D018352:Coronavirus Infections / Q000191:economics / Q000453:epidemiology*; D004651:Employment / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D058872:Epidemics / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D056910:Republic of Korea; D012923:Social Class; D012940:Social Problems; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D014478:Unemployment / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Epidemics; Labor Market; Middle East Respiratory Syndrome; Older workers; Quarantine; Unemployment; Vulnerability