Job loss during COVID-19: Estimating the poverty and food security effects in Egypt, Tunisia and Morocco

COVID-19 mobility restrictions have disrupted labor markets in Egypt, Tunisia and Morocco; thousands of workers have lost their jobs which has had consequences for poverty, food security, borrowing behavior and internal migration. However, empirical evidence regarding the effects of COVID-19 in these countries is scarce, due mainly to lack of data. This paper explores the effects of job losses due to COVID-19 on household income and food security. It investigates the coping mechanisms triggered and explores the heterogeneous effects of COVID-19 induced job losses on the same outcomes for different vulnerable population subgroups e.g. women, young workers, informal workers, rural workers, etc. Methodologically, we assess the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on individual outcomes in Tunisia, Morocco and Egypt by comparing differences in the outcomes of interest between respondents who lost their jobs due to the pandemic and those who did not. To account for selection into job loss, we employ propensity score weighting which balances job-losses and retained jobs for a set of common characteristics. Our results show that job-losers have suffered greater decreases in household income and a simultaneous considerably lower level of food security compared to job retainers. We show also that job-losers have a higher propensity to consume their savings, get help from relatives, sell assets and borrow from family. The webinars, reports and papers are supported by the project “Advancing the Decent Work Agenda in North Africa (ADWA’)”, implemented by the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida). The project aims to promote job-rich growth, International Labour Standards (ILS) and their application at the enterprise level. It works at the policymaking level in order to support evidence-based decisions on key dimensions of the Decent Work Agenda. This project was made possible by the generous contributions of the International Labor Organization (ILO), Agence Française de Développement (AFD), The Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) of the Government of the United Kingdom, the World Bank and the Arab Fund for Social and Economic Development (AFESD).