The financial effects of the coronavirus pandemic is impacting working-class families more quickly and more directly than the last recession.
In just a few short weeks, the daily lives of Americans have completely changed. Across the country, schools, restaurants, bars, stores, libraries, and more are closing. The phrase “social distancing” is now a part of our daily language. All of these measures are necessary to help prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus.
But those preventative measures come with a cost. The impact of social distancing on the economy is just beginning to be understood, and already it is staggering.
The state lost more than 10,000 private-sector jobs in 2019, with most of those losses coming in construction, manufacturing, and mining. While other sectors of the economy weren’t as weak going into 2020, the effect of the coronavirus shock is broad-based and will likely be felt in every industry and geography. Still, workers in certain industries will be disproportionately affected—in particular, workers in food service, accommodations, and brick-and-mortar retail.
Workers in these industries make up 27% of West Virginia’s private sector employment.
Last month, West Virginia got a glimpse of how severe the economic impact could be for a rural state. More than 40,000 West Virginians filed initial unemployment benefits in the last full week in March. Since 1987, no more than 5,800 had ever filed in a single week.
Estimates show that West Virginia could lose 91,000 jobs by the summer. To put that in perspective, during the 2008 recession West Virginia lost 22,000 jobs—over the course of 15 months.
The impact from the coronavirus is not only greater than the impact from the last recession, it’s affecting working families more quickly and more directly.
