Recovery for All? Long-Term Pandemic Impacts on the Employment and Health of Women and Youth

The COVID-19 pandemic has slowed economic growth, exacerbated inequality, and aggravated social divisions. As we work towards the United Nations SDGs, an opportunity-and a challenge- lies in global cities. Our most productive cities have experienced a transformation of economic activity, and COVID-19 mitigation has had acute impacts on the employment and health of women and youth, who are particularly at risk of adverse mental health outcomes and domestic violence associated with disruption of family supports, unemployment and school closure. Even as recovery progresses, many women and youth have struggled with health barriers to pre- pandemic levels of labour force participation. A fair and sustainable global recovery depends on the ability of our cities to reduce health and labour market inequities. In this study, we will examine the long-term recovery patterns of women and youth in three global cities (Bogota, London and Toronto) to understand why some cities and neighbourhoods have been better able to support an equitable recovery. This multi-disciplinary study will use a range of data sources including cell phone data, transit, business indicators, and individual, family and community data on socioeconomic characteristics and health in order to connect spatial patterns of advantage and disadvantage with inequities. We will examine the relationship between outcomes and policy interventions to determine the efficacy of different approaches. Specifically, we hypothesize that institutional factors (such as the availability of childcare assistance), environmental factors (such as the availability of transit), and economic factors (such as wage levels) explain the extent-and equity-of recovery. By identifying the factors associated with improved health and labour market outcomes, we are able to recommend policies to promote more resilient cities post-pandemic. The study objectives are to * Enhance our understanding of the economic and health consequences of COVID-19 restrictions and subsequent recovery efforts on youth and women in three global cities; * Identify interventions that can mitigate negative impacts through temporal and spatial analysis of the association between mitigation strategies and outcomes in the three cities, mediated through individual, family and community factors; * Generate evidence that can inform policies for a fair urban recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and protect vulnerable urban populations in future pandemics.