糖心TV

For nearly two decades self-employment has been an important source of job growth for the UK economy. However the coronavirus crisis has highlighted how risky it is being self-employed. Current UK Government measures to support the self-employed might not be enough to stop a flight from self-employment once the crisis ends.

The ramifications of the current Covid-19 crisis are likely to be felt in all areas of our lives. Many of the future projections we hear and read about every day are understandably stark and doom-laden, but are there any potentially positive implications of the pandemic?

The sharp rise in the number of people being required to work solely from home during the current crisis has led to a surge in interest in the longer-term outcomes of wider flexible working, with many researchers in the UK and elsewhere discussing Covid-19 as a possible turning point in our attitudes towards greater flexibility (; ).

A paper jointly presented by Professors Alan Brown and Jenny Bimrose at the 10th International Conference on Computer Supported Education (CSEDU), 15 – 17 March, Madeira, provided an overarching view of how to use on-line collaborative learning to facilitate learning development and professional identity transformation of careers and employment practitioners. It built upon work from a European research project, EmployID.

Dr Sangwoo Lee, Assistant Professor, Institute for Employment Research said "Today's release confirms a labour market in structural transition. Unemployment has risen to 5.2%, its highest since late 2020, even as economic inactivity continued declining to 20.7%. Rather than signalling genuine recovery, this pattern suggests a return to work that an increasingly slack labour market is struggling to absorb, with rising unemployment reflecting insufficient demand to accommodate those re-entering the workforce."

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