Youth, Precarious Work and the Pandemic

Abstract

While Australia has experienced low COVID-19 case numbers relative to other countries, it has witnessed severe economic consequences in the wake of the pandemic. The hospitality industry, in which young adults are overrepresented, has been among the most affected industries. In this article, we present findings from an interview and a digital methods-based study of young hospitality workers in the Australian cities of Melbourne and Newcastle who lost shifts or employment due to the pandemic. We argue that the participants’ ability to cope with the loss of work was mediated by the degree of family support that they could access, with some experiencing the pandemic as an inconvenience, while others suffered extreme financial hardship. Findings from this study show that the most severe impacts of the pandemic play out along pre-existing lines of inequality and marginality, causing the most severe consequences for those who were already most vulnerable to them.