The common characteristics of employment status during the Covid- 19 Lockdown

ABSTRACT

Poverty as defined in the literature is generally a deprivation to the basic needs of life (Dunga, 2019;Mdluli & Dunga, 2021;World Bank, 2020a) In order for households to avoid deprivation of the basic needs, they need an income as most of these basic needs can be bought from a market place. Gender, Age, marital status, and population group/race are among some of the variables that are considered in understanding the employment status of heads of household. The number share of care work between males and females is such that, women are forced to withdraw from the labour market to take care of the elderly and the children at the expense of a career in the job market (ILO, 2018;OECD, 2017). [...]gender and the demographic composition of a household has a bearing on who gets to remain in employment especially in the pandemic times. According to the Marriages and Divorce, 2020 report released by Statistics South Africa, the total number of people getting married has fallen steadily from 2011 to 2020. Besides the high decline in 2020 that may have resulted from the restrictions on gatherings in that year, the number of civil marriages have been consistently declining.