The Impact of the Covid-19 Pandemic on Labour Market Diversity

Abstract Diversity of labour market is currently one of its most striking features. The processes of globalisation and interdependence are creating pressure for ever more international cooperation, which naturally causes more frequent clashes between the diverse elements of the environment, and increases the interdependence of economies. In this context, the COVID-19 pandemic has generally weakened existing global relationships and chains. Economies have been distorted by various types of restrictive and later stimulus measures in a relatively short period of time - a situation that leads naturally to the idea of the interconnectedness of existing processes and the labour market. The main objective of the present study was to make a comparison of the authors' views on the development of these indicators on the basis of the results of analyses of selected macroeconomic indicators, and to establish the dependence between the development of the COVID-19 pandemic, macroeconomic developments and state interventions in the functioning of economies. We begin the empirical part by analysing the evolution of quarterly GDP values in selected economies of the world, and then turn to the employment rate. We conclude the study with the evolution of unemployment in comparison with the evolution of the pandemic situation in the Slovak Republic. The comparison of selected indicators and its results confirm the existence of links between pandemic, macroeconomic and legislative developments in the Slovak Republic. Although the COVID-19 pandemic is the ultimate cause of changes in the labour market, the immediate cause of the dynamics of GDP, employment and unemployment is the state intervention in the economy.