Time of coronavirus: Asian Americans better equipped to work from home

By the time the coronavirus pandemic ends, what's considered "normal" in the US workplace might need a new definition.

Asian Americans at the lower paying jobs share in the burden with other Americans of job losses in the service industry and food distribution, less attention has been focused on the jobs that have continued to function despite the stay-at-home policies.

"Less than 30% of workers can work from home," said a report from Economic Policy Institute in Washington. "and the ability to work from home differs enormously by race and ethnicity."

Nevertheless, today's Asian American worker may be in the best position to transition to the new normal in the American workplace, according to a new study released Tuesday (May 5) by the Pew Research Center.

Even as the country is still in the throes of battling the deadly virus, most Asian American workers are the least affected because many of them work in fields that allow them to telework -- work from home.

Since the arrival of the coronavirus, the country's economy has had a steep decline largely caused by the stay-at-home and business shut-downs implemented to stop the spread of the the virus. Over 30 million American workers have efiled unemployment claims since the mid-March, numbers that haven't been seen since the Great Depression.

While many workers could no longer wait tables, polish nails or give haircuts, others – especially those with college degrees – could go online and continue to teach, deliver sermons or trade stocks from the comfort of their homes.

Asian Americans -- better educated and most likely to be plugged into the internet than other racial groups -- could go online and continue to teach, code, conduct Zoom meetings or trade stocks.

According to the Pew study, among racial and ethnic groups, 48% of Asian workers and 44% of white workers could potentially telework, compared with 34% of black workers and 26% of Hispanic workers. Differences in education levels are again a factor. In February, about two-thirds (66%) of Asian workers had a bachelor’s degree or higher, compared with 44% of white, 33% of black and 21% of Hispanic workers.

Businesses that required their employees to commute to an office, meet face-to-face and interact with other workers are find out during the coronavirus environment, that while the social benefits of brick-and-mortar offices might suffer, productivity has not.

While the ability to work remotely is no guarantee of continued employment, it has become a realistic option for many workers in the internet age. Some 73% of American adults reported having broadband access at home in 2019, and 25% of workers did work at home at least occasionally in 2017-18. The share who work from home may increase for good as workplaces adapt to the post-COVID-19 environment.

Foreign-born workers – with Hispanic workers alone accounting for 46% of the immigrant workforce – saw sharper losses than US-born workers, especially in jobs that could not be teleworked.

Like most other groups, workers at all levels of education appear to have experienced greater losses in employment if they could not telework. 

But the differences are not always statistically significant. The employment of workers with a college degree was essentially unchanged whether they could work remotely or not. Workers with a high school diploma experienced sizable losses in employment, whether they could telework or not, reports Pew.

A report by Nielsen says Asian Americans have the highest level of connectivity to the Internet for gathering information and news, shopping, socializing or for work.

A second Nielsen survey found that Asian Americans appear among the most willing to embrace and adapt to the new digital workplace.

Although Asian Americans might be able to telework during this tumultuous time, that is not a salve for the US economy. Other groups, -- mainly Blacks and Hispanics -- work at jobs that cannot telework.

And despite the findings of these reports from Pew and the Economic Policy Institute, statistics released by the New York Department of Labor showed that in the last four weeks, jobless claims for Asian Americans rose a record 6900%