Despite reopening, some jobs lost to virus are gone for good

BANGKOK (AP) — Factories and stores are reopening, economies are reawakening – but many jobs just aren’t coming back.

That’s the harsh truth facing workers laid off around the U.S. and the world, from restaurants in Thailand to car factories in France, whose livelihoods fell victim to a virus-driven recession that’s accelerating decline in struggling industries and upheaval across the global workforce.

New U.S. jobless figures to be released Friday are expected to show millions more people's wages are disappearing, which in turn means less money spent in surviving stores, restaurants and travel businesses, with repercussions across economies rich and poor.

“My boss feared that since we come from Kibera (an impoverished slum), we might infect them with COVID-19, and so he let us go,” said Margaret Awino, a cleaning worker in a Nairobi charity. “I don’t know how I can go on.”

As the virus and now protests across the U.S. have shed new light on economic inequalities, some experts say it’s time to rethink work, wages and health benefits altogether, especially as automation escalates and traditional trades vanish.

THAI CHEF

When Wannapa Kotabin got a job as an assistant chef in the kitchen of one of Bangkok’s longest-established Italian restaurants, she thought her career was set.

But five years on, she’s in line with more than 100 other jobless Thais outside an unemployment office.

The government ordered all restaurants closed in March to combat the coronavirus, and 38-year-old Wannapa has been spending her savings on food and shelter.

When restaurants were allowed to re-open in May, Wannapa’s restaurant told staff its closure was permanent.

“I never thought this would happen,” she said. “It’s like my heart got broken twice.”

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