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About 1 million working mothers have stopped working during the pandemic, and more could follow.

Staggering stat: 23% of women with kids under the age of 10 are considering leaving the workforce, compared with 13% of men, according to a McKinsey survey.

There's a slew of reasons why balancing work and parenting is hitting mothers harder than fathers.

Women spend an average of five more hours on child care and chores per week than men, per a report from scholars at London Business School and Harvard Business School.

And many teleworking women have had to give up their house's one home office to their husbands — forcing them to work in less-than-ideal spaces, adding to stress and chipping away at productivity.

But it's not just what's happening in the home. There are dynamics at work that hurt women more than men, Ashley Whillans of Harvard Business School and Grant Donnelly of Ohio State University write in the Wall Street Journal.

Women are likelier than their male colleagues to take on administrative tasks, which means they're often saddled with urgent deadlines rather than work they can complete on a flexible schedule.

And women are less likely than male colleagues to request deadline extensions at work, per new research from Whillans and Donnelly.

They looked at a group of college students studying business and found that the men were "nearly twice as likely" as the women to ask for an extension on a big assignment. 

"Students who asked for an extension received grades that were 8.2% higher, on average. Because of their hesitation to ask for more time, female students’ performance suffered," the researchers write.

The bottom line: Working parents represent a whopping third of the U.S. workforce — and companies need to address burnout to retain this talent.

Strategies that can help include setting company-wide policies for deadline extensions, so everyone feels comfortable asking for the time they need, Whillans and Donnelly note.

Why working mothers are burning out

Women are less likely to ask for deadline extensions at work than men.

Illustration of a baby monitor on a busy work desk

Women in business

Jobs

After a record economic expansion, the coronavirus pandemic sent the U.S. economy into a recession as unemployment soared to staggering heights. The country now faces urgent questions about how much stimulus is needed for reeling consumers and businesses, and what a recovery might look like.

Economy & Business

Data: Employment Cost Index, via U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics; Chart: Axios Visuals

America's pay gains just logged a fresh record: wages and salaries surged at the fastest pace ever last quarter.

Why it matters: The data out Friday morning is considered a better gauge of wage gains than others because it's not impacted by the drastic workforce shifts we've seen during the pandemic.

The backdrop: Employers are still doling out pay hikes in an attempt to break a labor shortage stalemate.

Costco this week made a last-ditch effort to lure (and keep) workers as the all-important holiday season looms: effective Monday, employees will make a minimum of $17 an hour.

It's the second pay raise in eight months (Costco upped it to $16 in February).

What to watch: The retail sector's trade group said Wednesday the sector will hire up to 665,000 seasonal workers this season — one sign of the ferocious appetite by employers to keep up with the demand they expect for their goods.

That would be 179,000 more holiday hires than last year, if they can find the people.

One big asterisk: "With prices up 4.4% over the last 12 months, wage increases are barely keeping pace with inflation," economists at Brean Capital wrote Friday.

U.S. wages and salaries jump 1.5% in last quarter

Costco and other employers are still doling out pay hikes in an attempt to break a labor shortage stalemate.

Wages

Interest in IT and media jobs is surging, but no one wants to fill the sorely needed child care and home health roles.

Why it matters: Workers have the power, and some industries are struggling way more to hire than others, according to a new report from the jobs site Indeed. Labor shortages in those industries will continue to hobble the economy.

By the numbers: Interest in civil engineering jobs and IT operations jobs has surged the most since the pre-pandemic era. Postings for both types of jobs are getting 59% more clicks on Indeed now than in February 2020.

Interest in media and communication jobs is up 48%, and clicks for software development jobs have jumped 48%.

What's happening: Only around 37% of U.S. jobs can be done from home, per an analysis by economists at the University of Chicago. But more and more people are eager to secure those jobs for the flexibility they provide during the pandemic and beyond, says Indeed economist AnnElizabeth Konkel.

That explains the uptick in interest for jobs in IT and civil engineering, many of which are welcoming to career-switchers. 

Employers in these fields will often hire applicants who have taken short-term, skill-building courses even if their educational background is not in tech.

At the same time, Indeed's report shows that interest in loading and stocking jobs at warehouses has cratered 40%. Clicks for food service jobs are down 18%. And interest in personal care and home health jobs and child care jobs is down 33% and 15%, respectively.

The jobs in this group are all in-person roles with relatively low pay, says Konkel. And the gap between the number of open roles and the number of interested applicants keeps growing in these critical industries. 

For example, 9.8% of personal care and home health job postings and 4.8% of child care jobs on Indeed were "hiring urgently," well above the site's national average of 2.6% of job postings. 

"Those employers are likely going to continue to experience hiring difficulties in the immediate term," Konkel says.

The stakes: The labor shortages in each of the industries seeing declining interest will send ripples through the entire economy.

Loading and stocking jobs are key to supporting America's booming pandemic-fueled e-commerce habit. And restaurants keep reducing hours or shuttering because they can't find kitchen staff and waiters.

The labor shortage in child care is weighing on the post-pandemic recovery, as parents — who make up one-third of the U.S. workforce — keep delaying their return to work because they can't find child care, reports Axios' Courtenay Brown.

And the shortage in personal and home health care jobs is set to worsen as demand increases. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects home health aide jobs will grow 33% in the next decade as our society ages and as more people need long-term care after battling COVID-19.

What to watch: It'll be tough for employers to fill these jobs that are losing clicks unless they keep raising wages, Konkel says. Take hospitality and leisure, an industry in which interest was dipping but rose back up to pre-pandemic levels after wages went up.

But some industries in which interest is waning have been so battered by the pandemic that they just can't afford to bump pay.

Jobs people want — and don't want — after the pandemic

Clicks on Indeed to apply for food service jobs are down 18%.

Illustration of a job posting shaped as a briefcase with two strips missing

More companies are bowing to unprecedented calls to conduct "racial audits." Now there's a new playbook — backed by the likes of former American Express CEO Ken Chenault and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund's Sherrilyn Ifill  — for how they should do it.

Why it matters: Shareholders are newly demanding that businesses evaluate if and how they perpetuate racism. But how those inventories are done is left up to the companies, stoking fears such reviews will be watered down.

What they're saying: "We're trying to prevent this work from going the way of greenwashing, where companies can make these great pronouncements, but there's no meat behind their actions," Laura Murphy, an ex-ACLU official who authored the playbook, tells Axios.

Murphy helped Airbnb and Facebook conduct racial audits in recent years.

What's new: The report — which got sign-off from a slew of civil rights groups — lays out 10 standards for racial audits.

Among them: Executives should provide third parties with "adequate resources" and total access to information to complete the review, with input from civil rights advocates in the process. 

It also says the findings — and what the company plans to do in response — should be released to the public.

Between the lines: Companies are under no obligation to follow these guidelines. But since shareholders are the force behind the push, Murphy hopes they use this as a framework for their demands.  

Flashback: For the first time ever, racial audits were proposed during shareholder meeting this year. Companies from Amazon to Johnson & Johnson — and 10 others —  faced the calls from investors.

Yes, but: Even if companies agree to audits, it's unclear whether the reviews actually force change. They aren't binding. 

Take Facebook. Findings from its two-year racial audit were released last year. One big takeaway was the social media giant hasn't done nearly enough to combat hate and abuse on its platform — a criticism it's still facing.

"Our work is nowhere near done, but the civil rights audit was a critical first step," Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky says in the framework released today. 

What's next: Citigroup said last week it will undergo a racial equity audit. Shareholders called for one at the company's investor meeting earlier this year, but the bank (like its peers) told investors to vote it down.

Nearly 40% of shareholders voted in favor of the proposal.

That may have been enough to send a message. 

Starting in January, Citi said law firm Covington & Burling would assess its $1 billion commitment to help "close the racial wealth gap," announced in the wake of George Floyd's murder. 

The review will be led by Aaron Lewis, Axios has learned — who worked on Starbucks' civil rights assessment.

Between the lines: Citi's audit is not a companywide assessment — it has a limited scope. Still, the move was praised from the group that filed the shareholder proposal for an audit (they also called for one at eight other financial institutions).

"Citi is taking a critical step toward confronting centuries-old harms against marginalized communities that are still present to this day," SOC Investment Group's Dieter Waizenegger said in a release.

Editor's note: This article has been updated to correct Sherrilyn Ifill's organization. She works at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, not the NAACP.

"Racial audit" playbook pushed on companies with lacking practices

It outlines how companies should carry out demands for racial audits.

Illustration of a pattern of leather office chairs.

Activist shareholders

Stock market

Food insufficiency among those who missed a week of work due to having COVID-19 or care taking for someone with COVID

Data: Health Affairs; Chart: Danielle Alberti/Axios

Lower-wage workers in the U.S. were the most likely to report missing work due to COVID-19, but the least likely to have access to paid sick days or family leave, according to a new report out in Health Affairs on Monday. 

Why it matters: The gaps in paid leave policies is the latest evidence of food insecurity experienced during the pandemic among Americans who had to miss work because they were sick or had to take care of someone who was sick.

Taking half a day off may result in lost wages worth a household's monthly budget of fruits and vegetables, the report says.

But "being forced to miss an entire week without pay could result in a substantial lack of food."

By the numbers: Census Household Pulse Survey data collected by the study authors over the past year and a half showed workers earning less than $50,000 were more than four times as likely on average as workers earning $100,000 or more to report missing a whole week of work due to COVID-19 last year.

Many low-income households, which are twice as likely to be unvaccinated, and people of color cited postponing their shot to avoid missing work and wages needed to afford necessities like food, the authors write.

On the flip side, experts have argued, expanding paid sick leave policies could have a positive impact on vaccination rates by offering workers time to get the shot and leeway to recover from potential vaccine side effects. 

What to watch: Paid medical leave policies are among the major issues Congress remains at an impasse over this week.

Those who miss work without pay due to COVID also had food insecurity

Postponing their shot to avoid missing work and wages needed to afford necessities like food, workers said.

Visuals

Coronavirus

The U.S. faces a range of health care flashpoints — unaffordable drugs, opioids, vaping — as we debate whether to adopt universal care. For now, the Affordable Care Act is the law of the land, but Republicans want to issue it a final death blow.

Health

Monthly quits rate

Data: Bureau of Labor Statistics; Chart: Will Chase/Axios

Kentucky has the highest rate of job quitters in the nation, according to the inaugural release of state-level job openings and labor turnover data.

Why it matters: It offers a look at the places driving a pandemic-era trend that's seeing people leave their jobs in droves.

What's going on: Kentucky has a large concentration of jobs in warehousing and transportation — two sectors that have seen employees flee for better working conditions and pay.

Details: The rate of job openings in Kentucky (8%) is among the country's highest (second only to Alaska, 9%). At a national level, it's 6.6%.

There are two open jobs for every unemployed Kentuckian. That doesn't beat out Nebraska, however, which has three available gigs for every jobless person.

Bonus ... The place with the lowest quits rate? D.C.

Kentucky is America's job quitting capital

New data offers a look at a COVID-era trend that's seeing people leave their jobs in droves.

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Amazon employees allege that they have been shortchanged pay while on leave, according to a New York Times investigation published Sunday. 

Why it matters: Much of the recent spotlight on Amazon — along with Google, Apple and Facebook — has been over competition and privacy,  but labor concerns have been growing across the industry as well.

The Times tells the story of workers who were dealing with a new baby or health issue and found themselves being repeatedly underpaid. The issue appears to have gotten attention only after one worker wrote to then-CEO Jeff Bezos.

An Amazon spokeswoman told the Times that the company is still in the process of identifying affected workers and repaying them.

Amazon, which operates a network of warehouses and runs an extensive delivery operation, has faced unionization efforts, most recently a push at a facility in Bessemer, Alabama. An initial vote there failed to garner the needed votes, but federal regulators say labor laws may have been broken.

The big picture: Labor issues have been rising on the list of concerns brought up by workers at big tech companies. 

Chelsea Glasson is suing Google over pregnancy discrimination claims at Google, Ashley Gjøvik and several former colleagues have been raising a variety of workplace issues at Apple, while Facebook has faced criticism over the conditions faced by contract content moderators.

Update, 11:01 a.m. PT: Amazon said that the Times article incorrectly suggests that the issues are widespread and ongoing. "They are not," Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel said in a statement. "In fact, the controls we’ve implemented over the last 18 months have resulted in less than 1 percent of people experiencing an issue while being on paid leave."

Report: Amazon shortchanged workers on leave

Labor concerns have been growing across the Big Tech industry.

Illustration of a frowny face with an upside down Amazon arrow as the mouth.

Amazon

Big Tech

From the Valley to D.C., Big Tech players like Facebook, Google and Amazon are under more scrutiny than ever as new technology develops and privacy and antitrust concerns grow in lockstep with companies’ ambitions.

Technology

Data: Morning Consult/Axios Inequality Index; Chart: Axios Visuals

Polling for the Morning Consult/Axios Inequality Index suggests that as the Delta variant ebbed over the last month, job security improved for lower-income Americans.

The big picture: As a result of the improving environment, the Inequality Index this month declined to its lowest point since April — reversing a significant spike in September.

Why it matters: The sharp reversal shows that “the impact of the Delta variant on the economy was largely acute rather than chronic,” John Leer, Morning Consult chief economist, tells Axios.

High-frequency data like this and others that Morning Consult has analyzed imply that more individuals are going back to work — and that the October employment report might show more job growth than the disappointing figures of the last two months.

The details: The share of workers earning less than $50,000 a year expecting to experience a loss of employment income in the next four weeks fell to 14.9% in October from 16.8% in September.

Adults in the same category who lacked savings to cover basic expenses for one month fell by more than 3 percentage points to 27.7%.

The bottom line: “Continued improvements in income inequality will depend on labor market tightness,” Leer says. “Should reported labor shortages translate into increased leverage for lower-wage workers, wage growth at the bottom end of the income spectrum will likely continue to outpace inflation and boost relative living standards.”

Inequality Index signals October jobs growth for lower-income Americans

The Inequality Index this month declined to its lowest point since April — reversing a significant spike in September.

Economic inequality

Report: U.S. Latinos near 50% homeownership rate

The Hispanic Wealth Project found that homeownership rate grew despite Latinos lacking diversified financial assets.

Real estate broker  Alex Betances sits in front of a home ion Reading, Penn. 

Real estate broker Alex Betances sits in front of a home in Reading, Pa. Photo: Ryan McFadden/MediaNews Group/Reading Eagle via Getty Image

Hispanic and Latino Americans

Real estate broker Alex Betances sits in front of a home ion Reading, Pa.

More than 5% of all U.S. job postings on the site Indeed are trying to lure applicants with hiring perks like cash bonuses, per new data. 

The big picture: That sounds like a small percentage, but it represents hundreds of thousands of jobs across several industries and states.

Why it matters: Businesses of all sizes have started posting scores of open roles as the country reopens post-pandemic. But they're still struggling to fill them as workers stay home to avoid the risk of infection or take care of children. Some also still have a financial cushion from recently expired unemployment benefits.

And the desperation is getting worse. The share of postings offering incentives and bonuses to take a job — or even just take an interview — has more than doubled since this time last year, when it was 2.3%.

What to watch: Many businesses — such as fast-food restaurants — have cut hours or menu offerings to deal with staff shortages. Look for that to continue as they keep struggling to fill jobs.

And worker shortages could get even worse due to vaccine mandates if some people quit when they're told they need to get the jab to keep the job.

Hundreds of thousands of job postings are offering hiring incentives

Businesses — large and small — are struggling to fill open roles.

Illustration of increasingly desperate "now hiring" signs

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