Usually this message is a short one to thank our research partners and sponsors. Whilst we make those thanks, and sincerely, this year is also different. Let’s be honest, 2020 wasn’t a good year. As the Covid pandemic unfolded, jobs suffered and the labour market is now loosening. The pre-Covid rise in youth unemployment has become worse, a huge swathe of the self-employed have disappeared, and jobs that were furloughed in some industries are now disappearing as government support changes.

And as the pandemic hit, jobs became a public health issue. On the one hand, some workers, most obviously in health and social care, were directly exposed to the virus leading to infections and, tragically, deaths. Some workers, particularly from Black and Asian ethnic groups, were disproportionately affected. On the other hand, the importance of also protecting other workers in essential services in teaching, policing, food production, supermarkets and transportation for example became obvious.

IER was grateful during the lockdown to be able to support efforts to deal with the pandemic through new research: the pandemic’s impact on apprenticeships, the graduate labour market and working-class women, and within the UK and internationally, for example in Colombia and Australia. We even developed a method to identify occupations most at risk. Remote working in often challenging personal circumstances, IER’s researchers and support staff were a credit to the Institute and University. They underlined IER as a public service.

Now, as the Covid threat recedes hopefully, ideas developed by our researchers before and during the crisis will help the post-Covid recovery and growth. West Yorkshire Combined Authority has adopted the idea of piloting better use of skills in its businesses for example – an initiative developed by IER with the OECD. Similarly, IER’s project with Nottingham University that identifies the on-going challenges posed by Covid to working class women will, through the Women’s Budget Group, feed into national government policy.

Whilst a full return to the ‘old normal’ is unlikely, the ‘all change’ thesis mooted by many might be wishful thinking. It is more probable that the Covid pandemic will accelerate changes already mooted. Some of these trends are negative: rising precarious employment and constrained pay-packets for example. More positively, there is a good chance that more and better flexible (as distinct from remote) working might finally be achieved. Likewise longstanding calls for the creation of more climate-friendly jobs might also be realised. At the same time, we have to hope that those of us lucky enough to keep our jobs will emerge from the lockdowns cash rich and able to spend so that we stimulate consumer demand, thereby boosting labour markets in some industries and regions.

During the first lockdown we also called on the UK Government to revamp its Industrial Strategy. As the second wave of localised lockdowns eases, national and regional governments should set up taskforces to examine the future of work. The remit should be broader than the current debate focused on digitalisation and clever robots. Instead, the taskforce should have two linked remits. The first to boost employment and reboot self-employment. It should assess which jobs can be sustainably revived as well as created. The second to boost the quality of those jobs. It should ensure that all future jobs are healthy jobs and meet the material needs of all workers to have decent lives. If government really does start to build back better and these taskforces are set up, IER will be there to support their work through its research and evidence-based ideas.

Everyone in IER wishes you a hopeful 2021.