Work-life balance becomes worse for working women during pandemic, finds survey

According to the report, ''Women@Work'', on the effects of COVID-19 on the women workforce in the formal sector in India, over 80 per cent of working women in India, who participated in the survey, said they have been negatively impacted in some form or the other during COVID-19 with the work-life balance becoming worse.

As per the report, 38.5 per cent of working women surveyed said they were adversely affected by the burden of added housework, childcare and eldercare while 43.7 per cent said that work-life balance has become worse.

The report was launched by not-for-profit firm Aspire for Her and Sustainable Advancements on Thursday. Madhura DasGupta Sinha, Founder & CEO of Aspire For Her said the pandemic has had a perceptible impact on women in various stages of their lives, across different industry sectors, occupational status, work experience, and life stages.

The research was conducted during the third quarter of the financial year 2020-21 on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the women workforce in the formal sector, correlating them to four variables - industry sector, occupational status, work experience and hierarchical position. The research was conducted with a sample size of 800 women across the metropolitan cities of Mumbai, Kolkata, Bengaluru, Delhi, Chennai, Hyderabad, Bhubaneswar, Ranchi, Jaipur, Pune and Ahmedabad.

The research had the highest representation from the corporate sector (41 per cent), followed by academic (21 per cent), Self-employed (10 per cent), healthcare/essential Service (9 per cent), Government (5 per cent), Civil Society (1 per cent) and others (13 per cent).