In the United States, the proportion of people out of work hit a yearly total of 8.9%, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), signalling an end to a decade of jobs expansion.

Millions of workers have also been put on government-supported job retention schemes as parts of the economy, such as tourism and hospitality, have come to a near standstill.

The numbers of new job opportunities is still very low in many countries.

Job vacancies in Australia have returned to the same level of 2019, but they are lagging in France, Spain, the UK and several other countries.