The Korea Spatial Planning Review 2025 KCI Impact Factor : 2.35
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pISSN : 1229-8638
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Effects of Job Structure in Local Labor Market Areas on Regional Economic Resilience: Focusing on the COVID-19 Shock and Recovery Periods
- The Korea Spatial Planning Review
- 2025, 127(), pp.91~115
- DOI : 10.15793/kspr.2025.127..005
- Publisher : 국토연구원
- Research Area :
- Received : August 13, 2025
- Accepted : November 21, 2025
- Published : December 31, 2025
CHANGHYUN SONG 1, Up Lim 1
1연세대학교
Accredited
ABSTRACT
This study explores the patterns of occupational employment shocks and subsequent recovery within local labor market areas in Korea and empirically analyzes the heterogeneous effects of COVID-19 on employment, depending on the structure of local labor markets. Based on the importance ratings of occupational task characteristics, four types of occupational skills were derived through exploratory factor analysis. Using these classifications, skill specialization indices were calculated for each region. The study defines the year 2020 as the shock period and the years 2021 to 2022 as the recovery period. Spatial econometric models were employed to examine how regional specialization in different types of occupational skills influenced regional employment robustness and short-term recovery. The results indicate that local labor markets with high levels of cognitive and technical skill specialization exhibited greater robustness to employment shocks. Moreover, local labor markets specialized in cognitive skills demonstrated stronger recovery performance following the initial shock. In contrast, areas with high specialization in interpersonal or physical skills were more vulnerable to pandemic, related employment disruptions. In particular, local labor markets specialized with interpersonal skills showed persistent vulnerability during both the shock and recovery periods. These findings suggest that the structure and function of local labor markets can lead to diverse outcomes in response to external shocks, and they offer policy implications for enhancing regional resilience in local labor markets.
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This paper was written with support from the National Research Foundation of Korea.