Employment Vulnerability and Union Dissolution: Evidence on Intentions and Behaviors in Times of COVID-19 in Five European Countries

Couples’ stability at younger ages is often a precondition for family formation and childbearing. While there is evidence that the COVID-19 crisis has impacted union formation in high-income countries, micro-level studies on union dissolution are almost absent. Our data stems from the Youth Report project of Toniolo Institute, collected in April/May and October/November 2021, on quota samples of young individuals (aged 18 to 34) in Italy, France, Germany, Spain, and the UK. Our explorative research, undertaken with logistic regression models, provides evidence on how employment vulnerability (e.g., holding a temporary occupation) was associated with different likelihoods of breaking up (or intending to) before the COVID-19 pandemic. We find that employment vulnerability spilled into separation plans during the economic recession and in European regions (NUTS-1 or NUTS-2 level) reporting poorly performing labor markets, in terms of young women’s employment and young adults’ unemployment. Additionally, among men with less vulnerable employment conditions, couple stability is less negatively affected by the recession. Finally, we find that men report a higher likelihood of revising their pre-pandemic intention to break up for non-economic reasons, which is interpretable—at least in some cases—as evidence of a “cocoon effect”.