Teleworking has fallen significantly over the last year, but remains far greater for workers with higher levels of educational attainment: Share of employed that teleworked, overall and by education level, May 2020–April 2021
| date | Total, 15 years and older (ATUS) | High school or less (ATUS) | Some college (ATUS) | Bachelor’s or higher (ATUS) | Total, 16 years and older | High school or less | Some college | Bachelor’s or higher |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017/2018 | 8.07% | 3.00% | 5.90% | 15.44% | ||||
| May-2020 | 35.47% | 12.15% | 23.65% | 59.64% | ||||
| Jun-2020 | 31.34% | 9.91% | 20.83% | 54.00% | ||||
| Jul-2020 | 26.52% | 8.05% | 17.68% | 46.29% | ||||
| Aug-2020 | 24.39% | 6.75% | 15.95% | 43.35% | ||||
| Sep-2020 | 22.72% | 6.34% | 14.43% | 41.28% | ||||
| Oct-2020 | 21.26% | 5.58% | 13.43% | 39.43% | ||||
| Nov-2020 | 21.85% | 5.79% | 14.64% | 39.91% | ||||
| Dec-2020 | 23.77% | 6.78% | 15.51% | 42.76% | ||||
| Jan-2021 | 23.30% | 6.36% | 14.53% | 42.28% | ||||
| Feb-2021 | 22.71% | 6.16% | 14.08% | 40.85% | ||||
| Mar-2021 | 20.98% | 6.27% | 13.39% | 37.29% | ||||
| Apr-2021 | 18.32% | 4.78% | 11.16% | 33.82% |
Notes: 2017/2018 ATUS estimates show the share of employed who teleworked prior to the recent recession; these estimates include workers 15 years and older who teleworked for any reason for one day a week or more. This differs from EPI estimates using the CPS for workers who are 16 years and older who teleworked for some amount of time, but only for reasons related to the coronavirus pandemic. Because the 2020–2021 numbers do not include those teleworking for other reasons, they do not include the universe of teleworkers included in the ATUS measure and therefore provides a lower bound on the number of people teleworking in the recent period.
Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics American Time Use Survey (ATUS); authors' analysis of EPI Current Population Survey Extracts, Version 1.0.14 (2021), https://microdata.epi.org and the Current Population Survey COVID supplement.