Workforce Anxiety Due to Covid-19 Pandemic: The Mediation Effect of Personal Finance among Private Labor Force in Kerala

The COVID-19 pandemic hit at its worse on the economic and social conditions of the workers across the world. Studying how COVID-19 has created anxiety among the private workforce in Kerala can contribute significant input to the policymakers. The place of this research is also important as Kerala is a state with a strong public health care system and a sizeable number of workers from Kerala are employed in the private sector. The objectives of this study are to measure the direct impact of COVID-19 on workforce anxiety and to analyze the mediation effect of personal finance on workforce anxiety during the COVID-19 pandemic. Principal Component Analysis was done to identify the influential variables under each factor. After ensuring the reliability, validity, and consistency of the questions, the regression analysis was carried out. The statistical software’s IBM SPSS Statistics 20 and PROCESS macro 3.5 were used for data analysis. The initial hypothesis (H1) of this study was COVID-19 has a direct relationship with the worker's anxiety. The result of the regression analysis confirmed this assumption. The mediating role of personal finance during the impact of COVID-19 on the worker's anxiety was tested through the bootstrapping method and the indirect effect of COVID-19 on the worker's anxiety through personal finance is also positive and significant. This study is suggesting numerous measures to the policymakers and to the corporate for addressing the worker's anxiety in the social and economic levels.