Social Policy and Coping with Precarity During COVID-19: Experiences of Hotel Employees in the Cape Metropolis of Ghana

While precarious employment is not novel, COVID-19 has exposed the weakness of existing social policy structures to shield people from crises. This paper describes precarity and limitations of social policy in the hotel sector in Ghana. Using interpretative phenomenology, I draw on in-depth interviews with 17 hotel wage workers to reveal the experiences of precarity in the hotel working environment. Findings illustrate workers experienced reduced earnings, anxiety about job security, limited social protection and control over work schedules. I also document the workers' responses to precarious working conditions, which show varied coping strategies. I noted that the workers drew from their savings, cut down expenditure on non-food items and relied on support from family and friends. I explain the social policy implications by highlighting how transformative social policy instruments can be adopted to reduce precarity in the labor market. This article calls for a scale-up effort on social policy reforms.