Labor Demand for Digital Skills in Post-2022 Ukraine: Evidence from Online Job Vacancy Data

Yurii Kleban and Britta Laurin Rude

No 11446, Policy Research Working Paper Series from The World Bank

Abstract: This paper examines how invasion-related disruption reshapes the demand for digital skills. The analysis uses a novel dataset of millions of online job vacancies in Ukraine from 2021 to 2025 classified with large language models and mapped to the ESCO taxonomy. The paper links vacancy-level skill data to high-frequency ACLED attack intensity measures and estimate time-series models. The findings document a robust positive association between attack intensity and the digital skill share of job postings, consistent across specifications and alternative attack measures. Within- and between-occupation shifts and remote work adoption jointly drive this increase, with within-occupation reskilling and upskilling alone accounting for roughly half of the total rise. The growing digital skill share partly reflects the relative resilience of digital hiring against a broader contraction in the volume of vacancies. These findings carry concrete implications for dig-ital reskilling policy, labor market monitoring, and recovery and reconstruction planning.

Date: 2026-09-14
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-big, nep-cis and nep-tra
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