Asia is one of the most diverse regions on earth. Some countries are characterized by poverty and the daily struggle for livelihood, while others are among the strongest and most dynamically growing parts of world economy. COVID-19 caused a real global economic downturn, which led to a sudden rise in unemployment and income-induced insecurity. We have focused our research on three countries. One of them is Japan: it is one of the most stable economies in the region and has long been one of the model states for the modern economy. The other is South Korea: one of the fastest growing economies in Asia, with extensive international connections. The third country is Australia, which belongs to the Anglo-Saxon culture. Our research goal was to examine the evolution of unemployment in the decade before the pandemic, and the impact of short-term measures introduced because of the epidemic. For our study, we chose the ARIMA method, which is suitable for the analysis of long time series based on the OECD database and for estimating the future development of the data. Our results show that because of the epidemic, unemployment increased in all the three countries studied, but due to the typical response strategy of each country, the subsequent development of the data was no longer the same. In our study, we examine the labour market impact of each protection strategy and draw attention to the most effective ways of protection against a subsequent pandemic.