Research is developing rapidly during the COVID-19 pandemic, a time when the public needs access to factual information. Many HCEO members are at the forefront of coronavirus-related research, examining areas ranging from unemployment numbers to the healthcare system to housing policy. Below you can find links to a range of research and writing from our members. We will update with new research as it becomes available.
Inequality
HI/MIP network member Kate Pickett and co-authors show how COVID-19 has exposed inequalities in the UK food system
In another project, Pickett and colleagues assess the impact of COVID on vulnerable groups in the UK
ECI network member Plamen Nikolov used a randomized field experiment to examine the economic determinants for social distancing
The COVID Inequality Project, from ECI network member Teodora Boneva and SSSI alums Christopher Rauh and Abi Adams-Prassl, revealed key findings:
- America's inequalities are being further increased by COVID-19
- COVID-19 had a large and unequal impact on workers
- Containment measures in the US and the UK were highly unequal and exacerbated inequalities.
- The Impact of the Coronavirus Lockdown on Mental Health: Evidence from the US
ECI network member Orla Doyle authored this perspective from Ireland: COVID-19: Exacerbating Educational Inequalities?
In this HCEO working paper "Family Life in Lockdown," ECI/HI network member Pietro Biroli and co-authors studied how the pandemic-altered daily routines in ways that contributed to gender inequality within the household.
FI/ECI network member Daniela Del Boca and co-authors also analyzed the gender distribution of the additional workload associated with COVID-19 in the HCEO working paper Women’s Work, Housework and Childcare, Before and During COVID-19.
In Gender Inequality in COVID-19 Times: Evidence from UK Prolific Participants, FI network members Climent Quintana-Domeque and Sonia Oreffice investigate gender differences across socioeconomic and well-being dimensions after three months of lockdown in the UK.
Quintana-Domeque and Eugenio Proto also assess and quantify changes in mental health among ethnic groups in the UK in this HCEO working paper.
MIP network member Carol Graham and co-authors found Blacks and Latinos remained more resilient and optimistic during the outbreak in Coping with COVID-19: Implications of Differences in Resilience across Racial Groups for Mental Health and Well-being.
MIP network member Manasi Deshpande spoke to the New York Times about how the closure of Social Security field offices, all of which were closed during the pandemic, disproportionately discourages impacts low-income people from applying.
Learning Loss and Impact on Young Children
Markets network member Dirk Krueger and colleagues estimated pandemic learning loss and future economic impact in one paper. Their approach is detailed here.
Emma Tominey, an ECI network member, and co-authors examine children’s socioemotional skills and the home environment
Research by Markets network member Matthias Doepke's work on how COVID-19 is exacerbating inequalities in education was featured in The Economist
HI network member Gabriella Conti wrote about supporting parents and children in the early years during (and after) the COVID-19 crisis for VoxEU.
Conti also discussed the effects of the coronavirus on inequality, mothers, and children for University College London's COVID-19 podcast.
MIP network member Aaron Sojourner coauthored Child Care is Key to Our Economic Recovery. This report from the National Women's Law Center and the Center for Law and Social Policy finds that at least $9.6 billion is needed each month to fully fund existing providers in the child care system during the coronavirus pandemic. This report was cited in the Washington Post, CNBC, and Bloomberg Law, among other news outlets.
A new proposal from Sojourner and Elizabeth E. Davis posits that the government should provide every American family with access to high-quality, affordable early childhood care and education services.
Unemployment and Markets
Predicting Initial Unemployment Insurance Claims Using Google Trends
- In advance of each week’s release, MIP network members Aaron Sojourner and Paul Goldsmith-Pinkham construct harmonized news-based measures of UI claims in a state over various sets of consecutive days. They forecast state and national UI claims using the estimated daily model.
Markets can improve rationing of medical supplies, writes MIP network leader Scott Kominers
Price gouging represents a shift in essential goods from the poor to the wealthy at the worst time, according to Scott Kominers
Paying It Backward and Forward: Expanding Access to Convalescent Plasma Therapy Through Market Design, by HCEO members Scott Kominers and Parag Pathak, and co-authors
Health versus Wealth: On the Distributional Effects of Controlling a Pandemic In this HCEO working paper, Markets network members Andy Glover and Dirk Krueger and co-authors study the optimal economic mitigation policy of a utilitarian government that can redistribute across individuals.
Sectoral Digital Intensity and GDP Growth After a Large Employment Shock: A Simple Extrapolation Exercise This HCEO working paper, by Markets network member Giovanni Gallipoli and Christos Makridis, looks at how coronavirus has affected output and employment, mediated by the digital economy.
US Unemployment Insurance Replacement Rates During the Pandemic In this paper, Markets network member Peter Ganong and co-authors Pascal Noel and Joseph Vavra use micro data on earnings along with the details of each state's UI system under the CARES Act to compute the entire distribution of current UI benefits. They find that two-thirds of UI eligible workers can receive benefits that exceed lost earnings.
- This work has been featured on CNBC, the New York Times, NPR, and the Financial Times, among other outlets.
This Time It’s Different: The Role of Women’s Employment in a Pandemic Recession by FI/Markets network member Michèle Tertilt, Markets network member Matthias Doepke, and co-authors
Home Production and Leisure During the COVID-19 Recession by FI/Markets network member Oksana Leukhina and Zhixiu Yu
Spending and Job Search Impacts of Expanded Unemployment Benefits: Evidence from Administrative Micro Data by Markets network member Peter Ganong and co-authors Fiona Greig, Max Liebeskind, Pascal Noel, Daniel M. Sullivan, and Joseph Vavra
Who's In and Who's Out Under Workplace Covid Symptom Screeing, by MIP network member Aaron Sojourner and co-authors Krista Ruffini and Abigail Wozniak
From Mancession to Shecession: Women’s Employment in Regular and Pandemic Recessions, by Markets/FI network member Michèle Tertilt, Markets network member Matthias Doepke, and co-authors
Information and Misinformation
The Relation between Media Consumption and Misinformation at the Outset of the SARS-CoV-2 Pandemic in the US, by Kathleen Hall Jamieson IP network member Dolores Albarracin
Demand for protective gear and Covid-19 information in the UK, by FI network members Climent Quintana-Domeque and Sonia Oreffice
Impact in China
China’s early warning system didn’t work on COVID-19, writes MIP network member Dali Yang
Dali Yang provides insight into the early actions in Wuhan
Policy Impact
Markets Markets network member Dirk Krueger and colleagues followed up work estimating learning loss from COVID school closings with a paper that suggested a policy to extend schooling into the summer could reverse the impact of learning loss and pay for itself by preventing future income loss and increasing tax revenues.
COVID-19 Housing Policy Scorecard
- To better understand the steps states have taken to prevent homelessness during and after the pandemic, the Eviction Lab, directed by MIP network member Matthew Desmond, and Columbia Law School’s Professor Emily Benfer have developed a policy scorecard for each state, distilling the contents of thousands of newly-released emergency orders, declarations, and legislation into a clear set of critical measures included in, and left out of, state-level pandemic responses related to eviction and housing.
Optimal Management of an Epidemic: An Application to COVID-19. A Progress Report, by Markets network member Carlos Garriga, Rody Manuelli, and Siddhartha Sanghi
MIP network member Matthew Desmond spoke to NPR about what states are doing to help renters
An SEIR Infectious Disease Model with Testing and Conditional Quarantine, HCEO working paper by Markets network member Kyle Herkenhoff, Simon Mongey, and David Berger
Effect of Universal TB Vaccination and Other Policy-Relevant Factors on the Probability of Patient Death from COVID-19 In this HCEO working paper, MIP network member Amos Golan and co-authors work to identify underlying policy-relevant factors that could be leveraged to decrease future COVID-19 death rates.
The implications of silent transmission for the control of COVID-19 outbreaks HI network leader Burton Singer and co-authors find that symptom-based isolation must be supplemented by rapid contact tracing and testing that identifies asymptomatic and presymptomatic cases, in order to safely lift current restrictions and minimize the risk of resurgence.
Demand for COVID-19 Antibody Testing and Why It Should Be Free In this HCEO working paper, MIP network member Nora Szech and Marta Serra-Garcia study individual demand for COVID-19 antibody tests in an incentivized study on a representative sample of the US population.
Predictors of Social Distancing and Mask-Wearing Behavior: Panel Survey in Seven U.S. States by ECI network member Plamen Nikolov and co-authors
In this HCEO working paper, MIP network member Nora Szech and Marta Serra-Garcia study the effects of two measures to increase vaccination and testing: "choice architecture" and monetary compensations.
COVID-19 is a global problem that needs a global solution, Markets network member Raghuram Rajan wrote early in the pandemic.