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Social stability challenged by Covid-19: Pandemics, inequality and policy responses

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  • Perugini, Cristiano
  • Vladisavljević, Marko

Abstract

The public health measures implemented to limit the COVID-19 pandemic are likely to affect economic inequalities. In this paper we first provide a theoretical framework to analyse how income inequality contributes shaping the trade-off between economic lockdown and contagion. Our empirical analysis on EU countries shows that the lockdown is likely to significantly increase inequality and poverty and that the magnitude of the change is larger in more unequal countries. To avoid social collapse, countries must consider inequality as an additional source of fragility, while supranational, coordinated health and fiscal policies are needed in the interest of all European economies.

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  • Perugini, Cristiano & Vladisavljević, Marko, 2021. "Social stability challenged by Covid-19: Pandemics, inequality and policy responses," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 43(1), pages 146-160.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jpolmo:v:43:y:2021:i:1:p:146-160
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jpolmod.2020.10.004
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    Cited by:

    1. Isaure Delaporte & Julia Escobar & Werner Peña, 2021. "The distributional consequences of social distancing on poverty and labour income inequality in Latin America and the Caribbean," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 34(4), pages 1385-1443, October.
    2. Piotr Skórka & Beata Grzywacz & Dawid Moroń & Magdalena Lenda, 2022. "COVID-19 in Memes: The Adaptive Response of Societies to the Pandemic?," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(19), pages 1-24, October.
    3. Mladen Stamenković, 2023. "Where Did All The Papers Go? A Bibliometric Overview Of Publications In Economics From Serbia," Economic Annals, Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Belgrade, vol. 68(236), pages 29-50, January –.
    4. Bonfiglio, Andrea & Coderoni, Silvia & Esposti, Roberto, 2022. "Policy responses to COVID-19 pandemic waves: Cross-region and cross-sector economic impact," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 44(2), pages 252-279.
    5. Goel, Rajeev K. & Nelson, Michael A. & Goel, Viraat Y., 2021. "COVID-19 vaccine rollout—scale and speed carry different implications for corruption," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 43(3), pages 503-520.
    6. Giammetti, Raffaele & Papi, Luca & Teobaldelli, Désirée & Ticchi, Davide, 2022. "The optimality of age-based lockdown policies," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 44(3), pages 722-738.
    7. Giovanni Busetta & Maria Gabriella Campolo & Demetrio Panarello, 2023. "Economic expectations and anxiety during the COVID-19 pandemic: a one-year longitudinal evaluation on Italian university students," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 57(1), pages 59-76, February.
    8. Luciano Ciravegna & Snejina Michailova, 2022. "Why the world economy needs, but will not get, more globalization in the post-COVID-19 decade," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 53(1), pages 172-186, February.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    COVID-19 pandemic; Lockdown; Inequality; Social stability; Supranational policy coordination;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution
    • E61 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Policy Objectives; Policy Designs and Consistency; Policy Coordination
    • H31 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents - - - Household
    • I30 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General

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