IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/idn/journl/v25y2022ispfp61-84.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Economic Effects Of Covid-19 Mitigation Policies On Unemployment And Economic Policy Uncertainty

Author

Listed:
  • Anasuya Haldar

    (National Institute of Technology Rourkela)

  • Narayan Sethi

    (National Institute of Technology Rourkela)

Abstract

This paper examines the effects of COVID-19 mitigation strategies and Economic Policy Uncertainty (EPU) on unemployment-rate over the period November 2019 to April 2021 for the 16 most severely COVID-19 affected countries. Our specific objectives are threefold: first, to examine the dynamic relationship between EPU and unemployment-rate; second, to analyze the extent to which government’s COVID-19 mitigation response affects the unemployment-rate; and third, to examine the effects of governments economic policies on the unemployment-rate through market indicators, such as the business and consumer confidence indices. We find that EPU increases fluctuations in unemployment for the COVID-19 affected countries, while governments’ vaccination drive significantly reduces it. Increases in government stringency aggravate unemployment in the informal sectors and enhances labor inequality.

Suggested Citation

  • Anasuya Haldar & Narayan Sethi, 2022. "The Economic Effects Of Covid-19 Mitigation Policies On Unemployment And Economic Policy Uncertainty," Bulletin of Monetary Economics and Banking, Bank Indonesia, vol. 25(Special I), pages 61-84, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:idn:journl:v:25:y:2022:i:spf:p:61-84
    DOI: https://doi.org/10.21098/bemp.v25i0.1833
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://bulletin.bmeb-bi.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1869&context=bmeb
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/https://doi.org/10.21098/bemp.v25i0.1833?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ismail O Fasanya & Oluwatomisin J Oyewole & Taofeek Agbatogun, 2021. "How Does Economic Policy Uncertainty Connect With the Volatility Spillovers in Asia-Pacific Markets?," Asian Economics Letters, Asia-Pacific Applied Economics Association, vol. 2(2), pages 1-6.
    2. Susanto Basu & Brent Bundick, 2017. "Uncertainty Shocks in a Model of Effective Demand," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 85, pages 937-958, May.
    3. Auray, Stéphane & Eyquem, Aurélien, 2020. "The macroeconomic effects of lockdown policies," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 190(C).
    4. Sylvain Leduc & Zheng Liu, 2012. "Uncertainty, unemployment, and inflation," FRBSF Economic Letter, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, issue sep17.
    5. Scott R. Baker & Nicholas Bloom & Steven J. Davis & Stephen J. Terry, 2020. "COVID-Induced Economic Uncertainty," NBER Working Papers 26983, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Maria Cristina Barbieri Góes & Ettore Gallo, 2021. "Infection Is the Cycle: Unemployment, Output and Economic Policies in the COVID-19 Pandemic," Review of Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 33(3), pages 377-393, July.
    7. Haochang Yang & Peidong Deng, 2021. "The Impact of COVID-19 and Government Intervention on Stock Markets of OECD Countries," Asian Economics Letters, Asia-Pacific Applied Economics Association, vol. 1(4), pages 1-6.
    8. Ololade Periola-Fatunsin & Johnson A. Oliyide & Ismail O. Fasanya, 2021. "Uncertainty Due to Pandemic and the Volatility Connectedness Among Asian REITs Market," Asian Economics Letters, Asia-Pacific Applied Economics Association, vol. 2(2), pages 1-5.
    9. Im, Kyung So & Pesaran, M. Hashem & Shin, Yongcheol, 2003. "Testing for unit roots in heterogeneous panels," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 115(1), pages 53-74, July.
    10. Bartosz Kozicki & Marcin Gornikiewicz, 2020. "Unemployment Rate in Poland and USA during COVID-19 Pandemic: A Case Study," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(Special 3), pages 187-200.
    11. Ben S. Bernanke, 1983. "Irreversibility, Uncertainty, and Cyclical Investment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 98(1), pages 85-106.
    12. Chinenye Ifeoma Nwokolo & Matthew Ikechukwu Ogbuagu & Onyebuchi Iwegbu, 2020. "Impact of Coronavirus Pandemic on the Global Economy: Demand and Supply Shocks," Ovidius University Annals, Economic Sciences Series, Ovidius University of Constantza, Faculty of Economic Sciences, vol. 0(1), pages 50-60, August.
    13. Ozili, Peterson Kitakogelu, 2021. "Economic policy uncertainty: are there regional and country correlation?," MPRA Paper 105636, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    14. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/32r3ebde539odb82dkmep529vf is not listed on IDEAS
    15. Warwick McKibbin & Roshen Fernando, 2021. "The Global Macroeconomic Impacts of COVID-19: Seven Scenarios," Asian Economic Papers, MIT Press, vol. 20(2), pages 1-30, Summer.
    16. Avinash K. Dixit & Robert S. Pindyck, 1994. "Investment under Uncertainty," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 5474.
    17. Armagan Gezici & Ozge Ozay, 2020. "An Intersectional Analysis of COVID-19 Unemployment," Journal of Economics, Race, and Policy, Springer, vol. 3(4), pages 270-281, December.
    18. Sangheon Lee & Dorothea Schmidt-Klau & Sher Verick, 2020. "The Labour Market Impacts of the COVID-19: A Global Perspective," The Indian Journal of Labour Economics, Springer;The Indian Society of Labour Economics (ISLE), vol. 63(1), pages 11-15, October.
    19. Ken Mayhew & Paul Anand, 2020. "COVID-19 and the UK labour market," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 36(Supplemen), pages 215-224.
    20. Morikawa, Masayuki, 2016. "How uncertain are economic policies? New evidence from a firm survey," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 114-122.
    21. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/5e33qpbdeh9pgbbfkkp2ddbtam is not listed on IDEAS
    22. Horvath, Jaroslav & Zhong, Jiansheng, 2019. "Unemployment dynamics in emerging countries: Monetary policy and external shocks," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 31-49.
    23. Anasuya Haldar & Narayan Sethi, 2021. "The Effect of Country-level Factors and Government Intervention on the Incidence of COVID-19," Asian Economics Letters, Asia-Pacific Applied Economics Association, vol. 1(2), pages 1-4.
    24. Andrew B. Abel & Janice C. Eberly, 1996. "Optimal Investment with Costly Reversibility," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 63(4), pages 581-593.
    25. Marta Fana & Sergio Torrejón Pérez & Enrique Fernández-Macías, 2020. "Employment impact of Covid-19 crisis: from short term effects to long terms prospects," Economia e Politica Industriale: Journal of Industrial and Business Economics, Springer;Associazione Amici di Economia e Politica Industriale, vol. 47(3), pages 391-410, September.
    26. Padhan, Rakesh & Prabheesh, K.P., 2021. "The economics of COVID-19 pandemic: A survey," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 220-237.
    27. Peterson K. Ozili, 2021. "Economic policy uncertainty: are there regional and country correlations?," International Review of Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 35(5), pages 714-728, September.
    28. Chun-Ping Chang & Gen-Fu Feng & Mingbo Zheng, 2021. "Government Fighting Pandemic, Stock Market Return, and COVID-19 Virus Outbreak," Emerging Markets Finance and Trade, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 57(8), pages 2389-2406, June.
    29. Narayan, Paresh Kumar, 2021. "COVID-19 research outcomes: An agenda for future research," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 439-445.
    30. Anasuya Haldar & Narayan Sethi, 2021. "The News Effect Of Covid-19 On Global Financial Market Volatility," Bulletin of Monetary Economics and Banking, Bank Indonesia, vol. 24(Special I), pages 33-58, January.
    31. Goswami, Binoy & Mandal, Raju & Nath, Hiranya K., 2021. "Covid-19 pandemic and economic performances of the states in India," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 461-479.
    32. Dan Andrews & Andrew Charlton & Angus Moore, 2021. "COVID-19, productivity and reallocation: Timely evidence from three OECD countries," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 1676, OECD Publishing.
    33. MORIKAWA Masayuki, 2016. "How Uncertain Are Economic Policies? Evidence from a survey on Japanese firms," Policy Discussion Papers 16008, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    34. Kong, Edward & Prinz, Daniel, 2020. "Disentangling policy effects using proxy data: Which shutdown policies affected unemployment during the COVID-19 pandemic?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 189(C).
    35. Stavros A. Drakopoulos, 2021. "The marginalization of absolute and relative income hypotheses of consumption and the role of fiscal policy," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 28(6), pages 965-984, November.
    36. Xin Gu & Shan Ying & Weiqiang Zhang & Yewei Tao, 2020. "How Do Firms Respond to COVID-19? First Evidence from Suzhou, China," Emerging Markets Finance and Trade, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 56(10), pages 2181-2197, August.
    37. Huayu Shen & Mengyao Fu & Hongyu Pan & Zhongfu Yu & Yongquan Chen, 2020. "The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Firm Performance," Emerging Markets Finance and Trade, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 56(10), pages 2213-2230, August.
    38. Patrick L Anderson, 2014. "Persistent Unemployment and Policy Uncertainty: Numerical Evidence from a New Approach," Business Economics, Palgrave Macmillan;National Association for Business Economics, vol. 49(1), pages 2-20, January.
    39. Levin, Andrew & Lin, Chien-Fu & James Chu, Chia-Shang, 2002. "Unit root tests in panel data: asymptotic and finite-sample properties," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 108(1), pages 1-24, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Iyke, Bernard Njindan & Maheepala, M.M.J.D., 2022. "Conventional monetary policy, COVID-19, and stock markets in emerging economies," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    2. Arbatli Saxegaard, Elif C. & Davis, Steven J. & Ito, Arata & Miake, Naoko, 2022. "Policy uncertainty in Japan," Journal of the Japanese and International Economies, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    3. N. Bloom, 2016. "Fluctuations in uncertainty," Voprosy Ekonomiki, NP Voprosy Ekonomiki, issue 4.
    4. Lorenzo Bretscher & Alex Hsu & Andrea Tamoni, 2019. "Response of the Macroeconomy to Uncertainty Shocks:the Risk Premium Channel," 2019 Meeting Papers 1567, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    5. Chow Sheung-Chi & Cunado Juncal & Gupta Rangan & Wong Wing-Keung, 2018. "Causal relationships between economic policy uncertainty and housing market returns in China and India: evidence from linear and nonlinear panel and time series models," Studies in Nonlinear Dynamics & Econometrics, De Gruyter, vol. 22(2), pages 1-15, April.
    6. Altig, Dave & Baker, Scott & Barrero, Jose Maria & Bloom, Nicholas & Bunn, Philip & Chen, Scarlet & Davis, Steven J. & Leather, Julia & Meyer, Brent & Mihaylov, Emil & Mizen, Paul & Parker, Nicholas &, 2020. "Economic uncertainty before and during the COVID-19 pandemic," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 191(C).
    7. Nicholas Bloom & Max Floetotto & Nir Jaimovich & Itay Saporta†Eksten & Stephen J. Terry, 2018. "Really Uncertain Business Cycles," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 86(3), pages 1031-1065, May.
    8. Ahmadi, Maryam & Manera, Matteo & Sadeghzadeh, Mehdi, 2019. "The investment-uncertainty relationship in the oil and gas industry," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 1-1.
    9. Phan, Dinh Hoang Bach & Tran, Vuong Thao & Nguyen, Dat Thanh, 2019. "Crude oil price uncertainty and corporate investment: New global evidence," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 54-65.
    10. Houari, Oussama, 2022. "Uncertainty shocks and business cycles in the US: New insights from the last three decades," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    11. Christina Christou & Giray Gozgor & Rangan Gupta & Chi keung Marco Lau, 2020. "Are Uncertainties across the World Convergent?," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 40(1), pages 855-862.
    12. Ngozi E. Egbuna (PhD) & Maimuna John-Sowe & Dauda Mohammed (PhD) & Hissan Abubakari & Eric L. Sambolah & Kormay Adams, 2020. "Uncertainty And Economic Performance In The West African Monetary Zone (Wamz): A Fixed Effect Panel Threshold Approach," Working Papers 19, West African Monetary Institute.
    13. Iván Alfaro & Nicholas Bloom & Xiaoji Lin, 2024. "The Finance Uncertainty Multiplier," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 132(2), pages 577-615.
    14. Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde & Pablo Guerron-Quintana, 2020. "Uncertainty Shocks and Business Cycle Research," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 37, pages 118-166, August.
    15. Adama Messanh COMBEY, 2016. "The Main Determinants of Private Investments in the WAEMU Zone: The Dynamic Approach," Journal of Economics and Political Economy, KSP Journals, vol. 3(4), pages 731-743, December.
    16. Pedro Costa Ferreira & Raíra Marotta B. Vieira & Felipi Bruno Silva & Ingrid C. L. Oliveira, 2019. "Measuring Brazilian Economic Uncertainty," Journal of Business Cycle Research, Springer;Centre for International Research on Economic Tendency Surveys (CIRET), vol. 15(1), pages 25-40, April.
    17. COMBEY, Adama, 2016. "The Main Determinants of Private Investment in The WAEMU Zone: The Dynamic Approach," MPRA Paper 75382, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Kotcharin, Suntichai & Maneenop, Sakkakom, 2020. "Geopolitical risk and corporate cash holdings in the shipping industry," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    19. Uddin, Moshfique & Chowdhury, Anup & Anderson, Keith & Chaudhuri, Kausik, 2021. "The effect of COVID – 19 pandemic on global stock market volatility: Can economic strength help to manage the uncertainty?," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 128(C), pages 31-44.
    20. Tajaddini, Reza & Gholipour, Hassan F., 2021. "Economic uncertainty and business formation: A cross-country analysis," Journal of Business Venturing Insights, Elsevier, vol. 16(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    COVID-19; Unemployment rate; Vaccination drive; Policy Uncertainty;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior
    • J21 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Labor Force and Employment, Size, and Structure
    • D84 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Expectations; Speculations

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:idn:journl:v:25:y:2022:i:spf:p:61-84. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Lutzardo Tobing or Jimmy Kathon (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/bigovid.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.