Can Stringent Government Initiatives Lead to Global Economic Recovery Rapidly during the COVID-19 Epidemic?

Lizheng Ma, Congzhi Zhang, Kai Lisa Lo () and Xiangyan Meng
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Lizheng Ma: School of Marxism, East China Normal University, 500 Dongchuan Road, Shanghai 200241, China
Congzhi Zhang: School of Economics and Management, Shanghai Maritime University, 1550 Haigang Road, Shanghai 201306, China
Kai Lisa Lo: School of Economics and Management, Shanghai Maritime University, 1550 Haigang Road, Shanghai 201306, China
Xiangyan Meng: School of Economics and Management, Shanghai Maritime University, 1550 Haigang Road, Shanghai 201306, China

IJERPH, 2023, vol. 20, issue 6, 1-16

Abstract: This paper investigates the effectiveness of government measures implemented against COVID-19 and the factors influencing a country’s economic growth from a global perspective. With the help of the data of the Government Response Stringency Index (GRSI), Google mobility, and confirmed COVID-19 daily cases, we conducted a panel model for 105 countries and regions from 11 March 2020 to 31 June 2021 to explore the effects of response policies in different countries against the pandemic. First, the results showed that staying in residential places had the strongest correlation with confirmed cases. Second, in countries with higher government stringency, stay-at-home policies carried out in the early spread of the pandemic had the most effective the impact. In addition, the results have also been strictly robustly analyzed by applying the propensity score matching (PSM) method. Third, after reconstructing a panel data of 47 OECD countries, we further concluded that governments should take stricter restrictive measures in response to COVID-19. Even though it may also cause a shock to the market in the short term, this may not be sustainable. As long as the policy response is justified, it will moderate the negative effect on the economy over time, and finally have a positive effect.

Keywords: COVID-19; government response stringency index; economic recovery (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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