Pandemic Depression: COVID-19 and the Mental Health of the Self-Employed

Marco Caliendo, Daniel Graeber, Alexander S. Kritikos and Johannes Seebauer

Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 2023, vol. 47, issue 3, 788-830

Abstract: We investigate the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on self-employed people’s mental health. Using representative longitudinal survey data from Germany, we reveal differential effects by gender: whereas self-employed women experienced a substantial deterioration in their mental health, self-employed men displayed no significant changes up to early 2021. Financial losses are important in explaining these differences. In addition, we find larger mental health responses among self-employed women who were directly affected by government-imposed restrictions and bore an increased childcare burden due to school and daycare closures. We also find that self-employed individuals who are more resilient coped better with the crisis.

Keywords: Self-employment; COVID-19; mental health; gender; representative longitudinal survey data; PHQ-4 score; resilience; L26; D31; I14; I18; J16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/10422587221102106 (text/html)

Related works:
Working Paper: Pandemic Depression: COVID-19 and the Mental Health of the Self-Employed (2022)
Working Paper: Pandemic Depression: COVID-19 and the Mental Health of the Self-Employed (2022)
Working Paper: Pandemic Depression: COVID-19 and the Mental Health of the Self-Employed (2022)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:entthe:v:47:y:2023:i:3:p:788-830

DOI: 10.1177/10422587221102106

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