COVID-19 and the role of inequality in French regional departments

Victor Ginsburgh, Glenn Magerman () and Ilaria Natali

No 3141, LIDAM Reprints CORE from Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE)

Abstract: In this paper, we examine the variation in the outbreak of COVID-19 across departments in continental France. We use information on the cumulated number of deaths, discharged patients and infections from COVID-19 at the department level, and study how these relate to income inequality, controlling for other factors. We fnd that unfortunately, inequality kills: departments with higher income inequality face more deaths, more discharged (gravely ill) patients and more infections. While other papers have studied the impact of the level of income on the severity of COVID-19, we fnd that it is in fact the dispersion across incomes within the same department that drives the results. Our results suggest that individuals in relatively more precarious conditions deserve dedicated policies, to avoid that temporary shocks such as COVID-19 lead to permanent increases in inequality.

Keywords: COVID-19; France; Departmental efects on the pandemic (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I10 I14 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021-01-02
Note: In: The European Journal of Health Economics, 2021, vol. 22, p. 311-327
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cor:louvrp:3141

DOI: 10.1007/s10198-020-01254-0

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