Societal Dynamics: Intersection of Policy, Race, and COVID-19
Paper Session
Friday, Jan. 3, 2025 2:30 PM - 4:30 PM (PST)
- Chair: Angelino Viceisza, Spelman College and NBER
Market Structure and Government Efficiency in Pandemics: Evidence from Nursing Home Networks
Abstract
How does market structure affect the efficiency and distributional impacts of the government policy response to health crises? To address this question, we examine the long-term care market in the early period of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, distinguishing between for-profit (FP) and not-for-profit (NFP) nursing homes. Using unique data on the social networks of over 11,000 nursing homes in 40 states, we show that FP nursing homes incurred more deaths from COVID-19 than NFP nursing homes. To explore causal mechanisms, we calibrate a two-sector continuous-time individual-based mean-field model and estimate the efficiency of public health and safety interventions (PHSIs) in curbing the spread of COVID-19. We find that PHSI efficiency interacts significantly with the ownership status of a nursing home to determine COVID-19 death among residents: a one standard deviation increase in PHSI efficiency increases the death gap between FP and NFP nursing homes by around 23 percent relative to the mean. Analyzing possible mechanisms, we show that FP nursing homes have more difficulties adapting to PHSIs. Our analysis implies that policymakers should account for both market and network structures and their heterogeneity in experiencing uncertain shocks when designing optimal targeted interventions for future pandemics.Immigration Enforcement and the Local Housing Market: Evidence Using Fintech Data
Abstract
This study examines the effect of interior immigration enforcement on the local housing market. We rely on the implementation of the Secure Communities (SC) program as our identification strategy. Using a difference-in-differences design to exploit the immigration enforcement policy's quasi-experimental properties, we investigate the unintended consequences of the policy on the local housing market. Our empirical results show that the Secure Communities program's implementation led to decreases in home values and rental prices ranging from 2.5% to 4.5% in the long run. We test three channels - immigration policy uncertainty, immigration fears, and local immigration attention - and find immigration sentiments and attention play an important role in driving our results. These findings imply a net loss of wealth in the affected communities.Does Racial Animus Influence Support for Public Policies?
Abstract
Once African Americans gained access to public provisions ---such as swimming pools, parks, and desegregated education--- support for these public provisions declined. A nascent literature argues that racism and a backlash to the civil rights movement also contributed to the decline in the U.S. social safety net. Using two parallel experiments, we study the causal effects of providing information about the number of Black people receiving welfare and unemployment insurance benefits on support for these policies. We use measures of individual confidence in their pre-treatment beliefs to measure treatment intensity and study the interaction of the treatment with individual-level racial bias, both explicit and implicit. Decreased program support following information that there are more Black recipients than expected (compared to a control) indicates a causal relationship between racism and policy preferences.Eviction Moratoria and Race Disparities of Eviction Filing Rates in the U.S.
Abstract
During the COVID-19 pandemic, US states enacted moratoria on evictions. Leveraging detailed administrative evictions data, we analyze the effect of eviction moratoria on eviction filings. Consistent with the literature, we find that evictions declined in moratorium states relative to states with no moratorium in effect. We then impute the race and gender of evicted renters. We estimate that the moratoria reduced evictions of black renters by about 26 filings per 100,000 black renters, a roughly 54% decrease relative to the pre-treatment mean in early 2020. We find a similar (67%) proportional effect on white renters, but since black renters are disproportionately evicted, they also experienced disproportionate eviction relief.Discussant(s)
José Navarro-Martínez
,
California State University Dominguez Hills
Ejindu Ume
,
Miami University
Maroula Khraiche
,
University of Texas Rio Grande Valley
Dania Francis
,
University of Massachusetts-Boston
JEL Classifications
- C9 - Design of Experiments
- I3 - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty