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COVID-19 and the 2020 US Presidential Election: Did the Pandemic Cost Donald Trump Reelection?

Author

Listed:
  • Marcus Noland

    (Peterson Institute for International Economics)

  • Eva Yiwen Zhang

    (Peterson Institute for International Economics)

Abstract

By Election Day 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic had killed 234,244 Americans and caused the sharpest macroeconomic downturn in US history. Regression analysis shows that in a "no pandemic" counterfactual or a counterfactual in which the severity of the pandemic was mitigated by 30 percent, Donald Trump would have lost the popular vote but won the electoral vote. In the 20 percent mitigation scenario, the electoral vote would have been tied, giving Trump a presumptive victory in the House of Representatives. For the second time in a row (and the third time since 2000), the candidate who lost the popular vote would have been elected president of the United States.

Suggested Citation

  • Marcus Noland & Eva Yiwen Zhang, 2021. "COVID-19 and the 2020 US Presidential Election: Did the Pandemic Cost Donald Trump Reelection?," Working Paper Series WP21-3, Peterson Institute for International Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:iie:wpaper:wp21-3
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    File URL: https://www.piie.com/publications/working-papers/covid-19-and-2020-us-presidential-election-did-pandemic-cost-donald
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    COVID-19; coronavirus; pandemic; Donald Trump; sociotropic voting; electoral college;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H1 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health
    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • F68 - International Economics - - Economic Impacts of Globalization - - - Policy
    • Z13 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics - - - Economic Sociology; Economic Anthropology; Language; Social and Economic Stratification

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