IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/28291.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Scarred but Wiser: World War 2’s COVID Legacy

Author

Listed:
  • Michael Lokshin
  • Vladimir Kolchin
  • Martin Ravallion

Abstract

The paper formalizes and tests the hypothesis that greater exposure to big shocks induces stronger societal responses for adaptation and protection from future big shocks. We find support for this hypothesis in various strands of the literature and in new empirical tests using cross-country data on deaths due to COVID-19 and deaths during World War 2. Countries with higher death rates in the war saw lower death rates in the first wave of the COVID pandemic, though the effect faded in the pandemic’s second wave. Our tests are robust to a wide range of model specifications and alternative assumptions.

Suggested Citation

  • Michael Lokshin & Vladimir Kolchin & Martin Ravallion, 2020. "Scarred but Wiser: World War 2’s COVID Legacy," NBER Working Papers 28291, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:28291
    Note: DEV EH
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w28291.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Michal Bauer & Christopher Blattman & Julie Chytilová & Joseph Henrich & Edward Miguel & Tamar Mitts, 2016. "Can War Foster Cooperation?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 30(3), pages 249-274, Summer.
    2. Bartscher, Alina Kristin & Seitz, Sebastian & Siegloch, Sebastian & Slotwinski, Michaela & Wehrhöfer, Nils, 2021. "Social capital and the spread of covid-19: Insights from european countries," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    3. Demirguc-Kunt,Asli & Lokshin,Michael M. & Torre,Ivan, 2020. "The Sooner, the Better : The Early Economic Impact of Non-Pharmaceutical Interventions during the COVID-19 Pandemic," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9257, The World Bank.
    4. Bargain, Olivier & Aminjonov, Ulugbek, 2020. "Trust and compliance to public health policies in times of COVID-19," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 192(C).
    5. Elgar, Frank J. & Stefaniak, Anna & Wohl, Michael J.A., 2020. "The trouble with trust: Time-series analysis of social capital, income inequality, and COVID-19 deaths in 84 countries," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 263(C).
    6. Jesse Rothstein, 2010. "Teacher Quality in Educational Production: Tracking, Decay, and Student Achievement," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 125(1), pages 175-214.
    7. Pauline Grosjean, 2014. "Conflict and Social and Political Preferences: Evidence from World War II and Civil Conflict in 35 European Countries," Comparative Economic Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Association for Comparative Economic Studies, vol. 56(3), pages 424-451, September.
    8. Bruno Arpino & Pierluigi Conzo & Francesco Salustri, 2022. "I am a survivor, keep on surviving: early-life exposure to conflict and subjective survival probabilities in adult life," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 35(2), pages 471-517, April.
    9. John M. Barrios & Efraim Benmelech & Yael V. Hochberg & Paola Sapienza & Luigi Zingales, 2020. "Civic Capital and Social Distancing during the Covid-19 Pandemic," NBER Working Papers 27320, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Bellucci, Davide & Fuochi, Giulia & Conzo, Pierluigi, 2020. "Childhood exposure to the Second World War and financial risk taking in adult life," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    RePEc Biblio mentions

    As found on the RePEc Biblio, the curated bibliography for Economics:
    1. > Economics of Welfare > Health Economics > Economics of Pandemics > Preparation

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Borisova, Ekaterina & Gründler, Klaus & Hackenberger, Armin & Harter, Anina & Potrafke, Niklas & Schoors, Koen, 2023. "Crisis experience and the deep roots of COVID-19 vaccination preferences," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 160(C).
    2. Klaus Gründler & Armin Hackenberger & Anina Harter & Niklas Potrafke, 2021. "Covid-19 Vaccination: The Role of Crisis Experience," CESifo Working Paper Series 9096, CESifo.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Abel Brodeur & David Gray & Anik Islam & Suraiya Bhuiyan, 2021. "A literature review of the economics of COVID‐19," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(4), pages 1007-1044, September.
    2. Conzo, Pierluigi & Salustri, Francesco, 2019. "A war is forever: The long-run effects of early exposure to World War II on trust," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    3. Gebka, Bartosz & Kanungo, Rama Prasad & Wildman, John, 2024. "The transition from COVID-19 infections to deaths: Do governance quality and corruption affect it?," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 235-253.
    4. Fraser, Timothy & Aldrich, Daniel P. & Page-Tan, Courtney, 2021. "Bowling alone or distancing together? The role of social capital in excess death rates from COVID19," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 284(C).
    5. Bartolini, Stefano & Sarracino, Francesco & Slater, Giulia, 2020. "Do epidemics impose a trade-off between freedom and health? Evidence from Europe during Covid-19," MPRA Paper 105035, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Arman ESHRAGHI & TAKAHASHI Hidetomo & XU Peng, 2021. "Early-Life War Experiences and Corporate Financial Outcomes," Discussion papers 21081, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    7. Borgonovi, Francesca & Andrieu, Elodie & Subramanian, S.V., 2021. "The evolution of the association between community level social capital and COVID-19 deaths and hospitalizations in the United States," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 278(C).
    8. Bellucci, Davide & Fuochi, Giulia & Conzo, Pierluigi, 2020. "Childhood exposure to the Second World War and financial risk taking in adult life," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    9. Francesco Sarracino & Kelsey J. O’Connor, 2023. "Neo-humanism and COVID-19: Opportunities for a socially and environmentally sustainable world," Applied Research in Quality of Life, Springer;International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies, vol. 18(1), pages 9-41, February.
    10. Laliotis, Ioannis & Minos, Dimitrios, 2022. "Religion, social interactions, and COVID-19 incidence in Western Germany," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 141(C).
    11. Alacevich, Caterina & Zejcirovic, Dijana, 2020. "Does violence against civilians depress voter turnout? Evidence from Bosnia and Herzegovina," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(4), pages 841-865.
    12. Alm James & Barreto Raul A., 2024. "Trust in Government in a Changing World: Shocks, Tax Evasion, and Economic Growth," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 24(1), pages 439-487, January.
    13. Bazzi, Samuel & Fiszbein, Martin & Gebresilasse, Mesay, 2021. "“Rugged individualism” and collective (in)action during the COVID-19 pandemic," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 195(C).
    14. Marcella Alsan & Luca Braghieri & Sarah Eichmeyer & Minjeong Joyce Kim & Stefanie Stantcheva & David Y. Yang, 2023. "Civil Liberties in Times of Crisis," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 15(4), pages 389-421, October.
    15. Cooray, Arusha & Jha, Chandan Kumar & Sarangi, Sudipta, 2024. "Good governance in troubled times: What we know and what experts say," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    16. Costa-Font, Joan & Vilaplana-Prieto, Cristina, 2023. "Health System Trust and Compliance with COVID-19 Restrictions," IZA Discussion Papers 15961, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    17. Calvo, Thomas & Lavallée, Emmanuelle & Razafindrakoto, Mireille & Roubaud, François, 2020. "Fear Not For Man? Armed conflict and social capital in Mali," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(2), pages 251-276.
    18. Travers Barclay Child & Elena Nikolova, 2020. "War and social attitudes," Conflict Management and Peace Science, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 37(2), pages 152-171, March.
    19. Christophe Muller & Marc Vothknecht, 2011. "Group Violence, Ethnic Diversity, and Citizen Participation: Evidence from Indonesia," IDEP Working Papers 1101, Institut d'economie publique (IDEP), Marseille, France, revised May 2011.
    20. Sou Hyun Jang, 2022. "Social-ecological factors related to preventive behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic in South Korea," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 17(3), pages 1-14, March.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D02 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Institutions: Design, Formation, Operations, and Impact
    • D74 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Conflict; Conflict Resolution; Alliances; Revolutions
    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior
    • N10 - Economic History - - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations - - - General, International, or Comparative

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:28291. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.