Current Research
List viewEconomists from around the world are using real time data collection to better understand the impact the Covid-19 crisis is having on families, workers, firms and society, and how policies can help the recovery out of the crisis. Find out more about how these research teams are carrying out their projects, and what their findings are below.
Understanding the impacts of Covid-19 on the provision of NHS health care and patient outcomes
We will provide a detailed description of the extent to which non-Covid-19 NHS activity has been affected by Covid-19, who is most affected, and how patient outcomes have changed. Covid-19 has led to enormous changes in the provision of NHS care. All...
Primary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Lead investigator: Carol Propper
Countries
Identifying and mitigating the impact of Covid-19 on inequalities experienced by people from BAME backgrounds working in health and social care
Prior to Covid-19, the NHS England Workforce Race Equalities Standard (WRES) found that BAME staff experience considerably greater levels of workplace harassment and discrimination, lower pay, less control and poorer working conditions than non-BAME ...
Primary Topic: Jobs, work, pay & benefits
Secondary Topic: Inequality & poverty
Lead investigator: Stephani Hatch
Countries
Monitoring socioeconomic and mental health trajectories through the Covid-19 pandemic
This study will use the nationally representative data collected monthly by the UKHLS COVID panel to assess the pandemic’s ongoing impact on individuals’ mental health and financial situation, and how this differs among subgroups of the UK popula...
Primary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Secondary Topic: Families & households
Lead investigator: Neil R Smith
Countries
Carrying the work burden of the Covid-19 pandemic: working class women in the UK
Working class women are carrying the burden of the extra physical and emotional labour being generated by the Covid-19 pandemic. These women care for children, sick and frail elderly, clean buildings, cook and serve food, administer institutions and ...
Primary Topic: Families & households
Secondary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Lead investigator: Tracey Warren
Countries
Addressing inclusivity in the spatial and social impacts of Covid-19 on the self-employed in the UK
The self-employed are a particularly vulnerable group in this current crisis. In contrast to elsewhere, the UK has seen significant growth in self-employment, now reaching 15% of the workforce. They are predominant in those sectors most hit by shutdo...
Primary Topic: Jobs, work, pay & benefits
Secondary Topic: Inequality & poverty
Lead investigator: Darja Reuschke
Countries
Post Covid-19, what will be the ‘new normal’ energy demand in buildings?
Since September 2019, 1,700 bill payers have agreed to share for research purposes, their half hourly gas and electricity smart meter data with SERL. This data will be combined with a Covid-19 questionnaire about changes to occupant energy using beha...
Primary Topic: Energy & climate change
Lead investigator: Tadj Oreszczyn
Countries
CAGE research centre (centre for Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy)
Research and working paper on increase in Google searches indicative of anxieties and economic fears.
Primary Topic: Attitudes, media & governance
Lead investigator: Thiemo Fetzer
consumer data research centre (CDRC)
Using footfall data supplied from Huq Industries to analyse changes in activity levels during the period of the lockdown.
Primary Topic: Recession & recovery
Lead investigator: Prof. James Cheshire
Countries
Assessing policy to address the medium-run impact of Covid-19 on income and health inequality with models informed by the history of disease outbreaks
This research aims to inform policy by assessing interventions to mitigate the medium-run implications of Covid-19 on income and health inequality. The uniqueness of our work is that we will develop models to predict inequalities that are consistent ...
Primary Topic: Inequality & poverty
Secondary Topic: Lessons from history
Lead investigator: Konstantinos Angelopoulos
Countries
Covid-19 and VCSE organisations response
According to a recent government report (DCMS 06/05/2020) the voluntary community and social enterprise (VCSE) sector is “fighting for survival”, with increased demand for its services, whilst simultaneously facing funding cuts estimated at £4.3...
Primary Topic: Charities & volunteering
Secondary Topic: Business, big & small
Lead investigator: Daniel King
Countries
Measuring the impact of Brexit/Covid-19 on UK investment, sales and productivity
Researching impact of Covid-19 via ongoing decision maker panel on sales, employment, capital and requirements/availability of credit, working patterns, non-labour inputs, business expectations.
Primary Topic: Business, big & small
Secondary Topic: Jobs, work, pay & benefits
Lead investigator: Paul Mizen
Countries
Rescuing a `sick’ labour market: using online vacancy data to track Covid-19’s economic impact
This project aims to identify the impact of Covid-19 and consequent lockdown measures on labour demand, using unique real-time data on UK online job postings, combined with text analysis and causal econometric research designs. - Firstly, we will con...
Primary Topic: Jobs, work, pay & benefits
Lead investigator: Mirko Draca
Countries
Nature engagement and wellbeing pre-, during and post Covid-19: supporting the UK (green) recovery
Engagement with nature benefits wellbeing (Twohigg-Bennet, 2019), but theory development in this area is limited. With free movement restricted during lockdown and health and wellbeing threatened by Covid-19, it is especially important now to underst...
Primary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Lead investigator: Biritta Gatersleben
Countries
Covid-19 and councils' finances: understanding risks and impacts & improving policy
Councils are on the front line of the coronavirus crisis, being responsible for key services like social care and homelessness prevention and facing revenues falling due to lockdown. Government has provided them with billions of additional funding, b...
Primary Topic: Inequality & poverty
Secondary Topic: Public spending, taxes & debt
Lead investigator: David Phillips
Countries
The real-time economic effects of Covid-19 in the United Kingdom
This project will examine the microeconomic impacts of the Covid pandemic and lockdown on UK businesses and its interaction with the UK’s decision to leave the European Union. The project will deliver two key outputs, which are fundamental to desig...
Primary Topic: Business, big & small
Secondary Topic: Attitudes, media & governance
Lead investigator: Swati Dhingra
Countries
Identity, inequality, and the media in Brexit-Covid-19-Britain
Covid-19 and Brexit are extraordinary social and political processes that are occurring simultaneously. These events are exposing the major inequalities that underpin British society across class, ethnic, national, migrant, generational and geographi...
Primary Topic: Attitudes, media & governance
Secondary Topic: Inequality & poverty
Lead investigator: Katharine Tyler
Countries
Assessing financial vulnerability and risk in the UK's charities during and beyond the Covid-19 crisis
This research will provide an analysis of the variegated impacts on charities of the very severe financial constraints they will experience due to the immediate and longer-term economic effects of the Covid-19 crisis. Building on our extensive prior ...
Primary Topic: Charities & volunteering
Lead investigator: John Mohan
Countries
Reducing the unanticipated crime harms of Covid-19 policies
The Covid-19 crisis is changing the shape of crime. Drawing on crime science, this research will inform evidence-based policy and practice. we will anticipate crime effects of prolonged, graduated or cyclical exit strategies. We will use (1) national...
Primary Topic: Crime & policing
Lead investigator: Graham Farrell
Countries
Covid-19: monitoring the effects of the pandemic on illicit online trade.
The pandemic has reshaped the demand for goods and services worldwide. Economic stress, the public health emergency and disinformation-driven panic have pushed customers, and vendors, towards the shadow economy. In particular, dark web marketplaces (...
Primary Topic: Crime & policing
Secondary Topic: Trade & supply chains
Lead investigator: Andrea Baronchelli
Countries
Agreements must be kept? Residential leases during Covid-19
This paper studies how a Covid-19 lockdown affected residential lease payments. Survey data on 1511 Israeli renter households show nearly one in eight households not paying full rent during the lockdown, with these households holding back, on average...
Primary Topic: Attitudes, media & governance
Secondary Topic: Families & households
Lead investigator: Itai Ater
Countries
