contagion
Why Social Distancing Measures Seem Less Effective in the US
Guidelines assume that the less people move around, the less likely they are to be in contact. However, phone location data show that in...
How to Restart the Economy and Save Lives: Simulations on Northern Italy
Italian officials have to choose the optimal strategy to end the lockdown. A policy that sends all the active population back to work avoids...
Covid Economics: During 1918 Influenza, Severe Social Distancing Reduced Negative Impacts on American Economy
ProMarket reviews the most recent and interesting academic papers on the ongoing pandemic: Sergio Correia, Stephan Luck, and Emil Verner studied how US cities and...
Bethany McLean’s Weekend Reading List: Covid-19 Models, Grocery Stores, and Bank Robberies
Corruption, lobbying, corporate malfeasance, and frauds: a weekly unconventional selection of must-read articles by investigative journalist Bethany McLean.
Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics. Maybe we...
Managing Expectations Is Critical to Ensure Compliance with Stay-at-Home Measures
A study of a representative sample of Italians finds that 50 percent of respondents reported having adopted all recommended actions, including staying at home,...
An Alternative to Complete Shutdown: Let Younger People Work
The mortality rate of Covid-19 is rising with age. The cost of the economic shutdown declines with the number of people not subject to the shutdown. Consequently,...
Testing People and Targeted Isolation: How to Save More Lives (and the American Economy)
Nobel laureate Paul Romer's model shows that if we use a test to determine who gets put into isolation, the fraction of the population...
This Is Not the Time to Be Cautious. We Need to Contain the Economic Contagion of the Coronavirus
The real danger is that the virus mutates and infects our economic system, even as we manage to root it out of our bodies....
Why More Elderly People Get Infected in Some Countries Compared to Others
Italy has a mortality rate of 6 percent while countries like Norway, Denmark, and Germany have rates still close to zero percent. The...
The Fight Against Coronavirus: What the US Can Learn from Italian Hospitals on How to Prevent a Disaster
In a Facebook post that has since become viral, Italian doctor Daniele Macchini offered a first-hand testimony from the Lombardy region, the epicenter of...
