Abstract
COVID-19 has become a global health pandemic forcing governments introducing unprecedented steps to contain the spread of the virus. On the 23rd of March, 2020, the UK government addressed the nation to announce extraordinary measures as a response to slow down the spread of the coronavirus, which have influenced the well-being and finances of millions of people. As a result people had to make difficult adjustments and to follow different coping strategies in order to respond to income losses. The main objective of this study is to examine the impact of various coping strategies, due to the lockdown measures, on the respondents’ subjective well-being by gender and ethnic background. We apply a difference-in-differences framework using data from the UK Household Longitudinal Study (UKHLS) combined with the UKHLS COVID-19 survey conducted in April 2020. Furthermore, using the Life Satisfaction Approach (LSA), we estimate the well-being costs of the coping strategies adopted that denote the amount required to revert individual’s well-being into the levels were before Covid-19 period. The results show that coping strategies with the earning losses have a significant detrimental impact on well-being and the related costs range between £250-3,500, which are significantly varied by gender and ethnic group.
Highlights
COVID-19 is a global health pandemic, which has forced governments around the globe to introduce unprecedented steps and measures to contain the spread of the virus
When we consider the coping strategy reduction in spending, men report a higher drop in General Happiness Questionnaire (GHQ)-12 and general happiness compared to women, which is shown from the higher well-being costs
We find a significant and adverse impact of the particular coping strategy in a larger set of the general happiness questionnaire’s outcomes for men, ranging between £300 about the belief of worthless and up to £1,300 for the loss of sleep followed by playing a useful role at £1,130
Summary
COVID-19 is a global health pandemic, which has forced governments around the globe to introduce unprecedented steps and measures to contain the spread of the virus. These steps include lockdowns restrictions by shutting down public places, such as schools, shopping malls, bars- restaurants, sport and cultural institutions, and businesses, and facilitating social distancing measures. The rapid and persistent decrease in earnings, which follow losses of jobs or cuts in wages and working hours, typically force people to strenuously adjust their finances, which affect adversely their quality of life, housing, nutrition and so forth (Eliason and Storrie, 2006)
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