Cities that act quicker to implement social distancing guidelines amid pandemics will likely have more economic growth once the restrictions lift, according to a working paper co-authored by researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge and the Federal Reserve.
The study, according to MIT News, evaluated data from the flu pandemic that affected the U.S from 1918-19. The data show U.S. cities that took a more aggressive approach to limit the public's exposure to the pandemic also had better economic rebounds.
Specifically, cities that implemented public health interventions like social distancing 10 days earlier than other cities saw a 5 percent relative increase in manufacturing employment post-pandemic through 1923. An additional 50 days of social distancing was linked with a 6.5 percent increase in manufacturing employment, according to the researchers.
"We find no evidence that cities that acted more aggressively in public health terms performed worse in economic terms," study co-author Emil Verner, PhD, an assistant professor in the MIT Sloan School of Management, told MIT News. "If anything, the cities that acted more aggressively performed better."
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