Staying at Home: Mobility Effects of COVID-19

16 Pages Posted: 15 Apr 2020

See all articles by Samuel Engle

Samuel Engle

University of Wisconsin - Madison, Department of Economics, Students

John Stromme

University of Wisconsin - Madison, Department of Economics

Anson Zhou

The University of Hong Kong

Date Written: April 3, 2020

Abstract

We combine GPS data on changes in average distance traveled by individuals at the county level with COVID-19 case data and other demographic information to estimate how individual mobility is affected by local disease prevalence and restriction orders to stay-at-home. We find that a rise of local infection rate from 0% to 0.003% is associated with a reduction in mobility by 2.31%. An official stay-at-home restriction order corresponds to reducing mobility by 7.87%. Counties with larger shares of population over age 65, lower share of votes for the Republican Party in the 2016 Presidential Election, and higher population density are more responsive to disease prevalence and restriction orders.

Keywords: COVID-19, Location Data, Restriction Order

Suggested Citation

Engle, Samuel and Stromme, John and Zhou, Anson, Staying at Home: Mobility Effects of COVID-19 (April 3, 2020). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3565703 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3565703

Samuel Engle

University of Wisconsin - Madison, Department of Economics, Students ( email )

Madison, WI
United States

John Stromme

University of Wisconsin - Madison, Department of Economics ( email )

Madison, WI
United States

Anson Zhou (Contact Author)

The University of Hong Kong ( email )

Pokfulam Road
Hong Kong, Pokfulam HK
China

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