The COVID Report Card

Abstract

The authors model COVID infections and COVID deaths, both reported and implied, for the 50 U.S. states as well as the District of Columbia, and separately for a sample of 33 countries, as a function of pre-existing circumstances that citizens have no ability to control over the short term. These models give predictions of expected COVID outcomes. They then compare their model’s predicted results with actual experience. They interpret the differences between actual experiences and the predictions across the jurisdictions as the COVID outcomes attributable to the behavior of citizens.

Keywords: COVID report card, Cross-sectional regression analysis, Implied deaths, New cases, Reported deaths,

JEL Classification: C10, C21, C23, C26, C31, C33, D10, D72, D78, I10, I12