Longer-Run Economic Consequences of Pandemics
研究14世纪以来重大大流行病的长期经济影响，发现其导致资产回报率持续低迷数十年，与战争的影响截然不同，可能源于劳动力短缺或预防性储蓄增加。
Abstract What are the medium- to long-term effects of pandemics? Do they differ from other economic disasters? We study major pandemics using rates of return on assets stretching back to the fourteenth century. Significant macroeconomic after-effects of pandemics persist for decades, with rates of return substantially depressed. The responses are in stark contrast to what happens after wars. Our findings also accord with wage and output responses, using more limited data, and are consistent with the neoclassical growth model: capital is destroyed in wars but not in pandemics; pandemics instead may induce more labor scarcity or more precautionary savings, or both.