FAU Expert Says Economic Pain, Slower Spread of COVID-19 Would Have Happened Without States’ Stay-at-Home Orders

Local Government Action Plays a Larger Role Than Previously Understood

MEDIA CONTACT: Paul Owers
561-221-4090, powers@fau.edu

BOCA RATON, Fla. (May 18, 2020) – Individuals, employers and local governments beat states to the punch when it came to limiting the spread of the coronavirus and shutting down much of the U.S. economy, according to a new research paper by William Luther, an assistant professor of economics in Florida Atlantic University’s College of Business.

In analyzing Google Mobility data, Luther found that consumers, workplaces and local governments started imposing their own restrictions even before the states took action in March and April. Roughly three-quarters of the change in residential, retail, recreation, workplace and public transportation activity preceded orders by states to shelter in place.

“Many employees who could work from home were already doing so," Luther said. "Consumers were making fewer trips out, and most of those trips were to stock up on groceries so they would not have to venture out as much when the risk of spread increased over the weeks that followed.”

Luther’s conclusion creates problems for both sides in the debate over state-sponsored, stay-at-home orders.

Some insist that state orders are vital to keeping COVID-19 under control and saving lives, but others suggest that forcing non-essential businesses to close leads to massive unemployment, economic hardship and psychological effects from which the country won’t soon recover. Instead, the evidence shows that much of the desirable mitigation and undesirable slowdown in economic activity would have happened even without state-level, stay-at-home orders.

Those state-level orders were ineffective, at least in part, because local governments took their own mitigation measures first. Elected officials in state and federal governments tend to be slower to act because they’re waiting until they have widespread support for their policies, Luther said. While local leaders also have to worry about re-election, their smaller jurisdictions allow them to gain consensus and respond quicker.

“It’s very easy to say, ‘Well, the state was too slow to respond,’ but that’s a feature of democracy, not a bug,” Luther said.

In times of crisis, people often wonder what state and federal governments can do to fix the problem – and there is plenty they can do, Luther said. But he also suggests looking for local solutions.

“Local leaders have a much better understanding of local life,” he said. “They can identify which locations and interactions are likely to encourage spread and where it is relatively safe to continue on more or less as usual. The result is locally tailored policy that is much more likely to be followed.” 

-FAU-

About Florida Atlantic University:
Florida Atlantic University, established in 1961, officially opened its doors in 1964 as the fifth public university in Florida. Today, the University, with an annual economic impact of $6.3 billion, serves more than 30,000 undergraduate and graduate students at sites throughout its six-county service region in southeast Florida. FAU’s world-class teaching and research faculty serves students through 10 colleges: the Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, the College of Business, the College for Design and Social Inquiry, the College of Education, the College of Engineering and Computer Science, the Graduate College, the Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College, the Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine, the Christine E. Lynn College of Nursing and the Charles E. Schmidt College of Science. FAU is ranked as a High Research Activity institution by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. The University is placing special focus on the rapid development of critical areas that form the basis of its strategic plan: Healthy aging, biotech, coastal and marine issues, neuroscience, regenerative medicine, informatics, lifespan and the environment. These areas provide opportunities for faculty and students to build upon FAU’s existing strengths in research and scholarship. For more information, visit fau.edu.