Arbeitspapier

Informing the public about a pandemic

This paper explores how governments may efficiently inform the public about an epidemic to induce compliance with their confinement measures. Using an information design framework, we find the government has an incentive to either downplay or exaggerate the severity of the epidemic if it heavily prioritizes the economy over population health or vice versa. Importantly, we find that the level of economic inequality in the population has an effect on these distortions. The more unequal the disease's economic impact on the population is, the less the government exaggerates and the more it downplays the severity of the epidemic. When the government weighs the economy and population health sufficiently equally, however, the government should always be fully transparent about the severity of the epidemic.

Language
Englisch

Bibliographic citation
Series: ESMT Working Paper ; No. 20-03 (R1)

Classification
Management
Subject
Public Health
Epidemic Control
Information Design
Strategic Behavior

Event
Geistige Schöpfung
(who)
de Véricourt, Francis
Gurkan, Huseyin
Wang, Shouqiang
Event
Veröffentlichung
(who)
European School of Management and Technology (ESMT)
(where)
Berlin
(when)
2021

Handle
URN
urn:nbn:de:101:1-2021013113240474763109
Last update
10.03.2025, 11:44 AM CET

Data provider

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ZBW - Deutsche Zentralbibliothek für Wirtschaftswissenschaften - Leibniz-Informationszentrum Wirtschaft. If you have any questions about the object, please contact the data provider.

Object type

  • Arbeitspapier

Associated

  • de Véricourt, Francis
  • Gurkan, Huseyin
  • Wang, Shouqiang
  • European School of Management and Technology (ESMT)

Time of origin

  • 2021

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