BFI Awards Five Grants for the Study of Economic Effects of COVID-19

The Becker Friedman Institute (BFI) is pleased to announce the award of five new research grants to University of Chicago faculty and students for economics research into the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. This is a unique and important moment for the study of economics and economic policy, and these grants will support research exploring the urgent and broad set of implications of both the pandemic and the public response across multiple areas of study.

Grants are intended to support a number of research activities, including the purchase of new data sets and software, hiring of research assistants, and travel. BFI will continue to award grants on a rolling basis.

BFI is proud to announce the 2020 recipients of the research grants, listed below, along with the research the grant will be supporting and data source where applicable.

Grants for the Study of Economic Effects of COVID-19

Ethan Bueno de Mesquita, Sydney Stein Professor, Harris School of Public Policy
Research: Coordination Problems and Social Distancing: Inertia in the Aggregate Response to COVID-19

Leonardo Bursztyn, Assistant Professor, Kenneth C. Griffin Department of Economics
Research: The Death Toll of Biased Media: Evidence From the Coronavirus Crisis 

Steve Cicala, Assistant Professor, Harris School of Public Policy
Research: Electricity Consumption as a Real Time Indicator of Economic Activity

Rafael Jimenez, PhD student, Kenneth C. Griffin Department of Economics
Research: Desperate Times, Desperate Prices? Quantifying Aversion to Price Gouging

Michael Weber, Assistant Professor, Booth School of Business
Research: COVID-19, Expectations, and Personality Traits

More information on BFI research grants can be found on the faculty intranet here.