Ethnic Discrimination During the Covid-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Ethnic discrimination is common in labor and housing markets. It leads to lower wages and higher unemployment for ethnic minorities, to segregation in the labor market, and to residential segregation. Several studies show that the Covid-19 pandemic increased the extent of ethnic discrimination. The prejudice against hiring migrants may have increased because people from countries where the epidemic started or from countries with a lower vaccination coverage were blamed for the spread. It may also have increased in the cases where the Covid-19 pandemic led to higher unemployment making it less costly for employers to discriminate.