The COVID-19 Cost of School Closures in Earnings and Income across the World

Abstract

Social distancing requirements associated with COVID-19 have led to mass school and university closures worldwide. The article provides estimates of the economic loss associated with these closures by mapping lost learning to the lifetime reduction of the earnings of graduates from 205 high-, middle-, and low-income countries. While others have provided estimates of earnings losses due to COVID-19 school closures, to our knowledge ours is the first analysis that includes a majority of countries. We also estimate economic losses by level of education. Our findings indicate the economic loss of school closures to be highly significant. We find that school closures are likely to lead to a reduction in global economic growth equivalent to an annual rate of 0.8 percent. Estimated losses in national income are greater in low- and middle-income relative to high-income countries.