Measuring COVID-driven Macro Uncertainty

COVID-19 outbreak paved the way for a big wave of uncertainty worldwide. Stock market volatility and plummeting business expectations are just two of its many markers.

Here, we focus on a wide set of alternative indexes, ranging from newspaper-based measures to the most recent surveys, aimed at capturing and evaluating epidemic-driven uncertainty, both at a macro and a micro level. Then, we resort to a suitable framework of reference (Baker, Bloom, Terry – 2020) to assess its short and medium-run impact on the economy.