COVID-19, Job Loss, and Intimate Partner Violence in Peru

A large literature has explored the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on intimate partner violence (IPV) worldwide. However, few studies provide clear evidence on the mechanisms through which the pandemic exacerbated violence, and many rely on hotline or police report data, which confounds changes in reporting behavior. Our paper addresses this issue by conducting a large nationwide survey in Peru, a country that has been hit particularly hard by COVID-19. We isolate pandemic-related economic shocks based on geographic variation in the industry composition of employment shocks and find a sizable and sustained increase in IPV, which aligns with the patterns found in helpline calls. Households most likely to lose a job experienced the largest increases in IPV. These patterns indicate that economic losses were an integral causal mechanism through which COVID-19 increased IPV.

Duke Scholars

Author Erica Field Economics