ESRI Discussion Paper Series No.370 Life Satisfaction of the Japanese people under Covid-19 Pandemic

Using individual data on life satisfaction from 2020 to 2021, we analyze the changes in people's life satisfaction during this period. We find the level of satisfaction in the areas where the state of emergency was declared decreased compared to the areas where the state of emergency was not declared, which had almost the same level of satisfaction in normal times. The impact of decline is sufficiently larger than the range of change that occurs in normal times, so even if we consider the results using bounded-variation assumptions, the data reveal that the declaration of a state of emergency caused a decline in satisfaction. Quasi-emergency declaration also reduced satisfaction, but to a lesser extent than the declaration of a state of emergency. In the immediate aftermath, the lifting of the declarations had the effect of increasing people's satisfaction more than in areas without the declarations.