@techreport{CaliendoGraeberKritikosetal.2022, type = {Working Paper}, author = {Caliendo, Marco and Graeber, Daniel and Kritikos, Alexander and Seebauer, Johannes}, title = {Pandemic Depression: COVID-19 and the Mental Health of the Self-Employed}, series = {CEPA Discussion Papers}, journal = {CEPA Discussion Papers}, number = {46}, issn = {2628-653X}, doi = {10.25932/publishup-54899}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-548999}, pages = {65}, year = {2022}, abstract = {We investigate the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on self-employed people's mental health. Using representative longitudinal survey data from Germany, we reveal differential effects by gender: whereas self-employed women experienced a substantial deterioration in their mental health, self-employed men displayed no significant changes up to early 2021. Financial losses are important in explaining these differences. In addition, we find larger mental health responses among self-employed women who were directly affected by government-imposed restrictions and bore an increased childcare burden due to school and daycare closures. We also find that self-employed individuals who are more resilient coped better with the crisis.}, language = {en} }