Impact of Covid-19 on people and Work from Home

This pandemic has affected family life around the world. As a result of lockdown individuals are already experiencing significant revenue and job losses. The ability to ‘Work from Home’ (WFH) can help damp down the impact of the situation, undoubtedly. Overall, the effects of WFH arrangements rely a lot on the job status of parents and presence of dependents (children & elderly), and this current situation is likely to intensify these differences. It does not necessarily mean, however, that the effect of the crisis should inevitably be gender neutral. Working women have been particularly affected. It seems to be very fascinating to work from home, while sitting on a comfortable couch, casually dressed, even sometimes in sleep suits, without stepping out in scorching heat and wasting time in traveling, but this may not be a preferred situation for everybody, especially women. The most significant impact on working women during the crisis will be trying to balance household demands, childcare needs and work demands. The group most likely to be hardest hit then would be lower income families with young children, and single mothers in particular. Generally women are in charge of planning, organizing and recalling of everything that needs to be remembered. The mental stress and load that comes with such work has risen exponentially in present circumstances. Even though many countries are relied on lockdown to control widespread of COVID-19 pandemic, the mental problems such as depression, anxiety, insomnia, suicidal thoughts and other psychological trauma are most common in case of normal individual and extensive in case of people who are psychologically ill. Females are more prone to psychological distress. The main concern is to manage and provide opportunities for regulation of stress caused due to anxiety and lack of peer contact. Another main threat is an increased risk of parents to develop mental illness, women may also suffer from domestic violence and consequently it results child maltreatment. The current scenario may be particularly challenging especially for children and adolescents with special needs or disadvantages, such as disabilities, also if someone has prior trauma experiences, undiagnosed mental health problems, background of migration and low socioeconomic status.

Price Rigidity in Pakistan: Evidence from Disaggregated Cpi Data

There is constant debate between Classical and Keynesian on the issue of the flexibility of wages and prices. Classical economists assume flexible wages and prices and Keysian argue for rigid wages and prices. According to Keynesian macroeconomic models, effectiveness of the policy is mainly due to rigid prices. The effectiveness of monetary policy depends on the nature of price adjustment. In Pakistan there is no precise study available on the topic of price rigidity. Within this context, this thesis sets six objectives using the data of disaggregated consumer price index for the period of July 1991 to March 2016. First objective is to explore the price rigidity in Pakistan by using Frequency and Duration of price change. Second objective is to find out the size of last price change. Third objective is to determine the price setting strategy and its determinants for Pakistan by using the Panel Logit Random Effect Model. Fourth and Fifth objectives are to investigate the exchange rate and oil price pass-through using the recursive VAR approach. Sixth objective of the thesis is to check the exchange rate and oil price pass-through asymmetric behavior to disaggregated CPI inflation. The study concludes that prices are flexible but not fully flexible in Pakistan. Prices are more flexible in food items and rigidity is found in communication, education, and health sectors. Hotel, Food and Transport are high inflation category products and Communication, Health, Recreation & Culture are low inflation category groups. Keynes theory verifies that prices are downward rigid and upward flexible for Pakistan. In Pakistan combination of time-dependent and state-dependent policy is used for price setting. Exchange rate and oil pass-through have moderate effect on CPI inflation in Pakistan but their effect remains for twelve months. Exchange rate pass-through is low in flexible exchange rate regime as compared to managed floating exchange rate. Oil price pass-through is more pronounced in volatile period as compared to less volatile period. Domestic oil price pass-through is higher as compare to international oil prices as well as converted international oil prices to CPI inflation. Exchange rate and oil prices have asymmetric pass-through to CPI inflation. Prices in Pakistan are more flexible so State Bank of Pakistan should try to search other transmission mechanisms through which monetary policy can have real effects in the Pakistan economy.