The effect of cultural origin on COVID-19 infection rates

Mascia Bedendo, Valentina Febo & Linus Siming

We examine whether a community’s cultural origin affects COVID-19 infection rates by exploiting cultural differences in the bilingual province of South Tyrol in Northern Italy. We find lower infection rates in municipalities with a relatively higher proportion of German speakers, even after controlling for widely used measures of social and civic capital. Our findings can be explained by a more future-oriented behaviour of German speakers in comparison with Italian speakers.