COVID-19 Pandemic, Vaccination and Household Expenditures : Regional Evidence from Turkish Credit Card Data

The COVID-19 pandemic induced a volatile pattern in household expenditures on a global scale. In this study, we analyse the mitigating effect of vaccination trends on pandemic-related depression in expenditures by exploiting province-level high-frequency credit and debit card data from a large emerging market, Turkey. The baseline analysis confirms the moderating role of widespread vaccination with respect to consumption tendencies. Our baseline findings are validated by a myriad of robustness checks. Moreover, we show that this effect on pandemic-household expenditures nexus is stronger for provinces with a higher share of services industries in total value-added