Economic and social impact of Covid-19 pandemic on global scale and in the case of the Republic of North Macedonia

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected about 220 countries with more than 178 million
confirmed cases and over 3.8 million mortalities worldwide. North Macedonia belongs among
the severely affected countries by the COVID-19 pandemic, which by the mid-June 2021,
resulted with over 155 thousand confirmed cases or 7.470 cases per 100.000 inhabitants and
263 mortalities per 100.000 inhabitants. The crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, that
began as a health crisis in a short time has grown into an economic and social crisis, which
led to the strongest short term decline in the global economic activity in the past 150 years.
This crisis besides the health and economic implications has also contributed to social
instabilities. Economic and social implications of the COVID-19 crisis on global scale and in
the case of the Republic of North Macedonia are further analyzed within the paper. Analyzes
of the economic impacts of the crises is based on the movement of the key macroeconomic
indicators as: GDP growth rates, unemployment rates, Gross debt, etc. Analyzes of the social
impacts of the crises is focused on the reduced incomes, increased inequality in income
distribution and poverty growth. At the end of the paper is given summery overview of socioeconomic
impacts caused by COVID-19 pandemic in the country and there are designed some
proposals to policy makers applicable in the later stages of the crisis and in the period of
economic recovery. This proposals are aimed to support the process of reaching the forecast
growth rates and to increase the investment process and private consumption in the country,
in direction of achieving sustainable growth in future.