Employment status and evaluation of government performance in COVID-19 containment : evidence from China

Evaluation of government performance of citizens is crucial for regime stability as it could help authoritarian regimes to identify and address brewing problems before they fuel public discontent. It can also act as a potential mechanism for improving government performance and public services and establishing a good image of government. Following the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, Chinese government has adopted the zero-COVID policy to keep cases as close to zero as possible until December 2022. China’s job market also faced big pressure from the economic downturn caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. The pandemic is a shock that impact the all the people, and it could have far-reaching consequences; therefore, the understanding of public evaluation of Chinese government’s zero-COVID policy is crucial. Therefore, using data from China at both the individual and provincial levels, this study aims to examine the impact of employment status on public evaluation of government performance during the Covid-19 pandemic in China with multilevel analysis. The results reveal that the employed people were more likely to have a lower increase in their evaluation of the government performance in containing pandemic compared to unemployed people. Additionally, this study also employs causal mediation analysis and the public attitudes toward anti-pandemic policies is the mediator. The results show that employment status can have a significant impact on evaluation of government and medical system performance in COVID-19 containment through public attitudes towards anti-pandemic measures. The text analysis and interview analysis further explained the possible mechanisms for the effect of employment status on evaluation of government performance in COVID-19 containment. The research finding has broader implications for public policy and public opinion research in China.