Impact of the health crisis on an anonymised panel of La Banque Postale customers

Abstract

Anonymised data on the banking transactions of La Banque Postale customers constitute a complementary source for analysing the impact of the health crisis on the most insecure populations. In 2020, the crisis affected the incomes of most customers in a limited and temporary manner. The sharp fall in spending as a result of health restrictions therefore led to an increase in savings. The proportion of overdrawn customers decreased, especially for the quarter of customers with the lowest income. However, among the least wealthy customers, populations on the edges of the labour market suffer more. One group is studied specifically: single people with no dependants who are in receipt of the maximum amount of Active Solidarity Income (Revenu de solidarité active – RSA) at the beginning of the year. Their prospects of returning to work have fallen during the health crisis, and thus their earnings in 2020 were lower than those expected by extrapolating the pre-crisis trend. For these customers, the exceptional COVID-19 support paid out in May and November only partially compensated for the loss of income from employment: over the whole of 2020, their incomes were 4% lower than the level expected on the basis of the pre-crisis trend, but without the support, they would have been 7% lower. However, even without the crisis, the majority of RSA recipients at the beginning of the year continued to receive it throughout the year. The difference in mean earnings is therefore explained by the minority of recipients who would have been able to find a job without the crisis

Publication
Economics Statistics