Brief Analysis of Vienna's Selected Economic Support Measures in the COVID-19 Crisis. A First Qualitative Review

This short analysis provides a compact overview of the content and implementation status of a total of 17 measures taken by the City of Vienna so far to support regional companies and their employees in the COVID-19 crisis and makes a first qualitative assessment of their potential effects. Given the still incomplete state of data, this study cannot comprehensively evaluate the measures. Rather, it represents an informed interim assessment which allows to draw first conclusions on what has been achieved so far, but also identifies areas for improvement, allowing lessons to be derived for further initiatives that may be needed. The results indicate a rapid implementation of the measures as well as – for the most part – their regional and short-term economic effectiveness. The core task of the package of measures examined, namely to provide rapid and effective emergency aid during the pandemic, thus appears to have been fulfilled. Other (longer-term) benefits have only been partially addressed by the measures and will need to be given greater prominence in future measures aimed at stabilising the regional economy.