Abstract
Unprecedented as the COVID-19 crisis has been, it is not so unusual in two important ways. First, the pandemic disproportionately affected minorities and small businesses and exacerbated existing income and wealth inequalities. Second, the scope and quality of public policy responses exhibited large differences across countries. The policies of the United States under President Donald Trump, who downplayed the health risks, stand in sharp contrast to China’s harsh containment measures, epitomizing the vast global divergence in public policy response to the pandemic.