Economy & Business, Volume 16, 2022

Abstract: The outbreak of COVID-19 at the end of 2019 spread over the world extensively and quickly. The daily lives are affected by lockdowns, work-from-home, and travel bans. The economic growth is stagnated. To investigate the impact of this pandemic on the productivity of the industries in Taiwan, samples of the top 1000 manufacturing companies and the top 500 service companies before the pandemic, in the period of 2016-2019, and during the pandemic, in the year of 2020, are studied. The results show that the overall productivity of all companies in 2020 has not decreased. By classifying the sampled companies into different industries, there are four industries, including textile, automobile, tourism, and electronic products distribution, showing a decrease in productivity. There are also five industries, including electronic parts/components, optoelectronic, electrical and cable, rubber, and oil, gas and electricity, whose productivities are unexpectedly increased. The reasons that the productivities of these industries are affected by COVID-19 are discussed. They shed some light on how the government can help these industries to overcome the crisis and to recover the country’s economy.