What We Can Learn About Economics from Professional Sport During Covid-19

The economics of sport and how sport provides insights into economics have experienced exogenous shocks from Covid-19, facilitating many natural experiments.  These have provided partial answers to questions of: how airborne viruses may spread in crowds; how crowds respond to the risk and information about infection; how the absence of crowds may affect social pressure and arbitration decisions; and how quickly betting markets respond to new information.  We review this evidence and advise how sports economics research could continue to be most valuable to policymakers.