Upcoming Airline Travelers Are Much Less Stressed Out

As CivicScience enters the 52nd consecutive week of tracking COVID-19 sentiment, the country is on the brink of reaching half a million coronavirus deaths. While the country is administering about 1.5 million COVID vaccines per day, vaccine rollout has been stalled due to extreme weather in many regions. The more recent data shows concern about being in public spaces consistent with what in the prior week’s reporting, with roughly 7-in-10 U.S. adults expressing that they’re very or somewhat concerned. 

We observed an increase in the percentage of U.S. adults who are not sure how long they will have to practice social distancing and self-isolation, likely – at least in part – driven by the current uncertainty surrounding the vaccine distribution.

People’s comfort shopping in stores remains high and consistent with what we saw last week, with more than half of all adults (57%) reporting they’re comfortable doing so now.

While overall comfort traveling or taking a vacation declined slightly since last week, plans to travel via airplane in the next month increased (from 10% to 13%).

Taking Flight

Similar to what we observed last week with in-store shopping, young adults are currently more likely to travel in the next month.

The same can be said about men. Women are more likely to be staying grounded for the time being.

When comparing vaccine tracking data with travel plans, those who have plans to travel via airplane are more likely to say they won’t be getting the vaccine at all. Groups of travelers by other methods as well as those who do not have upcoming travel plans are the most likely to get the vaccine as soon as possible. Another stat stood out: those who have no travel planned in the next month are more likely than travelers to have already been vaccinated. 

Interestingly, those who have airplane travel booked report being much less stressed out than those who do not have travel on their horizon at all.

Those with airline travel plans are much more likely to be not working as a result of the pandemic. 

Could this have to do with the below data? An increasing percentage of people expect it to be easier to find a new job over the next six months, returning to the point we observed in mid-January.