The importance of political and religious affiliation in explaining county-level COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy

he authors use county-level data to test whether an array of socioeconomic, demographic, political and religious variables explain COVID-19 vaccination rates. Results presented here build upon previous investigations of COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy in different contexts and are largely consistent with those findings. Background controls such as county's percent male (+), median age (+), percent White (-), median household income (+), percent self-employed (-), and the percent with a college or higher education (+) explain county-level vaccination rates for COVID-19. Political affiliation (Percent Republican (-)) remains the strongest predictor in terms of overall statistical significance. The county's percent Catholic (+) and percent Evangelical (-) are also very strong predictors, though in opposite directions. This analysis includes state-level fixed effects and several robustness checks. Key points Results presented here are consistent with and build upon previous investigations of COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy. While several socio-economic and demographic factors are important, political affiliation remains the strongest predictor. Religious affiliation is also a very important predictor.