The Impact of UN and US Economic Sanctions on Misery Index of Target Countries

In recent decades, international sanctions have become a common feature of political interactions between governments. In particular, the United States is the country which has imposed the most economic sanctions since World War II. Moreover, several actions have been taken by multilateral organizations like the United Nations in recent years. This study seeks to unveil the effect of UN and US economic sanctions on the misery index in a panel of 41 sanctioned countries during 1991-2018. The model is estimated as unbalanced panel data using the Generalized Least Squares (GLS) method. The results of this study indicate that UN and US sanctions have a significant impact on the misery index. Furthermore, the positive and incremental effect of comprehensive UN economic sanctions on the misery index is greater than that of the United States.