In response to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, governments have imposed orders upon or encouraged citizens to decrease physical contact to slow down the spread of the virus. Current literature from the United States infers that only workers from limited socioeconomic groups have the ability to practice remote work. However, there has been little research on mobility disparity across income groups in US cities during the pandemic. The authors tried to fill this gap by quantifying the impacts of the pandemic on human mobility by income group in Houston-The Woodlands-Sugar Land, Texas utilizing pseudonymized cell phone location data. A longitudinal study was performed on mobility as measured by the total travel distance, the radius of gyration, and the number of visited locations in April 2020 compared to the data in January and February 2020. An apparent disparity in mobility has been found across income groups. In particular, there was a strong negative correlation (\r{ho} = -0.90) between the estimated income bracket of a traveler and the travel distance in April. Furthermore, larger percentage drops among higher-income brackets in the radius of gyration and number of visited locations implied different adaptability in mobility. The findings of this study suggest a need to understand the reasons behind the mobility inflexibility among low-income populations during the pandemic.

翻译：针对2019年的科罗纳病毒(COVID-19)大流行,政府命令或鼓励公民减少身体接触,以减缓病毒的传播。美国目前的文献推断,只有来自有限社会经济群体的工人才有能力从事远程工作。然而,对美国城市在大流行病期间不同收入群体之间流动差异的研究很少。作者试图通过量化德克萨斯州休斯顿-伍德兰-萨加尔地区收入群体对人口流动的影响来填补这一差距,他们使用了假名化手机定位数据。还进行了一项纵向研究,根据旅行总距离、回旋半径和2020年4月访问地点数量与2020年1月和2月的数据相比衡量的流动性。发现,不同收入群体之间在流动性方面存在明显的差异。特别是,4月旅行者的估计收入等级和旅行距离之间有着强烈的负关系(=-0.90)。此外,在游动半径和访问地点数量之间较高的收入档次中,比例下降,这说明对流动性的理解意味着对流动性的理解。