This paper estimates the benefits and costs of state suppression policies to “bend the curve” during the initial outbreak of COVID-19 in the United States. We employ an approach that values benefits and costs in terms of additions or subtractions to total production. Relative to a baseline in which only the infected and at-risk populations mitigate the spread of coronavirus, we estimate that total benefits of suppression policies to economic output are between $632.5 billion and $765.0 billion from early March 2020 to August 1, 2020. Relative to private mitigation, output lost due to suppression policies is estimated to be between $214.2 billion and $331.5 billion. The cost estimate is based on the duration of nonessential business closures and stay-at-home orders, which were enforced between 42 and 65 days. Our results indicate that the net benefits of suppression policies to slow the spread of COVID-19 are positive and may be substantial. We discuss uncertainty surrounding several parameters and employ alternative methods for valuing mortality benefits, which also suggest that suppression measures had positive net benefits.

This paper updates the mortality cost of expenditures, which has relevance to a broad range of policies, including regulations, wars, and COVID-19 restrictions. Because changes in income lead to changes in mortality risk, health investments costing more per life saved than a threshold cost-per-life-saved cutoff level are expected to increase mortality risk. This article discusses the mechanisms driving this relationship and provides recent empirical support. The 2019 cost-per-life-saved cutoff level at which expenditures increase mortality risk has a lower bound of $83.

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