Covid-19 lockdowns shaved 3.5% off U.S. GDP in 2020 even as the federal government spent more than $2.6 trillion in relief measures. Millions of children fell behind in learning and nearly 100,000 businesses closed for good.
Conventional wisdom holds this was worth it because lives were saved by shutting workplaces and schools and telling people to stay home. But a newby University of Chicago economist Casey Mulligan shows the opposite. After the first month of the pandemic, organizations that adopted prevention protocols became safer places than the wider community.
In “The Backward Art of Slowing the Spread? Congregation Efficiencies during COVID-19,” Mr. Mulligan uses empirical data to test the presumption that the workplace was less safe than the home. He recognizes that “absent costly prevention activities, larger groups naturally have more infections per member.”
Yet as he notes, people join firms “in part because they value the group’s management of local externalities and public goods.” That’s an economist’s way of saying that the human capital of a company is tied to its capacity to protect employees and serve customers. There is little doubt that infection would spread faster in congregations than in smaller groups if both engaged in similar practices. But since larger groups have an incentive to spend on expensive methods of prevention, larger organizations might be better at prevention than households with fewer people.
opinion the lack of critical thinking in this conclusion...
opinion My God. What a stupid take.
opinion More signs of the experts getting the guidence completely wrong.
opinion Funny how people behave like sheep. There hasn't been evidence in over 15 months that lockdowns work, and when an article comes saying that what they did wasn't that useful, now they demand evidence.
opinion All the critics of the article on this feed offer no substantive rebuttals, only the repetition of party narrative. It is hard to believe everything we were willing to do without asking real questions of authority was in vain. The data shows what the data shows people. Own it.
opinion I’d like to see a scientific analysis of multiple studies before drawing a conclusion on this topic.
opinion Of course they don't. Neither do masks. But we already knew all of this before we ever heard of a covid 19.
opinion I wasted my valuable time by reading this article.
opinion Hmmm my home is just me, my condo has 26 units, my office campus had hundreds... doesn’t make sense.
opinion As stated before, your opinion column is absolute trash.
opinion Idiots not wearing masks did not stop the virus?
opinion This is silly!!! People from home would have taken it to workplace and then exposed people from work would have taken it to their home! The cycle would have continued. Shame on
opinion That's because door knob lickers won't be told they can't lick door knobs. They will lick all the door knobs to prove a point. Just look at Ted Cruz.
opinion BS. Here in the UK. We recorded ZERO deaths from covid yesterday. You can clearly see each drop in our cases with each followed lockdown. Enabling our economy & life to bounce back to normal much faster compared to the ones not controlling spread through mitigation & vaccination
opinion Poojitarao4
opinion That's funny bc it didn't spread in my home but I'm sure working around 3,000 people would have been much different.
opinion And if they didn’t stay home? 🤔🤨😷🇺🇸
opinion lol you nazi grifters
opinion Well if we are at home it is spread only to limited family members. At office can be spread to entire office which is potentially very large in addition to family members. Can't read the article but I find issue with the headline. What am I missing in my logic?
opinion Hey Einstein, the virus.... spreads where the people are. And when they mix more, it spreads more. Going to work mixes more than staying at home. Oh wait, this was the opinion pages of the WSJ, which is Bizarro World.
opinion What do you expect when your country is filled with stupid, selfish people who don’t understand the difference between scientific fact and opinion?
opinion Simple! Now u and ur family members free from COVID-19. Tomorrow you go to workplace and meet-up with so many people. Will u hv higher risk or remain low?
opinion USA never locked down even close to the extent that countries in East Asia did.
opinion Summary: 'Attention plebs, it's time to return to your commuter hellscape and get back to your offices and cubicles. You're not spending anywhere enough money staying at home.'