States with the Most Restrictive Covid Measures Appear to Have Made Things Worse

Posted on by John C. Goodman
  • States with severe government interventions did not significantly improve health outcomes compared to states with more restrained approaches.
  • This may be partly because government interventions appear to have increased excess mortality from non-COVID health conditions.
  • Severe government interventions were strongly correlated with worse economic (increased unemployment and decreased GDP) and educational (fewer days of in-person schooling) outcomes.
  • The economic and education damage was most severe for lower-income families and children.

Paragon Health Institute study and NBER study.

3 thoughts on “States with the Most Restrictive Covid Measures Appear to Have Made Things Worse”

  1. The infection and mortality results of Florida and California are an extremely “mixed bag.” Even within California, there is a wide divergence of results. The Bay Area with its snobbish work-from-home techies had much better results than Los Angeles with its crowded housing, many restaurant and service sectors workers, etc.

    Florida does come out way, way ahead on the overall economy and in school openings. Ten years from now, that may be all that historians really care about.

    https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-03-09/florida-vs-california-who-had-better-covid-response

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  3. This is valuable information. There sure seems to be a pattern of red states doing much better than blue states…..I wonder if this is a cultural thing, where red states are less obedient to public health and educational authority figures.

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