U.S. Economy Lost $12 Trillion to COVID Lockdowns

The pandemic caused by the influenza pandemic saw the U.S. GDP fall. COVID-19 lockdowns According to researchers at the University of Southern California, this has led to trillions of dollars of losses in the past five years.

The pandemic had already wiped out $12.2 trillion of the U.S. economy by 2022. Study Published in Economic Modelling journal estimations. Researchers project that total losses will reach $14 trillion by 2023. Researchers blame involuntary behavior for the findings. Closure of businesses As the “leading cause” for the massive decline in America’s GDP during this period.

“I’m still amazed at how powerful a negative impact COVID is projected to have on the U.S. economy compared to previous man-made and natural disasters,” According to a, Adam Rose, co-author of the study and a research professor at USC Price School and senior researcher at the USC Center for Risk and Economic Analysis of Threats and Emergencies(CREATE), is a senior research fellow at USC Center for Risk and Economic Analysis of Threats and Emergencies. Press release On January 25,

“COVID’s impact on GDP is estimated to be nearly 100 times more than the previous largest disaster of the 21st century—the September 11, 2001, World Trade Center attacks.”

While the Trump administration’s stimulus spending eased economic losses during the pandemic, the Biden administration’s $1.9 trillion spending did not have such an effect, according to the study.

Instead, federal spending was the “opposite effect by crowding out private investment and the requirement to repay businesses loans.” The “crowding out” Economics theory states that falling private-sector spend is associated with rising public sector spending.

States with fewer restrictions perform better in a pandemic.

The study blamed three factors for America’s economic decline during the pandemic: deaths and illnesses, mandatory business closures, and voluntary avoidance of activities that stimulate the economy but prevent infection.

The study concluded that mandatory business closings were the most common of these three. “greatest impact” The U.S. economy. In the first six months after the pandemic began, the GDP declined by 26.3 percent due to the closure of businesses. Work avoidance only accounted for 12.2 percent.

Deaths and illnesses had the lowest impact on people who could work.

Although the economy experienced growth in late 2019, when businesses started to reopen their doors, it declined in early 2021 after certain mandatory business closings were reinstated.

A Study The August 2021 report by the Beacon Center of Tennessee examined how state policies concerning COVID-19 impacted their economies and their health. The report examined four states and identified Kentucky and Michigan as having more restrictive economic policies than Tennessee and Georgia.

The study revealed that both Georgia and Tennessee had economies in the range of $2.5 trillion. “less impacted” There were fewer deaths in the Pandemic than in Kentucky or Michigan.

“The biggest difference was in labor force participation rates, with Kentucky and Michigan experiencing a drop in labor force participation roughly four times greater than Tennessee and Georgia,” The report stated.

“Tennessee and Georgia did not experience a significant change in new COVID-19 cases after reopening their economies.”

Pandemic and Unemployment

COVID-19 lockdowns also contribute to the creation of “chaos” Jeffrey A. Tucker, founder and president, Brownstone Institute, stated that U.S. labor market conditions are favorable.

In a write-up Tucker, writing in The Epoch Times July 2022, pointed out that the most adverse effects of the pandemic-induced unemployment were felt by the working-class population without a college degree.

This demographic was successful “an incredible” He said that after the lockdowns, there was 17.5 percent unemployment. While adding that the professional class experienced “far less pain and suffering” In these circumstances. Due to COVID-19 policies the labor force participation rate plummeted.

In July, the labor force participation rates were only 5% “back to low levels that we haven’t seen in 1977, nearly a decade before more than half of the population of women with children entered the workforce. Forty years of labor inclusion wiped out with policies wholly approved by the political left,” He wrote.