Causal effects of closing businesses in a pandemic
研究了新冠疫情中州级强制企业关闭对经济和健康结果的因果影响，发现企业承担约三分之二成本，同时显著降低死亡率，尤其在接触密集型职业地区。
We study whether state-level mandatory business closures implemented in response to the outbreak of the Covid-19 causally affect economic and health outcomes. Using plausibly exogenous variations in exposure to these restrictions, we find that they impose substantial losses to firms and workers, the former bearing approximately two thirds of the cost, consistent with firms partially insuring their workers. We show that mandatory business closures have a significant negative causal effect on mortality rates, particularly in areas featuring contact-intensive occupations. We discuss the assumptions under which the health benefits of business closures exceed their associated economic costs.