(MarketWatch) — Wearing a mask has become a uniquely hot-button issue in the U.S., which finds itself in the throes of a coronavirus crisis that appears to be drifting out of control by the day.
However a recent report from Goldman Sachs projects that a lack of a national policy mandating the use of facial coverings throughout the U.S. is delivering an unnecessary hit to the domestic economy.
A team of economists lead by Jan Hatzius, chief economist at Goldman, makes the case that a national face-mask mandate could partially substitute for renewed lockdowns, as COVID-19 inflections flare up in a number of southern and western states in the U.S., that would “otherwise subtract 5% from gross domestic product.”
