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JUDY WOODRUFF: Once again, 
the hemorrhaging of American 
jobs was in the millions last

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week. The official unemployment 
rate is likely to spike to 20 
percent by June, if that is

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not already the 
case unofficially.

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And Federal Reserve Chair Jay 
Powell warns that we could be 
facing a prolonged recession

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that could damage growth 
for years to come.

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Everyone wants to restart the 
economy. The question is how.

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Paul Solman gets the views of a 
Nobel Prize-winning economist.

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It's part of our 
series Making Sense.

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PAUL ROMER, Nobel Laureate in 
Economics: Right now, this week, 
there is a choice about getting

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some more activity going 
vs. protecting lives.

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PAUL SOLMAN: Paul Romer, who won 
a Nobel Prize in 2018 for his 
work on technology and economic

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growth.

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These days, he's focused on how 
to avoid an economic depression.

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PAUL ROMER: Really, the only 
way to get back to a healthy 
economy is to stop the death

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and make people feel safe.

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PAUL SOLMAN: And ending 
the lockdowns won't 
do that, he says.

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PAUL ROMER: We're going to have 
a kind of a seesaw pattern, 
I think, of trying to open

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up, realize that we haven't 
done anything to protect 
against the spread of the virus,

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and then pulling back.

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And what we're going to just 
have to do is find a sustainable 
way to contain this virus.

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PAUL SOLMAN: That way, he's 
been arguing, is mass testing, 
everyone in the U.S. every

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two weeks.

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PAUL ROMER: If you don't know 
who's infectious, the only way 
to lock down and isolate the

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people who are infectious 
is to lock down everybody.

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I think if we just test 
everybody and isolate 
the people who are 
infectious, we can easily

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suppress it, and we can do it 
without causing a depression.

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PAUL SOLMAN: But how can we 
do that, given the well-known 
shortages of test supplies,

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personal protective equipment, 
laboratory capacity?

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Says Romer, how can we not? 
Just look at his model.

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PAUL ROMER: Each additional 
unit of testing frees up about 
eight or nine people who can

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go back to work.

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What's the value of the work 
the eight or nine people can 
do? Man, the test is really

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cheap compared to what the 
people can do. And for people 
who say, well, we can't get

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a lot of them right now, I'm 
OK with that. Let's just get 
as many as we can right now

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and start to get some 
people back to work.

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PAUL SOLMAN: Economics 
is fundamentally about 
costs vs. benefits.

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PAUL ROMER: Yes.

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PAUL SOLMAN: So all this 
testing costs how much vs. how 
much is added to the economy

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when the nine people 
that you were talking 
about go back to work.

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PAUL ROMER: If we can get the 
cost of a test down to $10, 
so one unit of testing per day

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will cost us about $3,600 per 
year, if that frees up nine 
people, then that means, at

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a median income of, 
say, $50,000, nine times 
$50,000 would be $450,000.

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It's like a hundred-fold 
increase on your 
investment. There aren't 
very many investments

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where you get a 100-X return 
pretty much guaranteed.

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PAUL SOLMAN: The latest 
relief bill did include 
$25 billion for testing.

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So, is $25 billion enough?

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PAUL ROMER: No.

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We need to commit about $100 
billion a year to expenditures 
on testing. That's enough

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to get us this 23 million tests 
per day, or test everybody 
every 14 days in the United

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States. The $25 billion is 
enough to get going. It'll give 
us some demonstration projects.

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I think we should be testing 
and reopen, you know, for TV, 
Major League Baseball. I think

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we should be testing everybody 
in nursing homes. I think we 
should be testing frequently

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everybody who's a 
health care provider.

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PAUL SOLMAN: Are you 
condemning the country for 
not having had the tests?

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PAUL ROMER: No, no, no. Bygones 
are bygones. I think it's a 
horrible mistake to worry about,

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you know, who do we blame, who 
are we going to punish, or to 
be thinking about, oh, would

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have, could have, should have.

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PAUL SOLMAN: Romer does, 
however, fault the Food 
and Drug Administration.

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MILES O'BRIEN: The FDA 
application was 28 pages' long.

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PAUL SOLMAN: Miles O'Brien's 
recent "Frontline" documentary 
described the challenges faced

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by a University of Washington 
researcher in the early days 
of the pandemic, when he raced

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to get a new test approved.

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DR. ALEX GRENINGER, University 
of Washington: One of the things 
is, they needed a document

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FedExed across the 
country before they could 
look at the document.

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MILES O'BRIEN: You couldn't 
electronically transmit it?

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DR. ALEX GRENINGER: I could 
electronically transmit it, 
but they couldn't look at it

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until it was FedExed.

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MILES O'BRIEN: The FDA 
told me it did review 
Greninger's application, 
but it was incomplete.

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They also said they were 
balancing the need for tests 
with concerns about accuracy.

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PAUL ROMER: I understand why 
they have to be very careful. 
But they're making people

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who are innovating, finding 
better ways to do the tests, 
jump through these extraordinary

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hoops. And it's taking months 
to just get simple things done.

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PAUL SOLMAN: Case in point, 
says Romer, the saliva 
test approved last week.

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PAUL ROMER: You just 
spit in a tube, much 
better than those swabs.

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WOMAN: I'm sorry, but I 
have to get in there, OK?

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PAUL ROMER: But it took almost 
a month for the FDA to say, 
OK, well, somebody can spit

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in the tube without being 
physically present in front of 
a health care professional who

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watches them while they do it.

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PAUL SOLMAN: Right.

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PAUL ROMER: I mean, if it takes 
a month to make a decision 
like that, we're never going

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to get to the faster, cheaper, 
better tests that we need.

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PAUL SOLMAN: What about 
people who've gotten the 
blood test that shows 
that they have antibodies,

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so they must have had the 
virus? Are they then OK 
just go back into the world?

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PAUL ROMER: So you can't restart 
an economy with just the 5 
percent who've got antibodies.

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You have got to let the virus 
run through the community and 
get to 60, 70 percent with

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antibodies. But it's a horrific 
path to get there, because 
a million people are going

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to die along the way. And it'll 
take a year for that kind of 
process to work through the

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whole economy.

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PAUL SOLMAN: What's your biggest 
fear right now, economically?

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PAUL ROMER: The biggest 
risk we face is that the 
economic turmoil is going 
to lead to political

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turmoil.

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We can rebuild. We can recover 
income. But if we damage our 
institutions of rule of law,

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democracy, basic 
freedoms, that can take 
a lot longer to rebuild.

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PAUL SOLMAN: Are we moving 
towards the kind of investment 
you think we have to make?

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PAUL ROMER: I am actually very 
confident that it's going to 
happen, because there are no

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good alternatives. We're 
losing $500 billion a month.

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It's eventually going to dawn 
on people that we can't afford 
to keep doing that. And compared

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to that, $100 billion a 
year is really pretty cheap.

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PAUL SOLMAN: In fact, Romer is 
sure enough that testing will 
soon be everywhere, he offered

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to put his money where 
his heart is, $500 of it.

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PAUL ROMER: I'm so confident 
that testing will be the way 
out of this crisis that I

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will bet you that, in 
six months, we will be 
doing 20 million tests 
a day in the United

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States.

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PAUL SOLMAN: So, I'm betting 
against you now that we're not 
going to hit 20 million a day,

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tests, in six months?

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PAUL ROMER: Yes.

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PAUL SOLMAN: And I pay 
your charity if you win, 
and you pay my charity?

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PAUL ROMER: That's a deal.

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PAUL SOLMAN: I 
will take that bet.

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PAUL ROMER: OK. Have me back, 
and we will see how it goes.

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PAUL SOLMAN: For the "PBS 
NewsHour," the ever-skeptical 
Paul Solman, now with 
some skin in the game.