The New York Times reported PACER revenues exceeded costs by about $150 million, as of 2008 according to court reports.

In a preface addressed to "Dear National Forest User," Dale Robertson, the service chief, said receipts from timber sales in the fiscal year 1987 exceeded costs by $540 million.

The Clean Air Act has been cited in retrospective studies as a case where benefits exceeded costs, but the knowledge of the benefits (attributable largely to the benefits of reducing particulate pollution) was not available until many years later.

Implicitly, exit costs exceeded costs of entry, largely due to the sunk costs of contacts, reputation and privileged access to information on market movements (on the demand side) and expertise (on the cost side) built up over time.