The government should undertake the construction project(s) where the total benefits are greater than (and ideally far exceed) the total costs , and among those, it should choose the project with the highest net benefit (total benefits minus total costs).

How the choice is made

Using standard cost‑benefit analysis, the government should:

  1. Calculate net benefits for each project:
    Net benefit=Total benefit−Total cost\text{Net benefit}=\text{Total benefit}-\text{Total cost}Net benefit=Total benefit−Total cost.
  1. Eliminate any project for which costs exceed benefits (negative net benefit).
  1. Compare the remaining projects and pick the one with the largest positive net benefit , since that yields the greatest gain to society.

Applying this to “the table above”

Because your question refers to a specific table of costs and benefits, the concrete answer is:

  • Compute net benefit for each row in that table.
  • The government should choose the project (or level of project) with the highest net benefit value in that table , as long as that net benefit is positive.

If you paste the numbers from the table (cost and benefit for each project), I can calculate the exact project name/letter and show the net benefit for each one.