What are your thoughts on using points to upgrade Economy tickets to Business class?

I like United's direct flight PEK-SFO. Last year we flew this and upgraded to business with points. We will most likely fly this route again, so I'm doing some pre-planning to review the previous trip and see how any future trip might be done differently.

Last year:

Ticket price: $993.50 / person
Upgrade price: 60,000pts + $1,200 / person
Earned points value: ~$257 / person

Total biz ticket: 60,000pts + $1,936.50 [sounds like a lot! ]

I justified/rationalized this as follows:

1) All cash biz ticket: $5,556 - So our pts value at $0.060
2) For an additional $1,200 + pts / person the wife is much happier. ^
3) We didn't have enough points for 3 biz tickets
4) I don't think there was econ award availability for the dates we wanted.
3) Last year business was excellent so this was a reward.

The other side of the coin

1) For the price of points and cash for the 1 flight we could have flown 3 times in economy. I'm having some difficulty getting over this fact.

We again have a total of 220,000 points among the 3 of us. So we have enough to either spend ~$1,936.50 each to fly in business class or fly for free in economy.

I guess it now really boils down to the question:

Is it worth $1,936.50 to fly business class versus fly for "free"?

I think if I put is to the wife this way, she may agree to tough it out in economy.

Did I figure that all out correctly?