Regarding Coronavirus (COVID-19)

[ChaosAgent]

I think everyone needs to look at Italy and wonder whether they wish they had done more, sooner.

The U.S., for a number of reasons, is playing catch-up tight now.

It's acceptable to lock down for 2-3 weeks. Maybe a month. People won't accept longer. As of now it's the immediately obvious thing to do. We'll see how our society feels at the start of April.

 

[Pens1566]

This goes along with a lot of things I've heard from wife and her colleagues. They've been thinking this for a few weeks now based on reports out of other countries and other things like CDC recommendations for hospital staff. Specifically the aerosol part.

 

[CascadiaPenguin]

Lots of H.S. friends went there when drinking age was still 18 (not that it mattered). Those few that made it past the first year (or even semester) were happy to get through with a 2.0. But they all had a lot more fun than I had at a small, Uber-competitive liberal arts college.

Our grocery store in S.C. just now catching up with the rest of the world and shelves are kind of bare. I’m still going to work every day, but I assume I’ll be directed to work from home pretty soon.

It was a good experience. I was there when the drinking age went up every year for three years and I was grandfathered in by 11 days. But like you said, in Morgantown, that hardly mattered. Hell, freshman year the Blue Tic bar in the Mountainlair would deliver kegs to dorm rooms!

 

[SouthGeorge]

They are testing air in Paris as we speak... Cars pulling up and testing, weird times.

 

[ChaosAgent]

This perception that it is only effecting the elderly makes no sense.

It can put 30-50 year olds in the hospital for a month. How is that effecting someone’s financial system?

It disproportionately affects elderly people. This is a fact. It's a risk for younger people, yes. The biggest is spreading it to elderly loved ones.

Unemployment is also a risk to younger people with little savings.

Edit: listen man I'm on your side. I'm just telling you, the "juice vs. the squeeze" debate hasn't started yet but it's going to and fast. At some point the doctors can't be the only ones calling the shots when you're talking about fundamentally restructuring a society.

 

[Gurglesons]

It's acceptable to lock down for 2-3 weeks. Maybe a month. People won't accept longer. As of now it's the immediately obvious thing to do. We'll see how our society feels at the start of April.

Maybe society will realize “job creators” bring nothing to society and the workers and consumers are what drives the world and should be the ones in power.

The fact that Mitt Romney is demanding congress pays their citizens instead of a corporation is a great move.

Kill all the landlords. Piss on Bezos’ grave.

 

[Kristopher Letang]

Maybe society will realize “job creators” bring nothing to society and the workers and consumers are what drives the world and should be the ones in power.

The fact that Mitt Romney is demanding congress pays their citizens instead of a corporation is a great move.

Kill all the landlords. Piss on Bezos’ grave.

Job creators bring nothing to society? lol

Imma head out.

 

[Turin]

This perception that it is only effecting the elderly makes no sense.

It can put 30-50 year olds in the hospital for a month. How is that effecting someone’s financial system?

Yea, but how likely is that, and is it worth the amount of pain it’s going to cost everyone, even in the prime of their lives, financially? Just about anything can put normal adults in the hospital. Not saying we shouldn’t be doing our best to limit this, but there’s a limit to what we can/should do, and I’m willing to throw skeptics a bone or two and agree that we could look back on this as the wrong response in many cases. Could. For me, life is fairly regular in that I keep my job, keep working, always wash my hands (did before anyway) etc. Only change is that I’m not shopping or going out to eat as much. I’m lucky in that respect, even though I wish I could be paid to sit at home haha.

Many people have better jobs than I do that have or are about to lose them. And it’s not easy to get jobs. Certainly not going to be moving forward here in the next little while. And stress is a real underrated killer health problem. This level of isolation can only last a couple weeks max, I think.

 

[CascadiaPenguin]

I'll never know the glory of sunnyside? I'm a townie, man. Born and raised. I was at the last block party in '94. Most fun I've ever had across the street from a shooting.

Props! Grant Ave? I presume you must have had the honor of attending a football game or two at old Mountaineer Field? I was there for many, including a PSU game where they grabbed the Nittany Lion mascot from the endzone in the student/bowl section and carried him up to the top before troopers saved him. New stadium is still a bit antiseptic to me, though I guess it is 40 years old..

 

[Turin]

Job creators bring nothing to society? lol

Imma head out.

If that’s the lesson this generation takes from this, we deserve a much bigger plague.

 

[CascadiaPenguin]

My buddy (lives outside of Tampa) said bars are still open and people are congregating like nothings wrong. Prob gonna get worse there.

Your buddy is correct. Clearwater Beach was packed today. People to people on the beach and in the water. Somewhere Darwin laughs?

 

[ImporterExporter]

I get being annoyed with people who don’t like the measures taken for superficial i.e. entertainment reasons, but for now it’s pretty valid for some to be miffed or uneasy about the entire world economy grinding to a halt because of this particular virus right now. People are losing necessary income and many businesses are going under if this lasts much longer. We’ll be able to evaluate whether or not the steps taken were too drastic in hindsight, but I don’t blame some people for questioning whether this is worth it.

This coming from somebody who would love to get paid leave from work right now and be quarantined

This is why society doesn't work. Precisely.

All of that is based around money. Pieces of paper and coin with an imaginary value attached to them. The hypocrisy is astounding. You claim to be the voices for the "collective" yet you are consumed for <insert likely wants rather than needs> that can help YOU. The ironic thing is money is worthless once the world goes to shit. A billionaire will be torn from his empty throne.

The people perpetuating this hysteria are just smarter than the masses. And they get very, very rich off it. And the ground level hysteria are people afraid of their own mortality.

Money is the root of all evil. Government was created to consolidate it.

 

[Jaded-Fan]

I know, no politics. And this really is only tangentially related.

But I was thinking about this crises. It really is different than a Katrina, or even a 9-11. Those were local tragedies limited in time. Shared national grief and mourning, but still not the same.

The only analogy that comes to mind for this is war. And a World war to boot. The shared national, no world, tragedy, suffering, fear and loss. The shared sacrifices. The unknown of how long that it will go on, only that it will not be of short duration.

In times like this we are not Democrats, Republicans or anything else. We are Americans. We are not Communists or Capitalists. We are human beings of the world with a shared humanity.

It is the one good thing about this. It for at least the now lessens the us vs. them and reminds us that we have more that unites us than divides. As Abraham Lincoln said it appeals to our better angels. At least that is the hope.

 

[Dipsy Doodle]

It's acceptable to lock down for 2-3 weeks. Maybe a month. People won't accept longer. As of now it's the immediately obvious thing to do. We'll see how our society feels at the start of April.

Death is usually pretty convincing, but we'll see.

 

[ChaosAgent]

Yea, but how likely is that, and is it worth the amount of pain it’s going to cost everyone, even in the prime of their lives, financially? Just about anything can put normal adults in the hospital. Not saying we shouldn’t be doing our best to limit this, but there’s a limit to what we can/should do, and I’m willing to throw skeptics a bone or two and agree that we could look back on this as the wrong response in many cases. Could. For me, life is fairly regular in that I keep my job, keep working, always wash my hands (did before anyway) etc. Only change is that I’m not shopping or going out to eat as much. I’m lucky in that respect, even though I wish I could be paid to sit at home haha.

Many people have better jobs than I do that have or are about to lose them. And it’s not easy to get jobs. Certainly not going to be moving forward here in the next little while. And stress is a real underrated killer health problem. This level of isolation can only last a couple weeks max, I think.

I want to let doctors run the thing for a while longer, but at some point you gotta bring sociologists, psychologists, economists and politicians in. Even lawyers.

Doctors can't run a society permanently.
1) They are very risk-averse as a rule about health. This makes them good at their job but as social planners their level of risk-aversion is far outside the median society member who wasn't even washing his hands after going to the bathroom until a week ago.
2) They don't know economic anxiety. At all. Yeah they get student loans but they rocket those MFers away as soon as they graduate and start earning $200K annually. And they don't have to worry about unemployment at all.

So we'll see. I'm with you that we'll lose our patience quickly. But then again in some parts of the country like Tampa, this lockdown stuff hasn't even begun. Thanks a lot, jagoffs.

 

[Gurglesons]

Yea, but how likely is that, and is it worth the amount of pain it’s going to cost everyone, even in the prime of their lives, financially? Just about anything can put normal adults in the hospital. Not saying we shouldn’t be doing our best to limit this, but there’s a limit to what we can/should do, and I’m willing to throw skeptics a bone or two and agree that we could look back on this as the wrong response in many cases. Could. For me, life is fairly regular in that I keep my job, keep working, always wash my hands (did before anyway) etc. Only change is that I’m not shopping or going out to eat as much. I’m lucky in that respect, even though I wish I could be paid to sit at home haha.

Many people have better jobs than I do that have or are about to lose them. And it’s not easy to get jobs. Certainly not going to be moving forward here in the next little while. And stress is a real underrated killer health problem. This level of isolation can only last a couple weeks max, I think.

Maybe my perspective is different given what I do and the global level of corporation I am in.

This will have a ridiculous effect on the world economy. Even if we do what we are only now doing. And everyone in my leadership team is prepared for this to get much, much worse.

 

[Dipsy Doodle]

The people perpetuating this hysteria are just smarter than the masses. And they get very, very rich off it. And the ground level hysteria are people afraid of their own mortality.

 

[ChaosAgent]

Maybe my perspective is different given what I do and the global level of corporation I am in.

This will have a ridiculous effect on the world economy. Even if we do what we are only now doing. And everyone in my leadership team is prepared for this to get much, much worse.

The virus or the world economy's response to it? Or both?

 

[Jaded-Fan]

Maybe my perspective is different given what I do and the global level of corporation I am in.

This will have a ridiculous effect on the world economy.

I am not sure about that. The human cost will be great, but think back to my war analogy. What happened after the world wars ended? They didn't call the following decades the roaring 20s and Happy Days for no reason.

After a time of sacrifice people often let loose and a time of prosperity and optimism follows. Most economists that I read expect a short recession and an extremely strong second half of the year. I expect a vaccine by summer. They already have begun human trials.

 

[Randy Butternubs]

Blah. I was just forwarded an article telling the readers to expect long last effects up to 18 months...

Guess I should start growing my own food...

 

[Gurglesons]

I am not sure about that. The human cost will be great, but think back to my war analogy. What happened after the world wars ended? They didn't call the following decades the roaring 20s and Happy Days for no reason.

After a time of sacrifice people often let loose and a time of prosperity and optimism follows. Most economists that I read expect a short recession and an extremely strong second half of the year. I expect a vaccine by summer. They already have begun human trials.

Sure. World wars weren’t resolved in a few months. And moreover, the world has linked itself far more than it was then. The USA was a great place to be. Other countries were not.

 

[ChaosAgent]

I am not sure about that. The human cost will be great, but think back to my war analogy. What happened after the world wars ended? They didn't call the following decades the roaring 20s and Happy Days for no reason.

After a time of sacrifice people often let loose and a time of prosperity and optimism follows. Most economists that I read expect a short recession and an extremely strong second half of the year. I expect a vaccine by summer. They already have begun human trials.

We built an economic machine to help win WW2. It wasn't on our soil. The countries who won WW2 in Europe were devastated; it's why we created the Marshall Plan for them.

Conversely, we're deconstructing our economy now to its bare essentials now.

Having said all of that, if people are as optimistic as you are potentially they'll be happy tiding themselves over and readying themselves for a BOOM 2H. In which case the short-term government subsidies will work and business won't close. I'm not going to violate the politics thing, so I'll only say that the former host of the Celebrity Apprentice said as much today. Hoping you and him are right, Jaded.

 

[Sideline]

Disclaimer: I have a very secure job where I can work from home and a decent rainy day fund in the bank. I'm hardly inconvenienced by this social distancing at all. I'm fine with it lasting months. It will protect a lot of my immediate family members.

With that said, a huge amount of young and middle age people live paycheck to paycheck. This shutdown is going to create a major recession that will leave a bunch of those people unemployed or under employed if it drags on much past a few weeks. That is real human suffering too.

That suffering will lead some of these people to spiral into addiction, depression, crime or even suicide. These are real costs beyond dollars and cents. Would you be okay getting a 25 year old hooked on fentanyl to save an 85 year old's life? Two 85 year olds? 20?

I won't judge anyone who has a different opinion on what the right balance is than I do. I don't like seeing people pretend that the only costs of the shut down are financial.

 

[Gurglesons]

The virus or the world economy's response to it? Or both?

I don’t think the virus is a big deal.

The repercussions of the two strongest economies in the world taking the percussions they are will be massive.

 

[Gurglesons]

We built an economic machine to help win WW2. It wasn't on our soil. The countries who won WW2 in Europe were devastated; it's why we created the Marshall Plan for them.

Conversely, we're deconstructing our economy now to its bare essentials now.

Having said all of that, if people are as optimistic as you are potentially they'll be happy tiding themselves over and readying themselves for a BOOM 2H. In which case the short-term government subsidies will work and business won't close. I'm not going to violate the politics thing, so I'll only say that the former host of the Celebrity Apprentice said as much today. Hoping you and him are right, Jaded.

We also had the best president in history from an economic, psychological and global context with a cabinet that absolutely supported those methods.

I’m not sure Biden or Trump are anywhere near the leadership FDR even winked at, let alone delivered. I’m not even sure they are on Truman’s level.