(04-24-2020, 08:07 AM)David Horn Wrote:(04-24-2020, 01:48 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:(04-22-2020, 07:39 PM)gabrielle Wrote: Well, good for them. Just so you know, though, they do all those things in blue states too. Even in blue cities within red states.
I think we all agree the economy is f--cked. Blues are sacrificing just as much as reds. Unemployment is likely around 15% or more right now, I've read. But I'm not really sure what you expect people to do. The economic crisis we have right now is because of the Covid crisis. The economy is only ever as healthy as the working people driving it. We have to beat this health crisis, and the only way to do that is to trust our health care experts.
It's going take a year or more to beat the COVID19 crisis. My issue with our governor, he talks a lot and dishes a lot information but doesn't give us any definitive information about time lines or goals related to economic recovery or loosening up and lifting restrictions and so forth. I figure the medical professionals, analysts and scientific related professional are going to get a handle the COVID19 crisis related stuff. My guess is unemployment is closer to 20% at the moment and will most likely be higher than that next month. My mother was a nurse for over forty years. I love/trust the nurses, doctors, first response folks and so forth like everyone else. But, the medical folks that we don't see that don't work in hospitals are now getting laid off too due to lack of work right now. So, something's got to give and attention must begin to shift from COVID19 to the economy pretty quick or we can expect to see all kinds of trouble from all the ripple effects that we aren't used to seeing going on all over the place. My governor ain't all that bad for Democratic governor but he needs to get his priorities straight and start setting some goals and objective relating to people's lives and the economy. I don't think virus is that dangerous to the bulk of us at this point.
You want what can't be. This problem will run its course based entirely on how we all behave, and no politician can change that. NYC stepped up, and that's amazing. The city is full of free spirits who don't take well to authority, but this time they listened. Other places haven't been tested yet. We'll have to see when they are.
It will take perhaps a year for COVID-19 to disappear, perhaps as people develop immunity after inoculation or after exposure that they survive (of course if they don't survive...) The virus is forcing changes in life that most people will accept as temporary measures for survival and compromises that will allow the return of near-normal commerce and other essential activities (which include love, schooling, and family formation). COVID-19 doesn't have the stigma that HIV/AIDS has had... I suppose that it could be spread in the same ways as HIV/AIDS (including sex and IV drug use) but it is also far easier to contract. It is also a faster, if less sure kill.
So people will wear masks at work. I expect those masks to even become fashion statements, even to the extent that there will even be "designer" face masks. People will get accustomed to seeing people wear masks while doing public contact work. People will learn to do such things as cut hair and receive haircuts safely.
The big hazard is that much of our commerce involves people making mindless choices in life that are good for business profits. In retail, those are impulse purchases; a merchant puts out attractive goods, a customer walks past them and decides with little thought that he wants it, and buys it. Impulse purchases are getting trickier to induce. People can't pump coins (or electronic credits) into a slot machine if they don't go into the casino.
Gambling? I'm not a gambler. I can hardly imagine a less satisfying way to spend money. So guess what I saw advertised? Horse racing -- if without bettors in the stands. One can watch the horse races on line and bet on them. It might work. People get excited about watching horses run. The Triple Crown (Kentucky Derby, Preakness, and Belmont) might run this year, if with only television audiences. The Indy 500 might run much the same way. There will be virtual poker, I suppose, with cameras trained on participants who get to see each other and bet 'virtual' money that goes to winners' bank accounts and leaves losers' bank accounts. (I am well versed in probability and statistics, so maybe I understand gambling better than anyone can without being a participant. I will say little more because I am not in the business. To put it as cynically as possible, the glitz of a casino largely comes from bettors' losses in a zero-sum game in which the House takes a cut).
The big thing is that people will decide after a few months what matters to them and what doesn't. We have a name for that situation: poverty. People might choose whether they want a dog or a car, have a monotonous diet or invite someone into the apartment to share the cost of the apartment, tell a brutal boss that he is the most wonderful person in the world or end up unemployed, his work or his religious values, get his own teeth fixed or get his kids' teeth fixed, medicine or heating -- usually the choice between one deprivation and another, between giving up something precious cheaply and getting an over-priced necessity because one is under-paid, over-taxed, or unfortunate to face monopoly racketeering.
We will adapt. The Governor of Michigan decided today that golf (but not while using golf carts) was safe, and that motorboats are safe. Stores can mandate that people wear masks if they are to enter. In a short time people are going to be able to able to attend religious services, pump coins into slot machines, visit libraries (they may need gloves as well as masks), and get their hair done. They will get to test-drive cars again. People will be making TV shows and motion pictures again. Casual dining and bar-hopping will be slower to return because people must open their mouths to eat and drink. People will go bowling again -- with masks over their mouths, which will make eating, drinking, and smoking difficult. Employers will find out whether people working remotely is compatible with command and control so much the style of management in recent decades -- or whether workers can get away with more entrepreneurial behavior. People will have places to go because there will be things to do in those places, so absurdly-low prices for gasoline will vanish. Above all, kids will be going back to school.
If I have one prediction, businesses already dying before COVID-19 will receive the coup de grace this time. Hint: Sears likely re-opens only for clearance sales. Book, video, and record dealers will be unable to compete with Amazon.com unless dealing in used ones. Casual dining in places that offer food little better than fast-food places will go to a carry-out and fast-food model or perish. Most people will learn what most matters to them and what doesn't. People might learn new interests that change their spending habits. As such they will change their spending habits permanently.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.