Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Personal affect just kicked in. My flight to New York has been cancelled.

Ah well, I’m fully insured. Time to wait to hear from Expedia, and then look into rescheduling.

I wanted to go to New York this year too, for the first time ever, after passing up the opportunity to go last year. That was a mistake.

 reds8n wrote:



I note that all the people screaming about how economic matters were irrelevant compared to the will of the people , even if it meant to economic degradation , are now the ones shouting most loudly that we should all get back to work despite the vast majority of people being in favour of the lockdown continuing and that people being kept alive is quite important with regards to their liberty.



[/i]

This is the exact circular argument of appeals to hypocrisy I mentioned in my post... I would air my opinions on this matter, reference the differences between this situation and that, but I fear it would veer too far off topic and into politics, so I will refrain.

 queen_annes_revenge wrote:

 reds8n wrote:



I note that all the people screaming about how economic matters were irrelevant compared to the will of the people , even if it meant to economic degradation , are now the ones shouting most loudly that we should all get back to work despite the vast majority of people being in favour of the lockdown continuing and that people being kept alive is quite important with regards to their liberty.



[/i]

This is the exact circular argument of appeals to hypocrisy I mentioned in my post... I would air my opinions on this matter, reference the differences between this situation and that, but I fear it would veer too far off topic and into politics, so I will refrain.

Don’t fall for that trap, being baited into talking about politics by a mod...like redsn8, only to be censured for talking about politics by a mod...like redsn8. There’s a reason I have him on ignore.

 CptJake wrote:
Pretty easy to say money isn't king or ridicule those who place a high value on economic activity if you're not the person who is furloughed and can't pay rent or mortgage and wonders how they're going to feed their family.

Those are pretty base needs. When your capability to secure them is taken away, you might have the opinion getting back to work is a damned good thing.

Alternatively, you might have the opinion that the state needs to step in.

It's perfectly reasonable for people to fret about their ability to survive but it's problematic to conflate that arbitrarily with 'reopening the economy'. I would suggest that large business, national, and supranational concerns about and advocacy for reopening the economy hurriedly is more about saving the economic system than helping the lower middle and working classes. When people who have never experienced financial hardship have to rely on state support for a long time, a lot of people are gonna learn a lot about the viability of bootstraps. That doesn't bode well for almost anyone with the platform to push for ending lockdowns.

nfe wrote:

 CptJake wrote:
Pretty easy to say money isn't king or ridicule those who place a high value on economic activity if you're not the person who is furloughed and can't pay rent or mortgage and wonders how they're going to feed their family.

Those are pretty base needs. When your capability to secure them is taken away, you might have the opinion getting back to work is a damned good thing.

Alternatively, you might have the opinion that the state needs to step in.

It's perfectly reasonable for people to fret about their ability to survive but it's problematic to conflate that arbitrarily with 'reopening the economy'. I would suggest that large business, national, and supranational concerns about and advocacy for reopening the economy hurriedly is more about saving the economic system than helping the lower middle and working classes. When people who have never experienced financial hardship have to rely on state support for a long time, a lot of people are gonna learn a lot about the viability of bootstraps. That doesn't bode well for almost anyone with the platform to push for ending lockdowns.

Why are you so dismissive of the idea that people who own small businesses that have been shut down for week or people who have been forced into unemployment by the shutdown wanting to reopen shuttered businesses? There are more than just giant corporations that want economic activity. The Federal and State governments conscripted us all into the lockdown to create public safety but there wasn't anything set up to compensate people who now have no income because they're self quarantining for the greater good. Small businesses got a hard capped fund in the billions that ran out in a week requiring Congress to reconvene and pass more legislation. The first CARES Act wasn't passed until days after the lockdown so by the time the small business assistance was available many businesses had already laid people off and then any businesses that applied after the money ran out had to wait over a week for Congress to pass CARES Act 2.0 (I think they've passed 3.5 now). Shuttering your businesses and then twisting in the wind as your ability to earn a living slowly wastes away through no fault of your own is going to create a lot of anxiety in people. People who lost their jobs because of the lockdown had to file for unemployment. Now with over 30,000,000 workers on unemployment the States have to find money to pay all of those people at a time when State revenues are at historic lows from the lack of economic activity.Now states are fighting with Congress over the possibility of having to declare bankruptcy. The only Federal assistance sent to people was a one time $1200 payment that only some (most?) of the people received and people need to cover April and May's bills. The economic hardship of the lockdown was created by government policy, the chosen response to the pandemic. Appealing to the government for aid has only gotten people told to file for unemployment or file for small business loans and wait for the indefinite lockdown to end.

Stories like the following are not uncommon.
https://q13fox.com/2020/05/03/line-stretches-outside-the-door-at-snohomish-barbershop-operating-outside-of-the-stay-at-home-order/

Line stretches out the door at Snohomish barbershop operating outside of ‘stay-at-home’ order
...
Martin says he closed his doors for about a month when the pandemic first hit. However, he says when money got tight, he opened back up in secret.

“I wouldn’t turn the lights on. I’d come in, cut their hair and lock the door,” he said.
..
He did this he says until he heard that Snohomish County Sheriff Adam Fortney is not enforcing the “stay-at-home” order.
...
Martin says he has no plans of closing again.

“If they fine me, take away my license, or not renew it, I’m going to operate anyway. What are you going to do now? I don’t need a piece of paper to do what I’ve been doing for sixty years,” said Martin.

 Future War Cultist wrote:
.

Also, I have noticed that those who are currently biting the heads off people for expressing any concern about the future of the economy also tend to be the same ones who, not too long ago, were decrying certain political decisions as being damaging to the economy. As in any damage to the economy at all as a result of these decisions was completely unacceptable.

Make of that what you will.

 Future War Cultist wrote:


Don’t fall for that trap, being baited into talking about politics by a mod...like redsn8, only to be censured for talking about politics by a mod...like redsn8. There’s a reason I have him on ignore.

et tu Brute.


via the FT

millions of companies will have to produce COVID risk assessments showing they’ve taken full precautions:

- some executives are worried this will be a major burden, especially on smaller companies

- unions think it doesn’t go far enough because assessments won’t be published

Shocked beyond belief that the Govt. and the unions won't agree !

Don't really see how the risk assessment thing is really going to help at all -- quite often very little you can do to change things here due to things like office space, opening hours etc.

Let the blame game begin it would seem.

London nightingale hospital to stand down next week.

Can we at least please stop the whole "it's either save the economy and accept a lot of dead people or much fewer dead people but a dead economy" nonsense?

It's a false dichotomy. If we hadn't locked down (basically) the planet, we'd have a lot more dead people, and the economy would still have tanked, probably worse than it will/is doing now.
Locking down was the right thing to do, both from a humanitarian and an economic point of view:

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=12328839

https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/the-false-choice-between-lockdowns-and-the-economy-11586164745

In the countries where the virus is retreating that are slowly opening up again (Denmark, to a lesser extent Netherlands and, yes, Italy) we'll have to see how it's going to go, what works and what doesn't. At the first sign of a re-emergence restrictions will have to be tightened again. But in all cases, the key factor is testing, testing, testing.
If you're not producing enough tests, you can't safely re-open, because you won't be able to tell if the virus is spreading again.

 reds8n wrote:



via the FT

millions of companies will have to produce COVID risk assessments showing they’ve taken full precautions:

- some executives are worried this will be a major burden, especially on smaller companies

- unions think it doesn’t go far enough because assessments won’t be published

Shocked beyond belief that the Govt. and the unions won't agree !

Don't really see how the risk assessment thing is really going to help at all -- quite often very little you can do to change things here due to things like office space, opening hours etc.

Let the blame game begin it would seem.

Indeed. this is why the government needs to stop and allow the public and business owner to work together and take a little responsibility. you cant legislate your way out of this sort of problem.

Shocked beyond belief that the Govt. and the unions won't agree !

Don't really see how the risk assessment thing is really going to help at all -- quite often very little you can do to change things here due to things like office space, opening hours etc.

Let the blame game begin it would seem.

Blame game?

As in allready argueing this side of the spectrum is guilty no this one?

kinda pointless really considering no side can be blamed for a natural disaster

Not Online!!! wrote:
kinda pointless really considering no side can be blamed for a natural disaster

But they can be blamed for the response and aftermath.

Bran Dawri wrote:
Can we at least please stop the whole "it's either save the economy and accept a lot of dead people or much fewer dead people but a dead economy" nonsense?

It's a false dichotomy. If we hadn't locked down (basically) the planet, we'd have a lot more dead people, and the economy would still have tanked, probably worse than it will/is doing now.
Locking down was the right thing to do, both from a humanitarian and an economic point of view:

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=12328839

https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/the-false-choice-between-lockdowns-and-the-economy-11586164745

In the countries where the virus is retreating that are slowly opening up again (Denmark, to a lesser extent Netherlands and, yes, Italy) we'll have to see how it's going to go, what works and what doesn't. At the first sign of a re-emergence restrictions will have to be tightened again. But in all cases, the key factor is testing, testing, testing.
If you're not producing enough tests, you can't safely re-open, because you won't be able to tell if the virus is spreading again.

The ETH in Laussane expects a worse second wave somewhere in summer in the worst case scenario, e.g. social distancing not happening and people forgetting basic hygiene standards again aswell as too quick an opening.

I am cautiosuly optimistic that i't will not be as bad as expected but i wouldn't be surprised if it would happen aswell.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Skinnereal wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
kinda pointless really considering no side can be blamed for a natural disaster

But they can be blamed for the response and aftermath.

Which is also pointless the peoples dead and the economy in shambles regardless, the only thing you could potentially hope to achieve is getting more votes for profesional politicians and parties, which is entirely irrelevant to the issue at hand then and to be blunt it happens regardless and is just a nice little distraction from the failure that many governments made regardless of party since 2008 ..

Of course the excessess in both ways will be and should be judged, but i fail to see what the blame game brings to the table when you actually can have the responsible organisations work together. If there is a time for productive and cooperative behaviour then it is this.

nfe wrote:

 CptJake wrote:
Pretty easy to say money isn't king or ridicule those who place a high value on economic activity if you're not the person who is furloughed and can't pay rent or mortgage and wonders how they're going to feed their family.

Those are pretty base needs. When your capability to secure them is taken away, you might have the opinion getting back to work is a damned good thing.

Alternatively, you might have the opinion that the state needs to step in.

It's perfectly reasonable for people to fret about their ability to survive but it's problematic to conflate that arbitrarily with 'reopening the economy'. I would suggest that large business, national, and supranational concerns about and advocacy for reopening the economy hurriedly is more about saving the economic system than helping the lower middle and working classes. When people who have never experienced financial hardship have to rely on state support for a long time, a lot of people are gonna learn a lot about the viability of bootstraps. That doesn't bode well for almost anyone with the platform to push for ending lockdowns.

The state cant provide for everyone for an indefinite period though, that has been proven. Plus, people want to provide for themselves and their families. they dont want to be dependant on the state, they want that dignity. its not just about big corporations, (although people do benefit from trickle down of those companies.) I know you will disagree because of your world view, but not everything is big business greed and the little man needing government aid.

 cuda1179 wrote:
Well, it's back to work Monday for me. (technically Saturday).

Restaurants are now able to be opened, but we have 2 days of food prep to do.

In addition to wearing gloves and face masks we need to stand at least 6 feet apart. We are also legally limited to 50% capacity, and all tables must be at least 6 feet apart. So, realistically this means we are at 45% table capacity. Also, no tables of more than 6 people.

I'm totally thrown. Mothers day is coming up fast. It's usually our busiest day of the year, by a far margin. Every year the store is PACKED. I have no idea what will happen now. I somehow expect groups of people waiting outside the door for a table to free up.

I hate dealing with people on "normal" days that demand "their table NOW". Also, I know I'm going to have to stop people from trying to pull 2 tables together.

I am probably way too late, but "Good Luck"

I once was forced to make a similar decision to stay open or try to run things at half capacity. I tried to run things at half capacity as some money was better than no money. It was one of the worst decisions I made as a small business owner. I lost way more than I gained and we never really recovered to the sales we were making pre-restricted opening. Mine was a closure due to building issues rather than a virus, but still out of my control.

Why did I end up loosing business?
1. Staff had a difficult time adjusting to new routines, so service speed and efficiency suffered
2. Customer expectations were then not met, and they got mad
3. These Customers hated change, and took it out on all of us
4. Poor staffing and Purchasing due to inaccurate forecasting of the new reality

I barely made any money, and lost more in the long run than just staying closed and collecting the insurance as long as I could.

I hope you have happier results! I am so glad to be out of this particular game.....

Prestor Jon wrote:

nfe wrote:


Stories like the following are not uncommon.
https://q13fox.com/2020/05/03/line-stretches-outside-the-door-at-snohomish-barbershop-operating-outside-of-the-stay-at-home-order/

Line stretches out the door at Snohomish barbershop operating outside of ‘stay-at-home’ order
...
Martin says he closed his doors for about a month when the pandemic first hit. However, he says when money got tight, he opened back up in secret.

“I wouldn’t turn the lights on. I’d come in, cut their hair and lock the door,” he said.
..
He did this he says until he heard that Snohomish County Sheriff Adam Fortney is not enforcing the “stay-at-home” order.
...
Martin says he has no plans of closing again.

“If they fine me, take away my license, or not renew it, I’m going to operate anyway. What are you going to do now? I don’t need a piece of paper to do what I’ve been doing for sixty years,” said Martin.

Yup. I'd be willing to bet money on lots of small businesses and self employed sending out discreet whatsapp messages and the like to their closest customers allowing them to keep their business running.

At my big company that I work at (not the small ones I used to own) we are allowed back in the office next week, but we can not have meetings, must wear a mask (even in our personal work spaces and offices), have twice daily cleaning routines, and can not interact.

Therefore, no point going in as WFH is just as effective for most of us. Now, Distribution centers works it is not so easy to avoid.....

It’s really hitting home now. Whilst my dad’s friends dad is on the mend (although he’ll be recovering for months and might never fully be himself again) my friend is awaiting the call to tell him that his mother has died from it.

Prestor Jon wrote:

nfe wrote:

 CptJake wrote:
Pretty easy to say money isn't king or ridicule those who place a high value on economic activity if you're not the person who is furloughed and can't pay rent or mortgage and wonders how they're going to feed their family.

Those are pretty base needs. When your capability to secure them is taken away, you might have the opinion getting back to work is a damned good thing.

Alternatively, you might have the opinion that the state needs to step in.

It's perfectly reasonable for people to fret about their ability to survive but it's problematic to conflate that arbitrarily with 'reopening the economy'. I would suggest that large business, national, and supranational concerns about and advocacy for reopening the economy hurriedly is more about saving the economic system than helping the lower middle and working classes. When people who have never experienced financial hardship have to rely on state support for a long time, a lot of people are gonna learn a lot about the viability of bootstraps. That doesn't bode well for almost anyone with the platform to push for ending lockdowns.

Why are you so dismissive of the idea that people who own small businesses that have been shut down for week or people who have been forced into unemployment by the shutdown wanting to reopen shuttered businesses?

I'm not.

queen_annes_revenge wrote:

nfe wrote:

 CptJake wrote:
Pretty easy to say money isn't king or ridicule those who place a high value on economic activity if you're not the person who is furloughed and can't pay rent or mortgage and wonders how they're going to feed their family.

Those are pretty base needs. When your capability to secure them is taken away, you might have the opinion getting back to work is a damned good thing.

Alternatively, you might have the opinion that the state needs to step in.

It's perfectly reasonable for people to fret about their ability to survive but it's problematic to conflate that arbitrarily with 'reopening the economy'. I would suggest that large business, national, and supranational concerns about and advocacy for reopening the economy hurriedly is more about saving the economic system than helping the lower middle and working classes. When people who have never experienced financial hardship have to rely on state support for a long time, a lot of people are gonna learn a lot about the viability of bootstraps. That doesn't bode well for almost anyone with the platform to push for ending lockdowns.

The state cant provide for everyone for an indefinite period though, that has been proven.

Depends on what you mean by provide. It can certainly provide for a considerable number of people for a considerable period of time.

Plus, people want to provide for themselves and their families. they dont want to be dependant on the state, they want that dignity.

51% of the public (39% of Tory voters!) backing UBI now. The majority of people are more than happy to receive support from the state. 'Supported through hardship' is not synonymous with 'dependent'.

its not just about big corporations, (although people do benefit from trickle down of those companies.) I know you will disagree because of your world view, but not everything is big business greed and the little man needing government aid.

Didn't say it was. That said, trickle down economics demonstrably does not work without significant redistributive intervention. Christ, even Adam Smith knew that.

Edit: to force it clearly back on topic. My point is that mass reopening of economies benefits late capitalism more than it does the average family, entrepreneur, or small business owner. The ratio between the two varies depending on territory and the support available, but in almost all cases the repercussions of large scale, rather than soft and gradual, returns to normal practice are far more economically damaging to most persons than sticking out a lockdown longer - as punitive as that is for many, too. The second spike will come in the winter, hurrying a return to normal (or near normal) to the point that we end up with three spikes just means more, stricter lockdowns and more dead people that never participate in economic activity again.

I've always advocated a soft, information driven targeted easing, not a blanket return to normal.

All the UK gov workplace guidance leaked.

https://www.buzzfeed.com/alexwickham/governments-draft-plan-to-ease-lockdown-workpace-in-full

Genuinely think some of this will herald a new way of doing things for many businesses, especially as larger businesses realise the cost benefits of home working and the anti-collectivist benefits of having limited interaction between employees. Those that want to get up and running fast will have to facilitate all of this, and once it's in place...

 queen_annes_revenge wrote:
I've always advocated a soft, information driven targeted easing, not a blanket return to normal.

That is the way to do it, and is exactly how the Netherlands are doing it, starting witgmh reopening schools starting next week.

There never will be a full return to normal, at least, not until we have a good vaccine, which might never happen.

Companies like the place I work, and Barclays Bank HQ, have found they can work very well with the staff working from home. Barclays may never again bring their HQ staff back to Canary Wharf.

My empoyer has prepared to keep the office closed until September. I don't miss my 2-3 hour round trip commute, and I like saving the money it costs.

Of course, that is part of how an easing of lockdown can be achieved. IDK how many office workers there are in the UK but if most of them stay at home, it takes a lot of people off the streets, busses and trains, making things safer for people like shopworkers who need to go to a premises.

We'll undoubtedly see other changes like widespread installation of heat detecting cameras to scan for potentially infectious people, perspex shields for checkout clerks, more space in aisles and cloors marked out with 2m square boxes for people to stand in.

There will have to be changes in social behaviour as well. Like if I go into the shop and there's someone looking at the goods in front of me, I need to be patient and let him find what he wants, and he needs to not take 10 minutes choosing,and the guy behind me needs to respect my space and not push past me.

Looks like I may be able to swing being physically in the office just once a week once lockdown is lifted.

WFH en masse has kinda answered management’s understandable wariness over its viability.

I mean, calls are recorded, and there’s been no downturn in my productivity or quality. So there’s genuinely no [i] need for me to be London based.

Plus, given I’m prone to anxiety and depression, not having to commute greatly improves my work/life balance.

God bless the March of technology I guess. Imagine this happening just 20 years ago!

From today's NY Times:

As President Trump presses for states to reopen their economies, his administration is privately projecting a steady rise in the number of cases and deaths from the coronavirus over the next several weeks, reaching about 3,000 daily deaths on June 1, according to an internal document obtained by The New York Times, nearly double from the current level of about 1,750.

Needless to say, I will not be returning to the office anytime soon whether my company fully opens it or not.

 Kilkrazy wrote:


There will have to be changes in social behaviour as well. Like if I go into the shop and there's someone looking at the goods in front of me, I need to be patient and let him find what he wants, and he needs to not take 10 minutes choosing,and the guy behind me needs to respect my space and not push past me.

Or just walk briskly past provided there's enough space to do so? We don't all need impenetrable 2m exclusion zones around us. You can pass next to some one with virtually no risk. Casual interactions aren't causing the spread. It's 'close contact' which, if you're not touching physically means you need to be around the person for a number of minutes, talking, interacting etc.

This is what gets me about the stupid one way arrow systsm they've put in tesco and the little stasi who glare at you should you dare to go the wrong way.

I can see some of your points queen_annes_revenge, but surely the arrows aren't a big deal? Keep everyone moving the same direction, makes for less touching and just a better flow of properly spaced people.

Aldi's has done that here, and I found it easy enough to pass someone who was looking at items, when needed (and the rest of the time, to just wait for the next person to progress forward when we were all moving at a reasonable pace).

I see we're still playing the "we need to reopen the economy" game even though economic analysis after economic analysis, regardless of bias or political leanings, have shown that to be even more harmful for the economy than just staying closed.

Anyway, latest headlines/talking points, super-digest-edition:

Pres. Trump says we can expect at least 100k corona deaths

Administration data projects 3k coronadeaths per day by early june - which suggests that we will have a lot more than 100k dead, as that would be almost 100k deaths *per month*. We are likely looking at 100k by the end of May alone.

Trump also admits that if we had done nothing at all we would have at least 1-1.5 million dead, minimum, probably a lot higher.

Russia announced 10k new cases yesterday, total of 134k, 68k of which are in Moscow. Apparently Moscows hospitals are overflowing and they are very close to a full on system collapse that we narrowly avoided in NYC. Last time Putins approval rating was this low he annexed Crimea, so things might get interesting.

 RiTides wrote:
I can see some of your points queen_annes_revenge, but surely the arrows aren't a big deal? Keep everyone moving the same direction, makes for less touching and just a better flow of properly spaced people.

Aldi's has done that here, and I found it easy enough to pass someone who was looking at items, when needed (and the rest of the time, to just wait for the next person to progress forward when we were all moving at a reasonable pace).

Not in my experience. I've been in more contact with more people due to the arrow systems, than I ever was when we could roam freely in the supermarket, and I avoided people as a matter of course. now youre all funnelled down the same path. even the little gaps in the middle of some aisles have been closed off so you cant use the shortcut. and ill be damned if im zig zagging the entire supermarket just to get something from the end aisle.

I'd rather spend an extra five minutes moving around the supermarket according to the flow system, than risk death by coronavirus.

In Aldi last Saturday there was a woman wearing an N95 mask, on her mouth.

In very sad virus news, Dave Greenfield, keyboardist of The Stranglers died on May the 3rd after contracting it while in hospital for a heart condition.

I have very happy memories of getting pissed as arseholes with a university mate to celebrate his engagement, and Golden Brown was playing on the jukebox.

 RiTides wrote:
I can see some of your points queen_annes_revenge, but surely the arrows aren't a big deal? Keep everyone moving the same direction, makes for less touching and just a better flow of properly spaced people.

Aldi's has done that here, and I found it easy enough to pass someone who was looking at items, when needed (and the rest of the time, to just wait for the next person to progress forward when we were all moving at a reasonable pace).

Yeah, I found the one-way system very effective at reducing close interaction with very little inconvenience. At worst it's 30 seconds to walk down an adjacent isle, something I see most people fine to do just out of politeness in locations organised that way outside of a pandemic.