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Things that Coronavirus is teaching us: -the people who are actually vital to make the economy are grocery clerks, doctors, nurses, teachers and other carers,

Things that Coronavirus is teaching us: -the people who are actually vital to make the economy are grocery clerks, doctors, nurses, teachers and other carers, but not corporate CEOs, who are ultimately just dead weight. -money is imaginary and they can print as much as they want. -the people in power right now would rather have the stock market crash and watch you and a million other Americans die than give healthcare to everyone, even in the middle of a pandemic. How much would it help to have a centralized, organized response where everyone gets tested early right now? But it’s impossible, because it would mean giving health care to poor people. -capitalism is a beast that dies if it cannot grow. People work mostly to pay rent and debts. They pay rent so the landlord can pay the mortgage. The bank has already lent out the money they expect to get from people paying the mortgage- so if property owners don’t pay their monthly bill, the whole financial system has a heart attack. Same thing with corporate debt. The corporation is assuming that you’re going to buy crap you don’t need. If you don’t, then they can’t pay their massive debts and again the whole system seizes up. So the primary reason we spend all our useful hours at work is so that we can make numbers bigger at the bank. And all of these debts, ultimately, are paid off on the backs of the working class. But the whole system can’t be reduced, or paused, or even slowed down- it must grow exponentially more and more, consuming more and more resources forever, or else it craters in a devastating crash and cannibalizes itself on the way down.

smileysteve 7y ago
There are 2 policy options I see moving forward: Public: Healthcare and Unemployment (possibly sick leave) Private: Forced GAAP accounting for 2-4 weeks of sick leave for all employees (including gig contractors) These would be paramount to national security; so could potentially receive backing loans or even the defense budget.
rchaud 7y ago
I'm not sure if the lessons will be interpreted in this way, or even remembered once things go back to some form of normalcy, at least for the monied classes that hold the largest microphones in our society. The lessons learned from the conflict in Vietnam was not that "war is a racket" or "the US shouldn't militarily intervene unless it's a last resort". It was simply that "the US should use proxies where possible and only intervene where the opposition has a limited capacity to fight back". And even then, they've greatly overestimated their strength in these conflicts. Because the people with the largest microphones said it would be enough to win.

smileysteve 7y ago

There are 2 policy options I see moving forward: Public: Healthcare and Unemployment (possibly sick leave) Private: Forced GAAP accounting for 2-4 weeks of sick leave for all employees (including gig contractors) These would be paramount to national security; so could potentially receive backing loans or even the defense budget.

rchaud 7y ago

I'm not sure if the lessons will be interpreted in this way, or even remembered once things go back to some form of normalcy, at least for the monied classes that hold the largest microphones in our society. The lessons learned from the conflict in Vietnam was not that "war is a racket" or "the US shouldn't militarily intervene unless it's a last resort". It was simply that "the US should use proxies where possible and only intervene where the opposition has a limited capacity to fight back". And even then, they've greatly overestimated their strength in these conflicts. Because the people with the largest microphones said it would be enough to win.