8 ms·
A little off topic. I find it really weird that journalists have tried to paint this recession in light of other recessions. It feels like apples and oranges tr
by brink 7y ago
A little off topic. I find it really weird that journalists have tried to paint this recession in light of other recessions. It feels like apples and oranges trying to compare the two. We've effectively shut the economy off, yet people still act surprised when 6M apply for unemployment. It feels a bit like putting cake batter in an oven and being surprised that you pull out a cake 45 minutes later.
- emiliobumachar 7y agoIt's news. As obvious as it may be, it's close enough to unbelievable that it's still sinking in for most people.
- Brendinooo 7y agoI live in Western PA and work with people in NYC. Hard to quantify this, but I felt about a week behind New Yorkers in getting serious about it, and about a week ahead of people around me. Gotta be harder to not see it at this point, but don't count out the inability of people to comprehend big stuff that doesn't happen in their backyards.
- kitotik 7y agoTalking to some friends in the mid-west and some less populated flyover states, there is still a very prevalent sentiment that this is all a coastal big city problem.
- dhosek 7y agohttps://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/1986/03/12 https://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/1986/03/12
- josephjrobison 7y agoSorry, what’s the connection here?
- jolmg 7y agoWell, it's a similar metaphor to the cake-batter-in-the-oven one that brink provided, both of which are trying to highlight that it's weird to shut off the economy then being surprised that it resulted in greater unemployment, as if it wasn't obvious that one thing would cause the other.
- dhosek 7y agoWhat jolmg said. Plus, it's one of the best C&H strips ever. If it were up to me, I'd share the link in every comment thread.
- yodsanklai 7y agoI must be very naive, but I also don't understand why general lockdown has to have negative consequences. Couldn't we stop most non essential activities for a few months, feed everyone in the meantime (thanks to the work of essential workers), and just start again exactly like it was before the shutdown?
- conanbatt 7y agoYou can, albeit 70%+ retail businesses no longer exist and their former employees don't have jobs.
- azernik 7y agoFreeze mortgage payments/interest, waive rent - there are lots of ways of dealing with this, and most are all about removing any financial return on capital for the duration.
- bequanna 7y agoThis is the (horrible) idea that just won’t die. What do you propose that the parties who are due rent/mortgage payments do? Those payments aren’t simply ‘return on capital’ they pay taxes, utilities, insurance, employees.
- aaronblohowiak 7y agoA lot of people don’t realize that one person’s debt is another person’s income.
- azernik 7y agoYou cut down as much of those as possible (e.g. not making people pay utilities, as many countries/localities have done), treating nonessential employees as laid-off and needing government aid like anyone else, adding tax and insurance-premium holidays. Lots of places have approached this model very closely; there is almost always some little bit that falls through the cracks, but it's doable.
- trhway 7y ago>yet people still act surprised when 6M apply for unemployment. we're just at the first stage of grief - denial. 4 more to go.