4 ms·

Were virtually all businesses shut down for weeks or months during the 1918 flu pandemic? All I can find is reports of localized shutdowns in certain cities. I

• _curious_ 7y ago
  As a percentage of population (and volume of dollars) then vs now: how many are negative net worth? Break even/neutral net worth?
• clairity 7y ago
  > "Were virtually all businesses shut down for weeks or months... If not, I don't think you can say it's comparable." that's the (over-)reaction. the precedent is the more-virulent-than-usual infectious disease. the precedent is the need to break the infection chain to slow/stop the pandemic. you wouldn't expect the reaction to be 'comparable' after 100 years. you'd hope that we'd have developed methods to better assuage fear and panic though.
• CydeWeys 7y ago
  Yes, there were very large, long shutdowns during the 1918 flu pandemic. And they had more of an effect than what we're doing now, because people couldn't work remotely.
  • SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
    Do you have a source for that? I've seen charts purporting to show that, but digging in always revealed that they showed "social distancing measures" more broadly, limited to things like public gatherings bans and restaurant closures. I haven't seen any record of general business shutdowns or bans on private gatherings in 1918.