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Most of your local small businesses have already closed permanently. We haven't even gotten to the next contractionary wave where state and local governments l

Most of your local small businesses have already closed permanently. We haven't even gotten to the next contractionary wave where state and local governments lay off millions of people. It's conceivable to imagine a world where government response prevented almost all of this pain but that's not the world we live in.

JoeAltmaier 6y ago
Citation? Because its not true in my town. Landlords have forgiven rent; businesses have put employees on unemployment. But the plan is, to restart afterward. Nobody has abandoned their business or fled.
- Marsymars 6y ago
  I don't know about most, but I'm seeing local gyms, fitness studios, restaurants, retailers, etc. announcing permanent closure on pretty much a daily basis. Many landlords are refusing to forgive or decrease rent, and pretty much any path forward involves a small business taking on additional debt while having zero revenue for an indefinite period of time.
- jandrewrogers 6y ago
  The situation in Seattle does not support this view, and I know many small business owners here. Sure, some businesses are exactly as you describe but that is very far from all businesses. Many businesses have permanently closed their doors, and just as importantly, all of their capital was destroyed in the process so they no longer have the means to start a new business. The financial structure of many types of business intrinsically cannot absorb a couple of months of shutdown, it literally makes that investment a total loss to the owner. Many of these small business owners have almost all of their net worth in these businesses, it isn't like they are independently wealthy. You are seriously underestimating the scale of the destruction of capital that has occurred in the small business community. People without capital cannot afford to open a new small business. Most of them are not FAANG engineers, they don't have hundreds of thousands of dollars lying around to try again.
- pbourke 6y ago
  State and local governments: you know all the talk from Mitch McConnell about state and local governments using bankruptcy rather than receiving federal assistance? It’s because the budgets of many of them, which rely heavily on gas, property and sales taxes, have been blown apart while they are spending money left and right on the crisis. Seattle alone has a $300M budget gap as of now.
  - JoeAltmaier 6y ago
    Fortunately my state revolves around agriculture. The tractors are still going (you're alone out there in the field) and half the corn crop is already in (mild spring weather).
- phil21 6y ago
  > Nobody has abandoned their business or fled. Curious where you are? Here just within walking distance in my neighborhood in Chicago there have already been "a lot" of local stores announcing permanent closures. If I had to estimate, something around 5-10% so far out of a couple hundred. But it's only April, and I fully expect most who are not re-opening to have either not realized it or not announced it yet. I also expect quite a number to re-open their doors only to be disappointed with 25% of their usual business. Conservative "boring" businesses I expect to survive for the most part (e.g. family owned laundromat), but anything in the niche retail or food and beverage sector I suspect will be at extremely high risk of going under very quickly. Landlords here are also not (at least from my limited network of business owners I'm friendly with) reducing or forgiving rent. The most I've heard of anyone getting is a forbearance where they simply tack on the extra months to the end of their lease, which certainly is better than nothing but not exactly forgiveness. Also if you pay attention to used commercial equipment markets, the markets are so far signaling a massive glut of used equipment coming into the pipeline via business liquidators. And this all just started in earnest this month. I suppose good for me in a sense since I've been really lusting over a commercial-grade deli slicer, but the massive impact it's already having on small businesses is quite sobering to me.
  - JoeAltmaier 6y ago
    Midwest, Iowa. College town.

JoeAltmaier 6y ago

Citation? Because its not true in my town. Landlords have forgiven rent; businesses have put employees on unemployment. But the plan is, to restart afterward. Nobody has abandoned their business or fled.

Marsymars 6y ago
I don't know about most, but I'm seeing local gyms, fitness studios, restaurants, retailers, etc. announcing permanent closure on pretty much a daily basis. Many landlords are refusing to forgive or decrease rent, and pretty much any path forward involves a small business taking on additional debt while having zero revenue for an indefinite period of time.
jandrewrogers 6y ago
The situation in Seattle does not support this view, and I know many small business owners here. Sure, some businesses are exactly as you describe but that is very far from all businesses. Many businesses have permanently closed their doors, and just as importantly, all of their capital was destroyed in the process so they no longer have the means to start a new business. The financial structure of many types of business intrinsically cannot absorb a couple of months of shutdown, it literally makes that investment a total loss to the owner. Many of these small business owners have almost all of their net worth in these businesses, it isn't like they are independently wealthy. You are seriously underestimating the scale of the destruction of capital that has occurred in the small business community. People without capital cannot afford to open a new small business. Most of them are not FAANG engineers, they don't have hundreds of thousands of dollars lying around to try again.
pbourke 6y ago
State and local governments: you know all the talk from Mitch McConnell about state and local governments using bankruptcy rather than receiving federal assistance? It’s because the budgets of many of them, which rely heavily on gas, property and sales taxes, have been blown apart while they are spending money left and right on the crisis. Seattle alone has a $300M budget gap as of now.
- JoeAltmaier 6y ago
  Fortunately my state revolves around agriculture. The tractors are still going (you're alone out there in the field) and half the corn crop is already in (mild spring weather).
phil21 6y ago
> Nobody has abandoned their business or fled. Curious where you are? Here just within walking distance in my neighborhood in Chicago there have already been "a lot" of local stores announcing permanent closures. If I had to estimate, something around 5-10% so far out of a couple hundred. But it's only April, and I fully expect most who are not re-opening to have either not realized it or not announced it yet. I also expect quite a number to re-open their doors only to be disappointed with 25% of their usual business. Conservative "boring" businesses I expect to survive for the most part (e.g. family owned laundromat), but anything in the niche retail or food and beverage sector I suspect will be at extremely high risk of going under very quickly. Landlords here are also not (at least from my limited network of business owners I'm friendly with) reducing or forgiving rent. The most I've heard of anyone getting is a forbearance where they simply tack on the extra months to the end of their lease, which certainly is better than nothing but not exactly forgiveness. Also if you pay attention to used commercial equipment markets, the markets are so far signaling a massive glut of used equipment coming into the pipeline via business liquidators. And this all just started in earnest this month. I suppose good for me in a sense since I've been really lusting over a commercial-grade deli slicer, but the massive impact it's already having on small businesses is quite sobering to me.
- JoeAltmaier 6y ago
  Midwest, Iowa. College town.