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Sweden: 8% GDP drop countries that locked down early: China: 3% GDP increase Vietnam: 2% GDP increase New Zealand: 2% GDP drop Croatia: 15% GDP drop Denma
by berdario 6y ago
Sweden: 8% GDP drop
countries that locked down early:
China: 3% GDP increase
Vietnam: 2% GDP increase
New Zealand: 2% GDP drop
Croatia: 15% GDP drop
Denmark: 7% GDP drop
Norway: 6% GDP drop
(obviously, the numbers cannot be easily compared since they might refer to slightly different periods, but all of these include Q2 2020)
From these numbers, it's not obvious at all that not locking down would actually be beneficial for the economy. In fact, except for a few outliers like Croatia (disproportionately impacted by the drop in tourism revenue, I presume) it seems that locking down prevented even steeper losses.
- twblalock 6y agoThese numbers need to be compared to the numbers in the same country for the previous year. For example, in China a 3% increase is actually a regression, because they did 6% in 2019. Even that isn't enough, because we don't have the numbers for each country if it didn't lock down. It's all hypothetical. What would Norway's GDP growth rate have been without a lockdown, for example? The answer is a number. It's unknowable. People claiming that things would have been as bad, or worse, have zero evidence to back them up. People like me who say it would not have been as bad have evidence based on observed consumer behavior which was clearly curtailed during the lockdown and improved after.
- m0zg 6y agoI hate break it to people, but C19 is not going anywhere and this is not over yet, especially in countries/locales where there were very few infections. Meanwhile, Sweden had no new cases yesterday.