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Or maybe attempting to shut down large swaths of world economy for an indefinite amount of time wasn’t such a good idea? In the timescale of months to years all

Or maybe attempting to shut down large swaths of world economy for an indefinite amount of time wasn’t such a good idea? In the timescale of months to years all business becomes “essential”. Sure shut it down for “just two weeks” but a year or more? What did people think would happen?

allturtles 5y ago
I really don't understand what you mean by this comment. The only swaths of the economy that I'm aware of that got shut down in the U.S. are things like bars, restaurants and movie theaters. These are not tightly connected to global supply chains, AFAIK, and if they were why would their shut down cause bottlenecks (it should lessen demand, not increase it)?
- ralph84 5y ago
  Tesla's California factory was shut down for 2 months.
- zamadatix 5y ago
  Thinking about it from the perspective of someone who thinks the shutdowns were net good but reviewing the comment in good faith: Lessened demand in large sections of the economy can itself create shortages in the parts that take on the load or at least stress on the supply chain to redirect to those places now in extreme demand. Take restaurants for example, people didn't stop eating but vast swaths of food supply chains had to change pretty much overnight. Then there is also the problem of the demand of certain things being highly uncertain, like cars towards the beginning. Then there is the extreme induced demand on certain things like webcams, laptops, or other home electronics as everyone stays home. I'm sure that also isn't an easy overnight change to make and then swing back from since it was completely unplanned. I know the area I work immediately ran out of widgets based on orders of 10s of thousands instantly coming in and it has been backed up since that time to this day. Finally during the initial portion of the pandemic lots of factories, both in the US and China, were getting shut down. China seemingly longer. When restaurants and whatnot started to open back up was about the time you saw those shutdowns stop happening too. So on top of the above concerns for the supply chain lots of non bars and movie theatres were also affected by shutdowns, just perhaps not as long. May be more I'm missing but I don't think GP is an empty comment by any means.
  - allturtles 5y ago
    Much of the problem with understanding what GP means is that 'the shutdowns' is a very hazy term. Implicit in the comment seems to be the idea that there was some small set of authority figures who decided to shut down the global economy and if only they hadn't done that things would be better. e.g., The induced demand from work from home you mention I wouldn't count as part of any 'shutdown' at all. It has been largely driven organically by the decisions of individual firms and workers. My office was ordered to work from home by company HQ, not by any government authority, and at this point staying WFH is an individual voluntary choice. Does this count as part of the 'shutdown'? Certainly my sector of the economy (software development) was not shutdown, quite to the contrary.
    - zamadatix 5y ago
      I'm not sure the comment is implicit of who did the shutdowns but even taking it as so the widget orders by the 10s of thousands I referenced were mostly public school systems receiving mandates and associated COVID relief funding to compl,y not private enterprises. Particularly younger grades weren't normally assigned personal hardware and not every child had internet access at home. Though like you say the private sector remote work shift certainly happened too and exacerbated the ordering situation.
      - allturtles 5y ago
        Sure, many (most?) schools went remote, but they didn't shut down, and they aren't really integrated into the "global economy." It's certainly true that collectively, society pushed down in some places and things popped up in others, sometimes in obvious ways (going remote creates demand for laptops and cameras and office chairs) and sometimes in surprising ones (spiking rental car prices, yet internet providers were totally unfazed). I don't think "if only we hadn't been so foolish as to shutdown a large part of the global economy" is a useful or helpful way to think about these phenomena, though.
hoppyhoppy2 5y ago
>What did people think would happen? We thought that if we didn't do that we'd run a very real risk of the entire healthcare system collapsing. We were trying to "flatten the curve" so that hospitals could deal with an ongoing roar instead of being hit with a massive explosion.
- polote 5y ago
  At least now we know that public health care experts cannot be trusted to make predictions
- celtain 5y ago
  >We were trying to "flatten the curve" Not were, are. The entire lockdown/restriction/mask mandate set of policies has been based on managing hospital capacity. State and local governments are still using hospital capacity to decide when to lift or reimpose restrictions. The wave of explainers we got last year about flattening the curve were wrong about how long it would take, but the fundamental strategy and the reasoning behind it never actually changed.
Afforess 5y ago
The TX Winter Storm and Big Freeze did more damage to the TX economy than the shutdowns. Try again.
- hosteur 5y ago
  That’s not a good argument. 1: damage done by shutdowns is still going on so we don’t even know the full cost. 2: the winter storm is not self inflicted. 3: I am not sure you are right that said winter storm did more damage. Would like a source though.
  - erosenbe0 5y ago
    When analyzing the storm I'm not clear are we talking about the power grid alone or the normal organic effects of Texas just not operating well at those temperatures and pipes bursting, frost heave, exposure deaths, etc?
  - JaimeThompson 5y ago
    Gas producers not having themselves marked as critical infrastructure so ERCOT would not kill power to them and the failure of plants to winterize themselves are self-inflicted.
numpad0 5y ago
A lot of people alive and not dead
- silent_cal 5y ago
  Sweden
  - elsonrodriguez 5y ago
    What about Sweden? https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/coronavirus-data-explorer?zoomToSelection=true&time=2020-03-01..latest&facet=none&pickerSort=asc&pickerMetric=location&Metric=Confirmed+deaths&Interval=Cumulative&Relative+to+Population=true&Align+outbreaks=false&country=SWE~NOR~FIN https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/coronavirus-data-explor...
    - rajin444 5y ago
      That's not a fair comparison. Most covid deaths are from those already past the average life expectancy. There's a very good chance they were going to die soon anyways. Not to mention you have to account for cancer patient + covid, etc. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-europe-mortality/sweden-saw-lower-2020-death-spike-than-much-of-europe-data-idUSKBN2BG1R9 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-europe...
      - MisterBastahrd 5y ago
        It's completely fair. There's always a cause of death, and averages aren't indicative of individual cases. If an old person gets shot by a gun tomorrow, we don't chalk that up as "well, they had their time."
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - silent_cal 5y ago
      Compare it to UK: https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths
pdabbadabba 5y ago
A fallacy that might be at work here is comparing the shutdowns that actually occurred with a counterfactual world where business activity remained essentially unchanged. We'll never know for sure, but I doubt that's the correct comparison. Even without government-mandated shutdowns, many areas--especially major urban cores--would still have experienced massive shocks as people voluntarily shifted to working from home, stopped going out to eat, etc. In other words, much of what the government did through law would likely have happened anyway out of fear and individuals exercising their common sense. Sure, it wouldn't have been exactly the same, but I think the counterfactual is much less rosy than you assume. And then there are the benefits of the shutdown which helped to direct the drop in activity towards less essential parts of the economy and increased predictability, to say nothing of the benefits of reduced viral transmission.
- fullstop 5y ago
  People working from home increased demand for microphones, web cameras, office chairs.
fullstop 5y ago
Where I live the vast majority of people were deemed "essential" for the purposes of working and then not "essential" for the purposes of receiving the vaccine. The places which were closed were not producing things used in the supply chain.
_Algernon_ 5y ago
Have you forgotten the state of Italy and New York (among others) at the start and middle of 2020? There were literal trucks full of dead bodies in the streets because they couldn't be buried fast enough. How do you envision the time between march 2020 and the point where herd immunity through vaccines / infection would have been sufficient would have gone without a lockdown? I'll take a lack of a few non-essential luxury goods for a year or two over a world where everywhere looked like that, any day of the week.
- rajin444 5y ago
  I'm not familiar with Italy, but NY was sending elderly patients back to nursing homes when they had covid. https://apnews.com/article/new-york-andrew-cuomo-us-news-coronavirus-pandemic-nursing-homes-512cae0abb55a55f375b3192f2cdd6b5 https://apnews.com/article/new-york-andrew-cuomo-us-news-cor...
  - AnimalMuppet 5y ago
    Which was insanely, criminally stupid, and absolutely contributed to a lot of deaths. But New York also has a subway system that (approximately) everyone uses to get around. That turned out to be a perfect spreading ground for a respiratory virus. If I understand correctly, that's a big part of why New York got hit so hard. You can't just pin it on Cuomo's criminal irresponsibility.
- fidesomnes 5y ago
  this is how effective propaganda works

allturtles 5y ago

I really don't understand what you mean by this comment. The only swaths of the economy that I'm aware of that got shut down in the U.S. are things like bars, restaurants and movie theaters. These are not tightly connected to global supply chains, AFAIK, and if they were why would their shut down cause bottlenecks (it should lessen demand, not increase it)?

ralph84 5y ago
Tesla's California factory was shut down for 2 months.
zamadatix 5y ago
Thinking about it from the perspective of someone who thinks the shutdowns were net good but reviewing the comment in good faith: Lessened demand in large sections of the economy can itself create shortages in the parts that take on the load or at least stress on the supply chain to redirect to those places now in extreme demand. Take restaurants for example, people didn't stop eating but vast swaths of food supply chains had to change pretty much overnight. Then there is also the problem of the demand of certain things being highly uncertain, like cars towards the beginning. Then there is the extreme induced demand on certain things like webcams, laptops, or other home electronics as everyone stays home. I'm sure that also isn't an easy overnight change to make and then swing back from since it was completely unplanned. I know the area I work immediately ran out of widgets based on orders of 10s of thousands instantly coming in and it has been backed up since that time to this day. Finally during the initial portion of the pandemic lots of factories, both in the US and China, were getting shut down. China seemingly longer. When restaurants and whatnot started to open back up was about the time you saw those shutdowns stop happening too. So on top of the above concerns for the supply chain lots of non bars and movie theatres were also affected by shutdowns, just perhaps not as long. May be more I'm missing but I don't think GP is an empty comment by any means.
- allturtles 5y ago
  Much of the problem with understanding what GP means is that 'the shutdowns' is a very hazy term. Implicit in the comment seems to be the idea that there was some small set of authority figures who decided to shut down the global economy and if only they hadn't done that things would be better. e.g., The induced demand from work from home you mention I wouldn't count as part of any 'shutdown' at all. It has been largely driven organically by the decisions of individual firms and workers. My office was ordered to work from home by company HQ, not by any government authority, and at this point staying WFH is an individual voluntary choice. Does this count as part of the 'shutdown'? Certainly my sector of the economy (software development) was not shutdown, quite to the contrary.
  - zamadatix 5y ago
    I'm not sure the comment is implicit of who did the shutdowns but even taking it as so the widget orders by the 10s of thousands I referenced were mostly public school systems receiving mandates and associated COVID relief funding to compl,y not private enterprises. Particularly younger grades weren't normally assigned personal hardware and not every child had internet access at home. Though like you say the private sector remote work shift certainly happened too and exacerbated the ordering situation.
    - allturtles 5y ago
      Sure, many (most?) schools went remote, but they didn't shut down, and they aren't really integrated into the "global economy." It's certainly true that collectively, society pushed down in some places and things popped up in others, sometimes in obvious ways (going remote creates demand for laptops and cameras and office chairs) and sometimes in surprising ones (spiking rental car prices, yet internet providers were totally unfazed). I don't think "if only we hadn't been so foolish as to shutdown a large part of the global economy" is a useful or helpful way to think about these phenomena, though.

hoppyhoppy2 5y ago

>What did people think would happen? We thought that if we didn't do that we'd run a very real risk of the entire healthcare system collapsing. We were trying to "flatten the curve" so that hospitals could deal with an ongoing roar instead of being hit with a massive explosion.

polote 5y ago
At least now we know that public health care experts cannot be trusted to make predictions
celtain 5y ago
>We were trying to "flatten the curve" Not were, are. The entire lockdown/restriction/mask mandate set of policies has been based on managing hospital capacity. State and local governments are still using hospital capacity to decide when to lift or reimpose restrictions. The wave of explainers we got last year about flattening the curve were wrong about how long it would take, but the fundamental strategy and the reasoning behind it never actually changed.

Afforess 5y ago

The TX Winter Storm and Big Freeze did more damage to the TX economy than the shutdowns. Try again.

hosteur 5y ago
That’s not a good argument. 1: damage done by shutdowns is still going on so we don’t even know the full cost. 2: the winter storm is not self inflicted. 3: I am not sure you are right that said winter storm did more damage. Would like a source though.
- erosenbe0 5y ago
  When analyzing the storm I'm not clear are we talking about the power grid alone or the normal organic effects of Texas just not operating well at those temperatures and pipes bursting, frost heave, exposure deaths, etc?
- JaimeThompson 5y ago
  Gas producers not having themselves marked as critical infrastructure so ERCOT would not kill power to them and the failure of plants to winterize themselves are self-inflicted.

numpad0 5y ago

A lot of people alive and not dead

silent_cal 5y ago
Sweden
- elsonrodriguez 5y ago
  What about Sweden? https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/coronavirus-data-explorer?zoomToSelection=true&time=2020-03-01..latest&facet=none&pickerSort=asc&pickerMetric=location&Metric=Confirmed+deaths&Interval=Cumulative&Relative+to+Population=true&Align+outbreaks=false&country=SWE~NOR~FIN https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/coronavirus-data-explor...
  - rajin444 5y ago
    That's not a fair comparison. Most covid deaths are from those already past the average life expectancy. There's a very good chance they were going to die soon anyways. Not to mention you have to account for cancer patient + covid, etc. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-europe-mortality/sweden-saw-lower-2020-death-spike-than-much-of-europe-data-idUSKBN2BG1R9 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-europe...
    - MisterBastahrd 5y ago
      It's completely fair. There's always a cause of death, and averages aren't indicative of individual cases. If an old person gets shot by a gun tomorrow, we don't chalk that up as "well, they had their time."
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - silent_cal 5y ago
    Compare it to UK: https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths

pdabbadabba 5y ago

A fallacy that might be at work here is comparing the shutdowns that actually occurred with a counterfactual world where business activity remained essentially unchanged. We'll never know for sure, but I doubt that's the correct comparison. Even without government-mandated shutdowns, many areas--especially major urban cores--would still have experienced massive shocks as people voluntarily shifted to working from home, stopped going out to eat, etc. In other words, much of what the government did through law would likely have happened anyway out of fear and individuals exercising their common sense. Sure, it wouldn't have been exactly the same, but I think the counterfactual is much less rosy than you assume. And then there are the benefits of the shutdown which helped to direct the drop in activity towards less essential parts of the economy and increased predictability, to say nothing of the benefits of reduced viral transmission.

fullstop 5y ago
People working from home increased demand for microphones, web cameras, office chairs.

fullstop 5y ago

Where I live the vast majority of people were deemed "essential" for the purposes of working and then not "essential" for the purposes of receiving the vaccine. The places which were closed were not producing things used in the supply chain.

_Algernon_ 5y ago

Have you forgotten the state of Italy and New York (among others) at the start and middle of 2020? There were literal trucks full of dead bodies in the streets because they couldn't be buried fast enough. How do you envision the time between march 2020 and the point where herd immunity through vaccines / infection would have been sufficient would have gone without a lockdown? I'll take a lack of a few non-essential luxury goods for a year or two over a world where everywhere looked like that, any day of the week.

rajin444 5y ago
I'm not familiar with Italy, but NY was sending elderly patients back to nursing homes when they had covid. https://apnews.com/article/new-york-andrew-cuomo-us-news-coronavirus-pandemic-nursing-homes-512cae0abb55a55f375b3192f2cdd6b5 https://apnews.com/article/new-york-andrew-cuomo-us-news-cor...
- AnimalMuppet 5y ago
  Which was insanely, criminally stupid, and absolutely contributed to a lot of deaths. But New York also has a subway system that (approximately) everyone uses to get around. That turned out to be a perfect spreading ground for a respiratory virus. If I understand correctly, that's a big part of why New York got hit so hard. You can't just pin it on Cuomo's criminal irresponsibility.
fidesomnes 5y ago
this is how effective propaganda works