Wuhan Coronavirus: Economic Effects -

[Ughubughughughughughghlug]

What's going to happen to the economy?

Yesterday I was talking to my neighbor about the Federal government's response. He's one of those Libertarian doomers who is kept awake at night by fantasies of Weimar hyperinflation and evil scheming Fed Reserve chairmen scheming to destroy the economy for a lol. So, his view on it is Great Depression 2 and very heavy inflation.

I'm much more optimistic. I'm willing to take on a fair amount of faith that the last bailout, whether or not it was the best decision overall, was at least effective in its primary goal of preventing Great Depression 2, as evidenced by the fact that Great Depression 2 didn't happen. Since the government has already had experience in running such a program, that should hint that it'd work even better this time. But, on the other hand, the situation wasn't near as severe. Regarding the inflation point, I think I heard somewhere on here that other countries are rushing to take US dollars, which is keeping that from being a big issue at the moment, but at some point they're going to not want US dollars.

The other issue is that this is more like the economy being put on pause than it just collapsing on its own. Now, pausing it isn't not going to have effects, but if businesses just hire back the workers they're furloughing (maybe there ought to be a moratorium on lay-offs), then you'd think it should be able to pick back up.

Biggest issue seems to be that this is completely fucking up the service sector, which is a problem when your postindustrial economy is based around services.
Also, Trumpbux is basically just a way to level access to goods. It's not going to magic toilet paper into existence, or any of the other products people want. What it'll do is basically cause shortages of goods, where it comes down to luck, rather than previous savings, as to whether or not you get the goods you need. For purposes of keeping the very bottom afloat that makes sense, but I doubt that any of the non-Proles out there are going to genuinely benefit much from it.

 

[Dude Weed]

Nothing good.

 

[millais]

There is already serious talk of introducing a second stimulus program. They're thinking the first one won't be enough to last the duration of the conomic crisis, even though it was the biggest one in history and just got allocated.

 

[TaimuRadiu]

I'll use my Trumpbux to buy ammo and toilet paper. One way or the other I'll survive this whole mess.

 

[Shiggy Diggster]

I don't think for a second that the US will experience a 1930s style depression, with large amounts of the population starving and homeless. At worst, a sizeable percentage of the population will live a couple years of NEET tier lives of unlimited internet, a room of their own, government tendies and little else. Other countries, probably not so much.

 

[pwnest injun]

A large number of slowly failing businesses are going to quickly and permanently go under. Anything of value will be purchased by vultures. More and more wealth moving upward.

 

[HeyItsHarveyMacClout]

Fuck it, im drunk and I’ve thought way too much about it.

Literally no one knows, least of which those in the economic circle. Every time something happens everyone says ‘this is different’ but it ends up being more of the same. This time, it is really different. This isn’t a normal recession. People physically cannot work. People cannot support themselves, and people can’t cope how they usually deal with bad times - alcohol and being with friends. This is fundementally different from all the other times. On one hand, we are seeing a tremendous shift in the power to the federal and state governments. While we were busy talking about corona, the Supreme Court ruled in Nautlius V North Carolina that states do not have to respect intellectual property laws. While this judgement seems minor, taken to its logical extreme a state government could wholesale copy businesses patent or copyright and they couldn’t do anything about it. This is the largest infringement on personal rights by the government in the past three hundred years. It doesnt matter if you spent a billion dollars patenting a life saving drug, under this ruling, a state could copy your work and give you no financial compensation whatsoever. Similarly, congress and the electorate have further expanded the powers of the president to take control of the American economy. Barely anyone alive today remembers the last time the federal government commandeered private industry to produce goods for them, and I worry that this may be just one step in the further expansion of government powers. People are upset that air lines are getting bailed out despite spending billions on share buy backs, however, they necessarily need to be saved if we want to protect American interests and independence. I can very much see the government taking its pound of flesh which is only more scary when you remember the old adage ‘the scariest words ever spoke are ‘im from the government and I’m here to help’”. on the other hand, these past few weeks have seen the revocation of millions of people’s personal liberties. People see themselves lose their standards of living and their ability to move freely, and it’s hurting them. People have not really valued their liberties until they were taken from them, and following the virus I think they will value them a lot more.

enough with my autistic drunk posting though. My actual, qualified, economic opinion though - a lot of baby boomers/greatest generations are going to die, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing economically speaking. It’s going to free up a lot of wealth tied up in houses, stock portfolios, and assets which will be transferred down to younger generations. Older people are a net drain on the economy, so removing them from the equation will be a Machiavellian boost to the economy. On the other hand, when corona is declared ‘gone’ the economy is not going to restart over night. It will take months to return to its previous levels so we should expect an immediate recession even following Coronas departure. This means low interest rates, stimuluses from the federal government, and inflation from the feds. This also means that wages will be depressed and quality of life will go down. I suspect that California will be the hardest hit from the corona recession because their regressive laws will severely limit the free markets ability to respond and innovate to these challenges, and they will hurt because of it. In my state Uber has been able to severely cut down on costs and increase its profits because of how many ‘gig’ drivers have signed up to drive for them. California recently required companies to pay ‘gig’ drivers as full time employees so that all but guarantees that there will be a severe lack of delivery drivers in these up coming days despite the needs for them.

fuck it. I’m drunk as hell and I can’t communixate any more ideas. Long and short of it, no one knows what’s going to happen. Chances are it’s going to get a whole lot worse before it gets better. I give it two years for the economy to recover. I think corona will be a true paradigm shift and will either lead to a much more authoritarian America, or a much more libertarian country. Idk which one it’ll be, but it’s one or the other. The status quo is gone and the Chinese have killed it.

 

[Archeopthryx]

How much did insurance of any kind cover the pandemic?

 

[Overcast]

I'm just grateful that I can still go to work. Sure, I'm constantly at risk myself, but I can't imagine how most everyone else is going to cope with all this.

 

[Save the Loli]

A large number of slowly failing businesses are going to quickly and permanently go under. Anything of value will be purchased by vultures. More and more wealth moving upward.

Wouldn't be surprised if that really helps the DSA crowd. Although optimistically we take whatever sane Democrats can be found, independent/third party people, and Republicans who are more small-business/middle-class types and form a solid bipartisan block (or a goddamn third party that fights the neoliberals/neocons with the DSA as an urban fringe party) to fight back against this in a way that doesn't involve passing hormones out to elementary schoolers, reparations for slavery, open borders, and the Green New Deal.

 

[A Welsh Cake]

Freddos are going to increase in price AGAIN. It’s disgusting and inhumane.

 

[Sped Xing]

How much did insurance of any kind cover the pandemic?

The Catholic Hospital near me is waiving fees for Covid stuffs.

We will see how long that lasts.

 

[Bat Soup Reviews]

US weekly jobless claims double to 6.6 million

First-time claims for unemployment insurance had been expected to total 3.1 million, according to economists surveyed by Dow Jones.

www.cnbc.com

I want off this ride

 

[jje100010001]

Start-up bubble popping?

Start-ups have always been risky, designed to grow fast or die, but the coronavirus pandemic is turbocharging Silicon Valley’s natural selection and causing a shake-up so sudden it has defied comparison. In just a few weeks, more than 50 start-ups have cut or furloughed roughly 6,000 employees, according to a tally by The New York Times. Plans for initial public offerings are on hold. And funding is drying up for many young tech companies.

The fallout is hitting the highest-profile start-ups as well as the smaller ones trying to disrupt them. Airbnb, the home rental start-up valued at $31 billion, has stopped hiring and has suspended $800 million of marketing. Bird, an electric scooter start-up, laid off 30 percent of its staff last week, while Everlane, an apparel company, cut or furloughed hundreds of workers.

The real estate start-ups Knotel and Convene have laid off or furloughed half of their workers. The hiring site ZipRecruiter cut around 40 percent of its staff. OneWeb, a satellite start-up that had raised $3 billion in venture funding from investors including SoftBank, the Japanese conglomerate, filed for bankruptcy on Friday and plans to sell itself. And travel start-ups — Vacasa, Sonder, Inspirato, Zeus Living and TripActions, among others — have been some of the hardest hit.

Start-ups in some areas — telemedicine, food delivery, online learning, remote work, gaming — are thriving amid the quarantines. And there were signs that the boom times were shakyeven before the coronavirus brought wide swaths of the U.S. economy to a halt.

But the pain is now deeper and most likely just beginning, especially as investors, already bruised by a string of disappointing I.P.O.s last year, become even more cautious. On March 5, Sequoia Capital, a top venture capital firm in Silicon Valley, issued a warning to start-ups, calling Covid-19 “the black swan of 2020.”

Bill Gurley, an investor at the venture capital firm Benchmark, said that over the past 10 years of the start-up boom, investors had taken on more and more risk. That has changed, leaving many of the riskiest start-ups exposed.

“‘Risk on’ happens slowly,” he said. “‘Risk off’ happens overnight.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/01/technology/virus-start-ups-pummeled-layoffs-unwinding.html (Archive)

 

[rando0675309]

Start-up bubble popping?



https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/01/technology/virus-start-ups-pummeled-layoffs-unwinding.html (Archive)

TLR Nothing of value was lost. Its like the dot com bust all over again, except it's going to cull the absolute dreck that was somehow being valued at insane numbers

 

[Jimjamflimflam]

On a positive side, with it setting up a precedent of mass remote workers, it will allow more workers/companies be comfortable with remote workers which could have a positive impact of less commuters on the road and better work-home life since people aren't losing more of their day to commuting and be flexible with their work hours.

 

[AmpleApricots]

A majority of office work is bullshit anyways. People commuting 1+ hours just to sit down in front of a computer that remotely connects to corporate. Pointless.

 

[CeleryStalks]

Michigan, USA

Michigan tax revenue predicted to drop between $1 billion and $3 billion, out of a total revenue of less than $25 billion (so 4% to 12%).

Michigan estimates that drop in tax revenues could be up to $3 billion for fiscal year

As of Thursday, the state had already spent more than $137 million on essential supplies. It could be looking at a $3 billion drop in tax revenues.

www.freep.com

(archive)

In other news, our unemployment claims are so high that they have appointed days to file based on your last name, and even so the government's website keeps crashing.

Computer system for Michigan unemployment agency crashes amid crush of new claims

The Michigan Unemployment Insurance Agency said today its computer system has gone down.

www.mlive.com

(archive)

 

[whatever I feel like]

Someone decided to be a Nazi and lay off 88 people at my company today. Thanks, Corona-chan!

 

[Jump]

US weekly jobless claims double to 6.6 million

First-time claims for unemployment insurance had been expected to total 3.1 million, according to economists surveyed by Dow Jones.

www.cnbc.com

I want off this ride
View attachment 1212583

The only reason those numbers are not higher is because people haven't filed yet or their state's website is choking and the physical offices are closed.
Our system is COBOL bassed and is already running backlog. 3 weeks just to process the requests sitting on the website.