Coronavirus thread

Started by JBS, March 12, 2020, 07:03:50 PM

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Pohjolas Daughter

#900
Quote from: k a rl h e nn i ng on March 30, 2020, 06:25:41 AM
How are you doing? PD?
Hi Karl! 

Sweet of you to ask!  :)

Trying to keep my sanity--like all of us.  On the positive side of things, there is a nice concert that is available to watch online; I think that it was aired on t.v. on Fox last night (here in the States).  Elton John was the host ....there are various acts and artists performing (some bands coordinating somehow or another from each of the members' homes remotely).  The special concert was to raise money for American national foodbanks and also to go to a special fund for first responders and their families to help them with their own needs during this horrific crisis.  Here's a link to it:  https://www.fox.com/watch/a9647679a60276e91d830ab21b26b179/

Made a big batch of soup (chicken, cannellini beans, lots of fresh veggies and homemade chicken stock) yesterday to keep me going and hopefully to also pass along some to a friend.  Am trying to avoid going to the markets often to limit risks to all.

Off to get some house cleaning/chores done and then hope to go out for a walk.

How are you holding out?  What are things like in Boston right now?

Best wishes,

PD

EDIT:  p.s. I've found going to this website to be a combo of entertaining and soothing.  Love the bird cams!  https://www.allaboutbirds.org/cams/

p.p.s.  A bit of irony:  Elton is currently holed up at a home of his in LA; the only home of his in which he does NOT have a piano!  ::)
Pohjolas Daughter

drogulus


     Jobs Aren't Being Destroyed This Fast Elsewhere. Why Is That?

     In the US dollars must be saved by not creating them. This is a very shitty idea, as only created dollars are saved in bank accounts. I'd rather save jobs. If you pay people to stay home and businesses to stay closed there will be jobs and businesses to go back to.
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Karl Henning

Quote from: Pohjolas Daughter on March 30, 2020, 06:45:16 AM
Hi Karl! 

Sweet of you to ask!  :)

Trying to keep my sanity--like all of us.  On the positive side of things, there is a nice concert that is available to watch online; I think that it was aired on t.v. on Fox last night (here in the States).  Elton John was the host ....there are various acts and artists performing (some bands coordinating somehow or another from each of the members' homes remotely).  The special concert was to raise money for American national foodbanks and also to go to a special fund for first responders and their families to help them with their own needs during this horrific crisis.  Here's a link to it:  https://www.fox.com/watch/a9647679a60276e91d830ab21b26b179/

Made a big batch of soup (chicken, cannellini beans, lots of fresh veggies and homemade chicken stock) yesterday to keep me going and hopefully to also pass along some to a friend.  Am trying to avoid going to the markets often to limit risks to all.

Off to get some house cleaning/chores done and then hope to go out for a walk.

How are you holding out?  What are things like in Boston right now?

Best wishes,

PD

EDIT:  p.s. I've found going to this website to be a combo of entertaining and soothing.  Love the bird cams!  https://www.allaboutbirds.org/cams/

p.p.s.  A bit of irony:  Elton is currently holed up at a home of his in LA; the only home of his in which he does NOT have a piano!  ::)

I certainly supposed that Elton would have more homes than one;  never would have guessed that he would lack for a piano in any of them! 8)

Thanks for the birds! Will certainly watch them.

I'm a good 12 miles north of Boston, so when the rain lets up (not that I complain for it) I'll be able to get out for walks easily.

I've been composing, so I have not wanted for engaging activity.

Keep the faith!
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

Mandryka

Quote from: drogulus on March 30, 2020, 07:15:46 AM
     Jobs Aren't Being Destroyed This Fast Elsewhere. Why Is That?

     In the US dollars must be saved by not creating them. This is a very shitty idea, as only created dollars are saved in bank accounts. I'd rather save jobs. If you pay people to stay home and businesses to stay closed there will be jobs and businesses to go back to.

With this attendant danger. There's a huge cost to paying non productive people. That expenditure will eventually he recovered by government through tax hikes. Workers will demand pay rises to compensate. Those pay rises will lead to higher prices because the cost of production has increased. Workers will demand more pay rises to compensate again. Those further pay rises will lead to even higher prices because production costs have increased again . . .
Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen

drogulus

Quote from: Mandryka on March 30, 2020, 07:31:28 AM
With this attendant danger. There's a huge cost to paying non productive people. That expenditure will eventually he recovered by government through tax hikes. Workers will demand pay rises to compensate. Those pay rises will lead to higher prices because the cost of production has increased. Workers will demand more pay rises to compensate again. Those further pay rises will lead to even higher prices because production costs have increased again . . .

     I don't think so. Rebalancing against a deflation is not net inflationary, or perhaps I should say if it isn't even a little inflationary you're not rebalancing hard enough. This is pretty conventional economics, not far out stuff. You have a hole and you fill it. Inflation is overfilling it. What are the odds we'll do that?

    The reason wage/price spirals don't happen is that we don't often fill holes. Look at what we did in 2008-9. We half filled a hole, got no inflation (just "expectations") and an endless stream of pointless monetarist blather about QE and how ZIRP would turn everyone into zombie superborrowers. How are we going to get all those small businesses and jobs back if we run out of dollars to keep them?

     The cost of not doing what's needed is higher than the costs of doing it. You get a smaller economy coming out of the crash than you otherwise would.
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Mandryka

Quote from: drogulus on March 30, 2020, 08:13:53 AM
     I don't think so. Rebalancing against a deflation is not net inflationary, or perhaps I should say if it isn't even a little inflationary you're not rebalancing hard enough. This is pretty conventional economics, not far out stuff. You have a hole and you fill it. Inflation is overfilling it. What are the odds we'll do that?

    The reason wage/price spirals don't happen is that we don't often fill holes. Look at what we did in 2008-9. We half filled a hole, got no inflation (just "expectations") and an endless stream of pointless monetarist blather about QE and how ZIRP would turn everyone into zombie superborrowers. How are we going to get all those small businesses and jobs back if we run out of dollars to keep them?

     The cost of not doing what's needed is higher than the costs of doing it. You get a smaller economy coming out of the crash than you otherwise would.

I just wish I has more confidence in the UK leadership to get the country through this - both the health and the economic  consequences.
Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen

drogulus

Quote from: Mandryka on March 30, 2020, 08:45:41 AM
I just wish I has more confidence in the UK leadership to get the country through this - both the health and the economic  consequences.

     I doubt any country will regret doing "too much" on either the virus or the economy.
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Pohjolas Daughter

Quote from: k a rl h e nn i ng on March 30, 2020, 07:21:42 AM
I certainly supposed that Elton would have more homes than one;  never would have guessed that he would lack for a piano in any of them! 8)
I know!  I was shocked by that too!

Quote from: k a rl h e nn i ng on March 30, 2020, 07:21:42 AM
Thanks for the birds! Will certainly watch them.
They are quite fascinating to watch.  Re the feeder one at Cornell:  I often spot a crafty squirrel (probably more than one!) who as managed to invade the flat platform one--happily gorging himself or herself. lol  One snowy day there recently, there was a HUGE array of birds there!  I saw four different types of woodpeckers there, grackles, tufted titmice, American goldfinch, red-winged blackbirds, etc.   ;D

Quote from: k a rl h e nn i ng on March 30, 2020, 07:21:42 AM
I'm a good 12 miles north of Boston, so when the rain lets up (not that I complain for it) I'll be able to get out for walks easily.

Excellent!

Quote from: k a rl h e nn i ng on March 30, 2020, 07:21:42 AM
I've been composing, so I have not wanted for engaging activity.
Do you find it all difficult to focus well with all of the news these days?

Keep the faith!
[/quote]
Pohjolas Daughter

Florestan

Quote from: k a rl h e nn i ng on March 30, 2020, 07:21:42 AM
I certainly supposed that Elton would have more homes than one;  never would have guessed that he would lack for a piano in any of them! 8)

Certainly he can order at least a square piano to be delivered to his door, can't he?  ;D
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

drogulus


     If I'm getting this right, the current death projections are premised on a worst case "no precautions taken" model. The only way we get close to these numbers is if all precautions are removed. That now looks unlikely.

     
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vandermolen

Quote from: Irons on March 29, 2020, 11:58:50 PM
I don't blame the Government, Jeffrey. I blame the selfish idiots who think it OK to drive to Brighton at the first sign of a summer's day. Yesterday the police broke up a bunch of lads playing football in a park! We have draconian laws for the minuscule few who flout them and we all suffer.

Trust your daughter is getting through this OK - the vast majority of youngsters do.
Thanks Lol. She seems to be getting on ok.
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

Karl Henning

Quote from: Mandryka on March 30, 2020, 07:31:28 AM
With this attendant danger. There's a huge cost to paying non productive people.

I feel that way about the Federal Government, too.
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

Karl Henning

Quote from: Pohjolas Daughter on March 30, 2020, 09:10:30 AM
Excellent!
Do you find it all difficult to focus well with all of the news these days?
I guess in this case, it helps that I am continuing a work already in progress.
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

mc ukrneal

Quote from: drogulus on March 30, 2020, 09:30:53 AM
     If I'm getting this right, the current death projections are premised on a worst case "no precautions taken" model. The only way we get close to these numbers is if all precautions are removed. That now looks unlikely.
Depends which number you are looking at. Worst case scenario was 2.2m expected dead from the virus.  Worst case I saw more recently was 1.7m. But there are a lot of assumptions that go into that.
Be kind to your fellow posters!!

premont

Quote from: drogulus on March 30, 2020, 08:13:53 AM
The cost of not doing what's needed is higher than the costs of doing it. You get a smaller economy coming out of the crash than you otherwise would.

Now I suddenly understand, what you tried to explain me earlier in this thread, and I see the common sense in the Danish approach. Thanks.
γνῶθι σεαυτόν

Holden

Cheers

Holden

drogulus


     
Quote from: Holden on March 30, 2020, 01:14:22 PM
I know I said I'd only post humour but this makes interesting reading.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/120666809/do-the-consequences-of-this-lockdown-really-match-the-threat

     Yes, it's interesting. High death rates are for a limited set of circumstances.
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Kaga2


arpeggio

There is so much activity here I really can not read everything.  I hope that this observation is new.

One of the many aspects that my non-Americans have to understand that a significant segment of out society is anti-government and anti-science.  This animas started with the Reagan Administration.

According to some of the polls I have seen 40% of Americans do not believe in Darwin.  The appearance of the Coronavirus is the result of evolution and they do not believe in it.  I have a niece who told me dinosaurs were not real.  Fossils were planted by the devil to mislead man from the true word of God.

We in the United States are now paying the price for this ignorance.  We have many scientist and leaders who are aware of the problem and are fighting an uphill struggle with the enlighten geniuses who support Trump.  In the end, among the industrialized world, we will suffer the most from this catastrophe.

Pohjolas Daughter

Quote from: Holden on March 30, 2020, 01:14:22 PM
I know I said I'd only post humour but this makes interesting reading.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/120666809/do-the-consequences-of-this-lockdown-really-match-the-threat
Humor is greatly appreciated at this time.

I do try and keep up with the news (trying not to get overwhelmed with too much at a time though...breaks are a good thing!).

Hard to hear the news about various major cities in the US struggling with things.  Incredible to believe that there's a naval hospital ship now in New York City and that they have built a temporary Covid-19 hospital unit in Central Park!  But am glad that the help is there.  Feel for NYC as they are getting hit really hard.

Hate to see that states are competing against each other to order supplies:  the Fed should be doing it.  Heard a story on NPR the other night about how the fighting/ordering by each state is driving up prices of various supplies by incredible amounts.  One question that did just occur to me:  is it just the ordering of supplies between states and/or between the governments of various countries?  I'm sure, though, that if it (the ordering) was just at the federal level that that would make a difference.  What do other Americans think here?

Best wishes and stay healthy,

PD

From what I understand (I did take a, albeit brief, look at your link) this virus is much more contagious than the average flu.
Pohjolas Daughter