The General Economics Thread

Because this event won't be easily forgotten, much like how 9/11 was a game changer for the USA and the world, the COVID-19 pandemic will leave a mark in society that won't fade away.

Edit:

Also, as we have said in the COVID-19 thread, it will take a year and a half at the most to have a vaccine, so governments will have to adjust in order to prevent any returning wave of infections.

Edited by raziel365 on Mar 22nd 2020 at 12:17:56 PM

Instead of focusing on relatives that divide us, maybe we should try to find the absolutes that tie us.

It does not. Neither of those words appear anywhere in the post. Raineh characterized it as forceful conscription, but that was not in the original post, which is why I called it out.

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

On the other hand, the Spanish Flu didn't leave a huge mark, and practically speaking all 9/11 did was make airport security super annoying.

I don't foresee society developing excessive germaphobia and fear of travel.

Avatar Source

Then I guess I was just confused.

And it led to effectively scrubbing the twin towers from our cultural history, an inadvertent consequence of Too Soon censoring, both for new media and retroactively.

It really strikes me as an odd reaction. Its as if Americans refuse to acknowledge that the event even happened by banning any and all reference to the buildings.

Edited by Redmess on Mar 22nd 2020 at 10:16:34 AM

Optimism is a duty.

...Are you sure? They actually talk about it far more openly now. The monument remains a widely popular visit.

There has been new attention drawn to the misery of Ground Zero workers, too.

Forgive me, but it seems you're jumping to assumptions and conclusions far too fast.

Edited by TheWildWestPyro on Mar 22nd 2020 at 4:06:19 AM

I also consider that’s the logic behind disappearing the twin towers in media, you don’t acknowledge the attack if you refuse the existence of the towers at all.

That said, I don’t know if it’s more about people sensitivities or it’s a matter of pride to not accept that a group of terrorist could do what no other modern army could to the USA, namely attacking one of its cities.

Really? When I went to the USA there was no mention of the twin towers at all in the news.

Edited by raziel365 on Mar 22nd 2020 at 4:11:48 AM

Instead of focusing on relatives that divide us, maybe we should try to find the absolutes that tie us.

Times change. For a while it was sensitivity, a blow to national pride. As the war weariness set in, folks talked about it again.

Actually, a large nation-wide program of infrastructure investment and public works building might help a lot. It both buys supplies, creating demand, and pays people, getting money into the system. Sort of like what Trump campaigned on, but never delivered.

"We learn from history that we do not learn from history."

Except for the part where it requires you to get a lot of people working together in close proximity directly defeating the point and cause of the problem.

Avatar Source

Yeah, it's not like everyone is staying home for fun.

The entire problem is that people can't go outside or gather in groups.

Oh really when?

At best, and I might be erring on overoptimism, the only infraestructure you could build right now would be asphalt roads since you can keep people in vehicles and machinery to do their respective job, thus keeping the risk of contagion at a low level.

Even then, you would still need your engineers to give a tour to the area from time to time, interact with the personnel to fix some mistakes or setbacks and heavily rely on drones to constantly supervise that the road is even or that the topography is correct; aside from that, asphalt roads are only useful in certain areas, for others you need concrete roads and those are a no-no right now.

Edited by raziel365 on Mar 22nd 2020 at 6:46:25 AM

Instead of focusing on relatives that divide us, maybe we should try to find the absolutes that tie us.

Perhaps this could be an opportunity to invest in automated construction? From what I understand, road maintenance is a mess in the US, so a boost in efficiency and cost reduction could certainly be welcome.

Optimism is a duty.

Not a whole lot to automate, it's not like we can just get drones to do it.

Oh really when?

Couldn't you make a robot that does it? Something like a self driving car that lays roads?

Optimism is a duty.

You can make a robot to do most things, the question is if it's economically feasible or rewarding to do so. Most roads are generally handled on a local scale, where it's cheaper to maybe, eventually, pay a guy to go over and fill a hole than it is to get an expensive single-purpose robot whose only purpose is to squirt hot asphalt into a hole and pound it flat.

Avatar Source

As a Canadian, the government going all-in to repave all the roads would be so nice right now (our post-winter roads are more like obstacle courses with pit-traps).

I think we use asphalt. At least that's what they look like.

Edited by nightwyrm_zero on Mar 23rd 2020 at 6:57:30 AM

As Raineh mentioned, robots with fine dexterity are not cheap enough to mass produce and fully replace human labour, armed concrete for instance requires the implementation of steel bars to complement the concrete structure, needless to say that those bars must be laid with care and with more than one person to ensure their proper placement.

Besides, theory and practice diverge at times so even if you can program a car to pour asphalt in a given trajectory, you still need humans on the site to evaluate it and make adjustments at the moment.

Edit:

Which material do you use for your roads? I think you could make some punctual repairs on concrete roads but there's also the freezing weather to consider to implement the right concrete.

Edited by raziel365 on Mar 22nd 2020 at 9:22:42 AM

Instead of focusing on relatives that divide us, maybe we should try to find the absolutes that tie us.

Yeah, neither Brin nor I were advocating for conscription in any way. What the article suggested was keeping people working by throwing money at infrastructure.

You're all right that there's still an issue with some areas of the economy being naturally seized up due to lack of demand, like airlines, and other areas (like medical supplies) where demand massively outstrips supply, of course. It's an unusual situation and the usual Keynesian levers aren't going to work right. But getting people the money they need to put food on the table is still relevant to counteract the effects of the demand drop.

I despise hypocrisy, unless of course it is my own.

But getting people the money by hiring them to do things they don't know how to do and need teaching for when we're trying to keep them apart is stupid.

Avatar Source

Right. This is a unique situation in which we need to be looking at paying people for not working.

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

Right, and the US is particularly difficult to get such aid for nothing. That is the flip side of the American Dream: if anyone can achieve anything through hard work, then failure to be successful must be somehow your own fault. It is the Hard Work Fallacy as a national philosophy.

Optimism is a duty.

I don't think I agree that we cant let people work together. If that were the case, police departments and hospitals would have to be shut down. If we're worried about the economic effects of the pandemic, you test the workers, train them in safe practices, make sure they stay at home off the job (or give them barracks to live in) and eat the resulting deaths, which should be moderate. Sounds cruel, but we do that sort of thing all the time. It's a national emergency, we got to do what we got to do. Offer generous hazard pay, and you wont lack for volunteers.

"We learn from history that we do not learn from history."

That sounds like bloody-minded stupidity. The entire point of limiting disease spread is to minimise all non-essential contact between people.

There is nothing essential about getting people to fix potholes.

Avatar Source

This is basically why coronavirus is the test for capitalism as a whole because it's a system that cannot work while under quarantine yet so many people act as if getting "free money" [even though it's not their fault they can't work] is horrifying.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.

The problem with getting “money for nothing” are inflation and the issue of state budgets.

Edited by raziel365 on Mar 23rd 2020 at 7:44:29 AM

Instead of focusing on relatives that divide us, maybe we should try to find the absolutes that tie us.