3.28M file for U.S. jobless benefits

As you look at this story, please keep some basic numbers in mind:

1. US Population: 329,433,166 (as of 3/25/2020)

2. Employed: 158,130,000 (approx. 48% of population)

3. Unemployed: 8,787,000 (approx. 5.6% of employed)

Note:

Take these numbers with a grain of salt as US Population is only as good as the Census Reporting itself. The Employed # is an estimate based on 155.76 million factually employed in 2018 and does not include self-employed, contractors, gig workers etc.

Sources:

1. https://www.census.gov/popclock/

2. https://www.statista.com/statistics/269959/employment-in-the...

3. https://www.deptofnumbers.com/unemployment/us/

3.28 million people are already out of work, likely a good deal more than that. One million are most at risk. There won't be zero impact, but that's less than a third, right out of the gate. Long-term we'll see significant increases in unemployment on the "shut-it-down" path.

To clarify based on your reply to this comment, my point was that we've already seen more people out of work than the estimated worst-case 1.2 million death toll. This is the first data point, and we'll see more huge increases as we gather more. You mentioned that sick people won't work, but we're already seeing what is possibly more unemployment than we'd have with people sick. 1.2 million While some people may not work in the short term, this "flattening the curve" business prolongs that time greatly. We'd all be back much sooner if we just ripped off the band-aid and got it over with.

EDIT: Replying to circumvent123 here, as HN is rate-limiting.

Yes, death is worse than unemployment, but for how many? Death for one vs unemployment for everyone, which would you pick? If so, is this simply a question of the ratio of the two? Regardless, that's not the choice of bureaucrats to make. At-risk populations are responsible for staying home and keeping themselves safe.

Well, the antibody tests are coming in a matter of weeks - multiple approaches have already been developed and they are currently being validated, that is, checked if they trigger reliably on the Coronavirus antibodies and ONLY on those and not similar ones (source: Charité Berlin - the virology lab there is on the forefront of developing Coronavirus tests and assists in validating new antibody tests).

They will allow us to make large randomized studies in the population and finally determine the "real" percentage of people who can be considered immune, which is the key element currently missing in all projection models. Having that data, more realistic projections can be made as to how fast the virus will resume to spread if we lift specific restrictions. At the moment, we can only hope for this number to be far larger than expected.

But doing such studies takes time, and without their results, lifting any of the restrictions is going to be a dangerous gamble with public health. So I would also suspect for most restrictions to stay in place for about 2 months, and then maybe a slow and gradual opening. First schools, then essential day-to-day businesses, and travel/leisure stuff last.

However, antibody tests are not a substitute for a vaccine. Only a broadly available vaccine will give people enough confidence of not contracting the disease for them to start living a normal life again. We can't expect any kind of normality in the economy until this happens, regardless of whether "America (or any other country) is opened for business" again or not - because an open business is worth nothing if the customers stay away.

So lets say that there are a couple hundred thousand dead and you are pretty sure that 50% of the people out there have it. Are you going to go out for dinner or a movie? Not me..

But ignore me if you aren't saying that the restrictions should be reversed so the economy goes back to normal. A guy on CNBC just said that even if it means 400K would die. The economy just will not go back to normal anytime soon.

At least some places the mandates are at the local level and businesses decide for themselves. Example: In-law's business does print advertising. One of their big clients is a fast food chain. So their company lawyers decided they can stay open because they are part of the food business and therefore essential.