Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

A Long Time Until the Economic New Normal

sloanreview.mit.edu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

271–280 of 322 posts

Re: A Long Time Until the Economic New Normal

#271

Post by tathougies »

jameslevy wrote: post #249
tathougies wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the Spanish flu led to one of the biggest economic booms in history: the roaring 20s

Correlation doesn't imply causation. This was around the onset of mass production, electrification, and the first time that cheap credit was a thing.

That's certainly fair, but the black plague also led to several economic benefits to the working and laboring class, so I do think there are typically economic benefits from a pandemic. Although, we'll see to what extent the stimulus and money creation might affect this.

Re: A Long Time Until the Economic New Normal

#272

Post by CydeWeys »

david_w wrote: post #191
PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

c.f. South Korea. c.f. Germany c.f. Canada even ... c.f. California. These are all jurisdictions that took early, effective, widespread action that have resulted in dramatically lower rates of cases and deaths.

Yeah those three nations are not that different from each other relative to the spread that exists between them and other nations. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/covid-daily-cases-traject... If you look at who has the LEAST per million (absolute number of cases are worse than useless and what most statisitic sites are showing) it's not nations usually associated with good governance, ahem... So what's going on. I…

It's not some foreign virus anymore. It's endemic everywhere. How many people die in any given place is now directly a result of the containment measures put into place there. You can't keep blaming this on China. Even places that have very tenuous connections to China are now experiencing massive death rates, because they aren't handling it well.

Re: A Long Time Until the Economic New Normal

#273

Post by CydeWeys »

pm90 wrote: post #93
rapind wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a populist war on expertise. Arguably justified when fake expertise is available for hire. Think big tobacco paying for studies (expertise) to say smoking doesn't cause lung cancer. When this becomes rampant, eventually there's a public trust issue.

Experts should not be expected to side either way on morality. Much like technology, expertise is neither good nor bad, it’s just what it is. Furthermore, I seriously doubt that there is anything close to a “populist” war on expertise. The US public has had a somewhat adversarial relationship with Science throughout its history (possibly because College is not considered mandatory, but that’s me speculating). The lac…

> Furthermore, I seriously doubt that there is anything close to a “populist” war on expertise.

Um, what? Look no further than the manufactured controversy over climate science, or evolution.

Re: A Long Time Until the Economic New Normal

#274

Post by CydeWeys »

cryoshon wrote: post #58
frockington1 wrote: post #2

The articles states as fact there will be negative impacts on long term consumer sentiment and spending without really providing any evidence. Most Americans are about to receive a $1200 check and unemployment benefits that pay more than their job did for the next 6 months. I don't think consumer spending is going anywhere soon.

$1200 is barely enough for one month for most people. for a lot of urbanites, that check will get eaten by rent more or less immediately. if not this month's rent, next' month's rent, and so on. if not rent, then food. or healthcare. or essential utilities, or car payments. when things get tough and there is scarcity, people save more and spend less. as far as the unemployment benefits go, i think most people will st…

> $1200 is barely enough for one month for most people.

It's only enough if you stop paying your mortgage/rent and utilities. It's certainly not enough for most people if they still have those expenses on top of everything else.

Though, admittedly, lots of people are getting substantially more than that -- a married couple earning even into six figures gets $2,400 plus $500 per kid.

Re: A Long Time Until the Economic New Normal

#275

Post by avgDev »

elliekelly wrote: post #233
dcolkitt wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt people alter their behavior for long. Certainly not more than 6 months after the crest is over. The 1957 flu pandemic killed 100,000 Americans, which adjusted for population is where current models estimate Covid will land. And it had virtually zero lasting impact on culture of behavior.

Were people in 1957 forced to alter their behavior so significantly? I’ve been spending $5+/day at starbucks every single day for the last 15 years. I’d often go morning and afternoon. Lately I’ve had to make my coffee at home. The first week or so sucked. The baristas did a much better job. But I had to make it work so I’d tweak things here and there until I got it right. Now I can pretty much make the same drink I…

I bought an espresso machine right before shit hit the fan, it was $500. I can make a latte as good as starbucks and I'm more consistent.

I had it for about 3 months, I wfh at least part of the week but now 100% remote and make at least 1-2 lattes a day. 30x3x5 = $450 this is just at one latte a day.

Re: A Long Time Until the Economic New Normal

#276

Post by guscost »

throwaway_USD wrote: post #84

It seems people don't realize how much $6T is and the effects of that kind of money being injected into the economy. Consider the 2008 housing bubble and financial crisis which was ultimately corrected with two stimulus packages totaling less than $2T...that money turned the economy around, put the economy into the longest bull market in history, resulting in a record stock market and corporate profits. Now its not t…

$6 Trillion is about $20,000 per person.

Re: A Long Time Until the Economic New Normal

#277

Post by empath75 »

throwaway_USD wrote: post #84

It seems people don't realize how much $6T is and the effects of that kind of money being injected into the economy. Consider the 2008 housing bubble and financial crisis which was ultimately corrected with two stimulus packages totaling less than $2T...that money turned the economy around, put the economy into the longest bull market in history, resulting in a record stock market and corporate profits. Now its not t…

I don’t understand the theory for why injecting money into the economy is supposed to work. They’ve forcibly shut it down. The point of injecting money is to stimulate the production of goods and services. If you can’t make goods and services all it’s going to do is generate a lot of inflation.

Re: A Long Time Until the Economic New Normal

#278

Post by BubRoss »

malandrew wrote: post #206
BubRoss wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

6 trillion USD is about $30,000 per US tax payer. People should think about where that is going as they get their $1000 checks in the mail.

The majority of that $30,000 is loans that will have to be paid back. Comparing their $1200 checks with no strings attached to other money in the stimulus being lent is apples and oranges.

To who and at what interest rate?

Re: A Long Time Until the Economic New Normal

#279

Post by carapace »

xwdv wrote: post #54

IMO things aren’t that bad. Yes restaurants and some small businesses are suffering, but look, people are cooking at home more, spending time with family, being healthier. People don’t need cosmetics or new clothes or cars or gasoline, and some luxury flashy items take a hit because there’s no way to really flaunt your wealth inside your own home. People aren’t traveling as much, tourist hotspots that were getting tr…

...

too soon, man, too soon

Give it forty or fifty years before you say shit like this out loud where people can hear you.

Re: A Long Time Until the Economic New Normal

#280

Post by ska »

nitwit005 wrote: post #223
ska wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect that we here on HN may suffer from selection bias, in that many of us do work that is most amenable to moving to remote. There is also an issue of transition, where there plausibly is quite an efficiency lag (months, at least) before people become get really set up, even assuming they are able to be as (or more) efficient.

When it comes to actually building a product there is definitely face to face benefits. However, I'd point out that many software companies have far more sales people than engineers. There has been this expectation that salespeople should fly out, and have meetings, meals, and expensive drinks with the companies they sell to. Now magically that's all vanished, but sales are still happening. The cost of some sales eff…

Are you assuming sales will keep to pre-covid levels in all this? At least in some industries that seems like a stretch...
Post reply on HN