The Great Pause Was an Economic Revolution • Hacker News Board

Re: The Great Pause Was an Economic Revolution

#41

Post by _skel » Sun, Jun 28, 2020, 1:03 AM UTC

geofft wrote: post #30

twblalock wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're kidding, right? This "engineering" of the economy has put tens of millions of people out of work and destroyed many small and medium businesses, and that was only after a couple of months! Imagine how bad things would be if we locked down for an entire year.

I think you're misreading the comment - the person you're responding to is claiming that the engineering of the economy started way more than a couple of months ago.

I read it right. It's a conspiracy theory about capitalism deployed as proof that "engineering" of the economy works, despite the obvious fact that the past few months of "engineering" have destroyed businesses and ruined many lives.

The "self designed, self regulated free market economy" which the OP insinuated is a myth or a lie is actually the only reason the economy still functions. Businesses didn't shift to remote work and radically alter their supply chains in record time because some government central planner told them to.

Re: The Great Pause Was an Economic Revolution

#42

Post by jackcosgrove » Sun, Jun 28, 2020, 1:03 AM UTC

lefrenchy wrote: post #34

jackcosgrove wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Inflation caused by currency debasement is a flat tax, which is comparatively regressive. It raises the prices of all items faster than wages, and everyone has to buy food, buy electricity, etc. Someone will have to pay.

I agree with the premise, but printing currency in the midst of a large economic crisis to keep consumers afloat is not guaranteed to result in inflation though, is it?

Supply chains were already starting to fray. There's a diner near me with a sign up front apologizing for raising their prices because of a beef shortage.

Borrowing money to fund consumption now won't result in long-term inflation if we consume less in the future to account for the pulled-forward demand. I doubt that will happen.

Re: The Great Pause Was an Economic Revolution

#43

Post by ivalm » Sun, Jun 28, 2020, 1:05 AM UTC

jackcosgrove wrote: post #31

scrollbar wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hm no; monetary inflation is reducing the value of each dollar so disproportionately affects those with more dollars, making it progressive.

Most wealth is tied up in assets that are shielded from inflation.

Poor people generally have high debt to asset and debt to income. Inflation helps them.

Re: The Great Pause Was an Economic Revolution

#44

Post by imgabe » Sun, Jun 28, 2020, 1:06 AM UTC

jjnoakes wrote: post #36

ptero wrote: post #28

> With the Spanish flu a century ago, people adapted their individual behavior, but social life proceeded more or less as before. “Public places of amusement” were shuttered, but work and business were little affected overall. This is a pretty telling difference with how we perceive the world today. During the last decades most people living in the "first world" (however you define it today) lost ability to rationall…

The DC shootings were mostly random; are most Chicago shootings random? If not then I don't think it is a fair comparison. I'm not arguing for or against your reasoning, but I know I would be more worried about infrequent random shootings than I would be about frequent targeted shootings, mostly because I believe I'm no one's target.

Even targeted shootings occasionally miss their targets and hit random bystanders. The odds would probably be comparable to being shot by someone choosing victims at random.

Re: The Great Pause Was an Economic Revolution

#45

Post by clairity » Sun, Jun 28, 2020, 1:09 AM UTC

secstate wrote: post #18

Is it just me, or is it a little silly to compare the 1919 world economy pre-mass production/consumerism with today? The irony to most of this shutdown is that "essential" businesses are still open. What the Great Pause has exposed is the shallowness and fragility of mass production/consumerism. During the pandemic of 1919, 80-90% of household income was spent on food and essential needs. Can you even imagine if we s…

> "Can you even imagine if we spent 80-90% of our income on essential needs?"

most american households (as in >50%) do spend 80-90% (or more) on essential needs.

Re: The Great Pause Was an Economic Revolution

#46

Post by skybrian » Sun, Jun 28, 2020, 1:13 AM UTC

ptero wrote: post #28

> With the Spanish flu a century ago, people adapted their individual behavior, but social life proceeded more or less as before. “Public places of amusement” were shuttered, but work and business were little affected overall. This is a pretty telling difference with how we perceive the world today. During the last decades most people living in the "first world" (however you define it today) lost ability to rationall…

It's true that we care more about small risks of death than in 1918. After all, that was in the middle of a war, and even in peacetime, life was more dangerous. (There were a lot more people working on farms and much less emphasis on safety.)

However, I don't understand why you think doing a lot to avoid COVID-19 is irrational. Around April it was the leading cause of death in the US, on a monthly basis. Currently it's below heart disease and cancer, but that's still a major risk. Furthermore, it's likely to go away next year, so it makes a lot of sense to temporarily change your lifestyle to avoid it.

Re: The Great Pause Was an Economic Revolution

#47

Post by neonate » Sun, Jun 28, 2020, 1:14 AM UTC

https://archive.vn/OCTOk

Re: The Great Pause Was an Economic Revolution

#48

Post by iakh » Sun, Jun 28, 2020, 1:15 AM UTC

ptero wrote: post #28

> With the Spanish flu a century ago, people adapted their individual behavior, but social life proceeded more or less as before. “Public places of amusement” were shuttered, but work and business were little affected overall. This is a pretty telling difference with how we perceive the world today. During the last decades most people living in the "first world" (however you define it today) lost ability to rationall…

How brave of you to be willing to sacrifice hundreds of thousands of other people's lives. If only the rest of the world weren't irrationally trying to reduce the number of preventable deaths, I guess?

Re: The Great Pause Was an Economic Revolution

#49

Post by jackcosgrove » Sun, Jun 28, 2020, 1:15 AM UTC

mjevans wrote: post #40

ptero wrote: post #28

> With the Spanish flu a century ago, people adapted their individual behavior, but social life proceeded more or less as before. “Public places of amusement” were shuttered, but work and business were little affected overall. This is a pretty telling difference with how we perceive the world today. During the last decades most people living in the "first world" (however you define it today) lost ability to rationall…

I agree with you about rational weight of risks. However there is a possibly implicit meaning that you consider the current efforts of preventing transmission of the virus to be overkill. Possibly in other parts of the world a little more measure and give might have been the best response in hindsight, but knowing what we did know then, rather than now, I believe most places* (in the 'first' world) made the correct a…

There was a thread about the Swedish government's response a month or two ago which argued that Sweden was overly reliant on an evidence-based approach. The thrust of the argument being that there was insufficient evidence at the time to determine a meaningful response; we were flying blind.

I'm bringing this up because the reasoning is the same as yours (policy should be evidence-based) and yet the outcome of that reasoning is so different.

Re: The Great Pause Was an Economic Revolution

#50

Post by awinder » Sun, Jun 28, 2020, 1:17 AM UTC

kortilla wrote: post #35

ptero wrote: post #28

> With the Spanish flu a century ago, people adapted their individual behavior, but social life proceeded more or less as before. “Public places of amusement” were shuttered, but work and business were little affected overall. This is a pretty telling difference with how we perceive the world today. During the last decades most people living in the "first world" (however you define it today) lost ability to rationall…

Shootings in Chicago are not randomly spread across the population though. Most is gang violence and is relatively easy to avoid. The DC shooter was different because it was arbitrary across the population. It was no longer about “avoiding the bad neighborhoods” or “not crossing a drug dealer”. Covid is a little similar in that it’s a new class of risk (different group dying than do from heart disease and all of the…

Also happened in the aftermath of 9/11 and the anthrax mailings which was a big thing in the dc-region, and involved targeting a school which again ups fear factor. Local economies at large were unaffected, everything is/was fine, life went on. People freak out and act economically differently and _have always and will always_ during catastrophes, no one is going to change that.