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Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pay August rent

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Re: Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pay August rent

#221

Post by Smaug123 »

just-juan-post wrote: post #194
MiroF wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a city of 2 million aka .004% of the population. Oh so it's the population now? I forgot that the whole city of Nashville was infected. Not going to respond further.

You're done because we both know the math is correct, my argument is sound, and you don't like that. I see it often in these types of debates. It's easier to walk away from a losing position than to defend it. I'm not sure what you think I changed but the math is fairly straight forward. Nashville metro is 2 million people. There were 80 cases confirmed traced to bars and restaurants. They were keeping bars and resta…

Please, please don't use "you stopped responding, so I'm right". It is one of the most infuriating (and also pretty insulting) things you could have said. People stop responding because they have better things to do with their time, and/or because they know an interaction is bad for them or for the other person (e.g. is enraging them), and/or because they took a while to work out that they were arguing with someone who cannot change their mind, and/or even because they can't face being wrong. There are dozens of reasons for refusing to engage in a pointless and enraging discussion.

Re: Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pay August rent

#222

Post by jaaames »

"Meanwhile, 90 percent reported they have been trying to negotiate their leases, but their landlords wouldn’t budge."

This is alarming. It may seem like just another statistic lost in a bigger article, but it's symptomatic of a ticking time bomb in NYC, and commercial real estate more broadly.

Louis Rossmann had an excellent breakdown of why the landlords won't budge on the leases https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdfmMB1E_qk

tl;dr - the loans on these restaurants are all bundled into commercial mortgage backed securities (sound familiar?) and sold to wholesale investors, and the landlords are unable to change the terms of the lease, or the banks will revalue the underlying asset based on a multiple of the rent, and the owner will either essentially get margin called, or end up with negative equity, and default on the loan.

Can someone from Wall Street please add their thoughts?

Re: Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pay August rent

#223

Post by sellyme »

just-juan-post wrote: post #183
dwaltrip wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn’t about people making decisions for themselves. It’s about preventing the spread of infectious disease. You might be fine, but if you are asymptomatic, you can directly harm or kill others and not even know it. That being said, I’m not sure what the best policy is. It doesn’t seem feasible to have a complete lockdown that extends for many months. So we have to be clever, keep learning, and find good solution…

> This isn’t about people making decisions for themselves Making decisions for ones self is exactly the principal that the USA was founded on. > You might be fine, but if you are asymptomatic, you can directly harm or kill others and not even know it. See also: Drinking, condom-less sex, smoking, and junk food. All of these things directly or indirectly harm others and if this is about public safety then it's time yo…

I'm all in for banning smoking, but unfortunately drug addicts tend to become violent if they're cut off. It's much less damaging to society to do that one slowly over time.

Re: Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pay August rent

#224

Post by air_ml »

grey-area wrote: post #181
dannyw wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps the "something" is simply antibodies and herd immunity? 1. In April (!!), 1 in 5 NYCers tested positive for antibodies: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/23/nyregion/coronavirus-anti... 2. Given asymmetric social contact patterns, experts estimate that ~20% may be the threshold for herd immunity of COVID: https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-could-it-be-burning-... I support looking at the science, and this…

It's not antibody immunity. That's why I said we don't understand. 20% is nowhere near enough to explain the patterns we're seeing. The good news is that even though we don't understand it, the NY experience does point towards a potentially more muted second wave in areas which were hit hard the first time round (as long as they take precautions at least), but we just don't know enough to be sure - anyone who is sure…

20% of the total population is probably 60% of choiceless and careless. Percentage of the population that are exposed to a potential Covid infection, either due necessity (essential workers and so on) or stupidity is much less than 100%.

Someone who has been barricaded inside of their home since February most likely doesn't have antibodies, but at the same time is not a potential Covid spreader.

Re: Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pay August rent

#225

Post by _heimdall »

paxys wrote: post #58

It's ridiculous that we couldn't coordinate a rent/mortgage forgiveness plan alongside all the customer bans put in place across the country. If a restaurant can't stay open, they shouldn't pay rent. If the property owner isn't getting rent, they shouldn't have to pay mortgage. And so on, up the entire chain.

Economics isn't that simple, you can't invent demand out of thin air and printing money is a very short term solution with huge long term impacts.

Dealing with debt is risky, whether you are the lender or the borrower. I completely agree with opinions that it is utter BS that the government effectively bailed out banks and corporations while leaving the rest out to dry, but the solution isn't further bailouts.

Life sucks sometimes, governments can't fix that. A pandemic spreading fast enough to bring broad shutdowns doesn't come free, and unfortunately small businesses sitting on piles of debt and tight margins are the first to bleed. Economic systems have pros and cons; with Capitalism we often get accelerated growth and innovation but the downside is that when things go south it can be a much faster and deeper cut.

Re: Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pay August rent

#226

Post by ehnto »

just-juan-post wrote: post #209
ehnto wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point of a lockdown is to stop people who think like you from hurting others. If we could trust people to act responsibly we wouldn't need to lockdown so strictly, but in example after example someone who thinks like you will ruin it for everyone. Regardless, the US has largely already decided to be on your side and let you make your own decision about how to act during a pandemic, and the results speak for thems…

> The point of a lockdown is to stop people who think like you from hurting others. So is the point of banning alcohol, unprotected sex, smoking, and junk food. Drunk people can fight me and kill me while drunk driving. Unprotected sex may be more pleasurable but if we want to stop hurting others then condoms must be mandatory. Smoking is an easy one, I can smell that from like 30 feet away. It's clearly getting into…

Drink driving is banned, smoking is banned in many situations and only thanks to tobacco lobbies and tax income is it not entirely banned. Having sex doesn't affect passers by, just the active participants. Junk food you choose to eat yourself, you don't hurt others with it. It can cost taxpayer dollars in medical funding though, if you want to take that angle. There are hundreds of laws to stop people from making choices that hurt others, so even if your examples weren't so flimsy they would still be moot.

This is a once in a lifetime pandemic, it will pass, take it on the chin and accept that you might have to do something to help others. You will get your choice back soon enough. The choice to be a carrier during a pandemic affects everyone. Why is it individual liberty to choose to spread disease but public will when people die from it?

Re: Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pay August rent

#227

Post by sooheon »

MiroF wrote: post #217
sooheon wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't tax the high income bracket, tax the rentier bracket.

But what about the overlap? And tax the rentier bracket's what ? The reality is that that professional/managerial bracket has a large proportion of both the wealth and income in America, just because there are so many compared to the extremely wealthy large-scale owner class.

Tax the rentier bracket's rent income. The overlap need not be considered.

> The reality is that that professional/managerial bracket has a large proportion of both the wealth and income in America

This is irrelevant. Tax policy should not be judged by what proportion of total wealth or income it collects, but by the economic incentives it creates and the externalities it offsets.

Re: Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pay August rent

#228

Post by MiroF »

sooheon wrote: post #227
MiroF wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But what about the overlap? And tax the rentier bracket's what ? The reality is that that professional/managerial bracket has a large proportion of both the wealth and income in America, just because there are so many compared to the extremely wealthy large-scale owner class.

Tax the rentier bracket's rent income. The overlap need not be considered. > The reality is that that professional/managerial bracket has a large proportion of both the wealth and income in America This is irrelevant. Tax policy should not be judged by what proportion of total wealth or income it collects, but by the economic incentives it creates and the externalities it offsets.

Actions should be judged by their consequences. Size of the resource collected impacts the impact of the consequence.

Re: Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pay August rent

#229

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

MiroF wrote: post #211
SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When someone proposes to address a problem by giving the government lots of money, I'm always skeptical. Why should we expect them to spend that money wisely? I'm not opposed to raising taxes if there's something important to spend the money on, but the words "income inequality!" aren't IMO a sufficient description.

Large amounts of government money go towards discretionary transfers like medicare, medicaid, social security, SNAP, etc. Is your claim that you think vast amounts of that money don't get to where they're supposed to go? I think most of these programs are characterized by extremely low administration costs as a percentage of budget.

My claim is that raising taxes won't by itself bring an effective program to fight income inequality into existence. The poll question is like asking "should the federal government expand its office space to deal with income inequality" - how's anyone supposed to know without an explanation of what it'll be used for?

Re: Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pay August rent

#230

Post by Yetanfou »

dwaltrip wrote: post #171
just-juan-post wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If people are scared and won't go to restaurants and bars then why continue to keep them closed? You are saying that patronage is already down so why even restrict them? Give people and businesses a choice in the matter. This is about letting individuals and businesses make their own decisions without the government forcing them to close.

This isn’t about people making decisions for themselves. It’s about preventing the spread of infectious disease. You might be fine, but if you are asymptomatic, you can directly harm or kill others and not even know it. That being said, I’m not sure what the best policy is. It doesn’t seem feasible to have a complete lockdown that extends for many months. So we have to be clever, keep learning, and find good solution…

Once SARS2 is history it will be interesting to compare the approach in places like NYC to those in e.g. Florida. I suspect the latter will come out on top when it comes to efficacy of the approach while the former will end up both bankrupt as well as looking for a new mayor and governor. Especially given the number of retirees living in Florida these results are remarkable, when the epidemic (as in 'local version of the pandemic') began I suspected FL would end up topping the mortality lists. A number of bad decisions were made in the beginning - e.g. allowing infected elderly people to be sent into care homes where they infected others - which have been haunting state and local government ever since and probably gave rise to the continued lockdown measures - a classical example of someone closing the barn doors after the horses escaped.

I live in Sweden where similar mistakes were made in the beginning, in this case mostly caused by personnel in care facilities not following the mandated personal protection measures which caused them to spread the infection between infected and 'clean' departments, facilities and people. In contrast to NYC this has not led to more draconic lockdown measures, probably because the problems in those care facilities were recognised. Unfortunately they were not dealt with in time which has led to a large number of vulnerable people getting infected. Apart from these (grave) mistakes it now looks like the Swedish approach might start to show its merits given the low infection rates here compared to surrounding countries. Things can still change but currently the number of new infections in Sweden is lower than that in surrounding countries.

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