You can't shut down small businesses but allow major retailers to stay open, and expect things to be ok. Eventually businesses run out of cash, run out of loans, and they go bust leaving employees in the cold. Good thing they have that $600...
U.S. jobless numbers surge as worsening Covid-19 pandemic hurts businesses
71–80 of 101 posts
Re: U.S. jobless numbers surge as worsening Covid-19 pandemic hurts businesses
#72Man, it's so frustrating seeing all these businesses shutting down (smaller ones are closing for good), meanwhile I'm sure Bezos and the Silicon crew are reporting record profits this year through food deliveries and amazon purchases. I sometimes find it very _very_ hard to not see this all a transfer of wealth from the middle/lower classes to the upper classes - either calculated beforehand or just being taken advan…
I have a photography studio in a small (population 1,000 or so) town in Minnesota that has surprisingly become a bit of a shopping destination.
Or had, anyways. Half of the shops on Main Street are now closed. Some were, I think, destined to fail. A candy shop is a pretty ridiculous prospect nowadays. Others have been staples to the town for years and helped make it worth it for other businesses to move in.
I’m really not sure if it’ll ever bounce back. There are still a couple of clothing shops, a restaurant, a brewery, and a wedding dress shop. If one or two of those go down I might think about pulling the plug myself.
Re: U.S. jobless numbers surge as worsening Covid-19 pandemic hurts businesses
#73> government response to worsening Covid-19 pandemic hurts businesses Fixed the title. Unfortunately we don't have to be where we're at. We knows who's most vulnerable, we know how it spreads (low airflow crowded spaces), we know who's been vaccinated and/or who's had it. The fact that any organized response, even at the city or state level, across both blue and red states, shows the ineptitude of these appointed off…
We can't even rely on citizens to wear masks. What makes you think that if government were competent enough to develop complex rules based on the factors you mention that we would be any better off.
Exactly, this is a great example of a failed policy.
Lets apply the simple rule: the less moving pieces a system has, the less it's likely to fail.
So, instead of getting 100 people to wear a mask in one business, get 1 business to increase the airflow in the business by 10x. Much simpler solution and something that can be directly measured. And really, they're non-competing; we can do both. Furthermore it eliminates the perceived need for draconian measure that are fueling other social problems.
Re: U.S. jobless numbers surge as worsening Covid-19 pandemic hurts businesses
#74We're a company of about 12 FTEs. Nobody here filed for unemployment, yet we've seen 5 fraudulent unemployment claims (for people that still work here) come across our HR department that creepily accurate information. What gives? And are those claims included in these stats?
People cashing in on the Equifax hack most likely.
Re: U.S. jobless numbers surge as worsening Covid-19 pandemic hurts businesses
#75Yet SPX is still hanging out at all time highs. I don't understand how professional short sellers made it through the past few years. Everything from economy, social structure, and climate, all going to hell, but the stock market seems blind to all of it.
At least as of a couple of months ago, the lion's share of growth in the S&P 500 was from a few tech stocks, everyone else seemed mostly stagnant. You might respond that stagnant seems to be an overvalue, and I'd agree except that the fed has been pumping money into the markets in huge amounts.
Re: U.S. jobless numbers surge as worsening Covid-19 pandemic hurts businesses
#76It is grimmer to look at the labour participation rate: https://www.bls.gov/charts/employment-situation/civilian-lab... If anything between outsourcing and automation employment isn't coming back. (And the employment that does come back will be at sub-minimum wage 12-hour days precarized "gigs" or 3 "half-time" jobs)
Really strange they don't have an age upper limit, a bunch of that decline is likely baby boomers leaving the workforce.
Not quite, employment participation declined since 2008 but working age population kept increasing until it stagnated near ~2017 according to "Working Age Population: 15-64" statisctis ( https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LFWA64TTUSM647S ) and stable since ~2006 according to "Working Age Population: 25-64" statistics ( https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LFWA25TTUSM647S )
Re: U.S. jobless numbers surge as worsening Covid-19 pandemic hurts businesses
#77We're a company of about 12 FTEs. Nobody here filed for unemployment, yet we've seen 5 fraudulent unemployment claims (for people that still work here) come across our HR department that creepily accurate information. What gives? And are those claims included in these stats?
People cashing in on the Equifax hack most likely.
And the whole "lets use this couple digit number that cannot be changed as authorization/authentication/proof of identity". Why can someone use the SSN to supplant identities?
Re: U.S. jobless numbers surge as worsening Covid-19 pandemic hurts businesses
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
The US economy appears to have bifurcated, which in my opinion is the root cause of a lot of our social unrest issues. The white collar/upper class is doing just fine, hasn't been laid off, and has been minimally affected by COVID. This group is also responsible for most of our economic output - which is turn driving a disconnected wallstreet. The lower/working class has been completely obliterated. Though these peop…
> It's no wonder these people are angry and rallying behind a psudo-fascist like Trump. Say what you want about Trump, and there's a lot bad to say about him, but at least he pretends to listen to the blue collar class. People need to understand this because most of his voters are not the radical MAGA people. If those voters don't believe they have a voice now, and arguably they don't have that voice, that increases…
> but at least he pretends to listen to the blue collar class
And while he pretends to listen, you've got politicians like AOC and Sanders fighting their backsides off for the blue collar classes, trying to get them healthcare and education.
Re: U.S. jobless numbers surge as worsening Covid-19 pandemic hurts businesses
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
In my small town all the locally-owned and operated coffee shops were forced to close due to government mandates, and most are now closed permanently, because they couldn't afford to pay rent without any customers. McDonald's and Starbucks? Still churning out coffee to people standing in long lines. It's infuriating, but what can you do?
We've normalized political violence on the left and right this year. One side trashes a bunch of cities, the other the capitol. That genie won't go back in the bottle for sure. Eventually the poors will get angry and united. So far our industry is helping keep them divided, but I'm not sure how long that will last.
> One side trashes a bunch of cities, the other the capitol
First, both sides are mostly made up of non-violent people dedicated to their cause. Both sides can rightfully claim that a minority of "bad eggs" amongst them caused the violence.
But that's where the equivalency ends. We have to look at the cause itself.
It's quite a stretch to say that a group protesting police brutality (in the face of actual police brutality) is at all equivalent to a group seeking to overthrow a legitimate government (with zero evidence to back their claims).
It's not the same ballpark. It ain't even the same fucking sport.
Re: U.S. jobless numbers surge as worsening Covid-19 pandemic hurts businesses
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
People cashing in on the Equifax hack most likely.
And the whole "lets use this couple digit number that cannot be changed as authorization/authentication/proof of identity". Why can someone use the SSN to supplant identities?
It's the one ID everyone had (eventually) and should only have 1 of for their whole life which means it's perfect as a lazy way to keep just one record for every customer that'll never change.