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More than half of American retailers didn't pay their rent in April and May

businessinsider.com

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Re: More than half of American retailers didn't pay their rent in April and May

#201

Post by save_ferris »

crazygringo wrote: post #102
ikeyany wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> fragile ... the word is fragile. We've built an insanely fragile economy. Take a look. There's been no war. 100% of the (not so great) US infrastructure that was there before SARS-COV-2 is still there. We've lost about 100k people, which is horrific but in the scheme of things at "USA" scale, and with the skewed demographics, not much of a hit to the economy. And yet the economy is staggering and it's likely to get…

> We've built an insanely fragile economy. Citation needed. Things seem to be functioning pretty well, all things considered. I can still buy virtually everything I need from the local grocery store and Amazon. I've lived in third-world countries where regular products would be out of stock for months at a time under normal circumstances. To me, the economy looks insanely resilient in a global pandemic. > the mere fa…

> To me, the economy looks insanely resilient in a global pandemic.

We’re still in the early days of this pandemic, as it usually takes many months for the upfront shocks to fully process through the economy. Numerous reports detail a potential collapse of the commercial real estate market, the government is signaling that it is going to hand out any more stimulus money, and health experts are warning about a second wave. Economists aren’t ruling out 40% unemployment down the road, which puts us firmly in depression territory.

I have no idea where you live, but I live in Austin, TX, a fairly affluent city, and the changes to the city have been dramatic and very visible. So much retail is still closed, and many thousands are out of work with little opportunity to renter the workforce and likely without future stimulus.

Just look at the George Floyd protests, there’s an inherent economic component to American racism and Covid provided a lot of fuel that the senseless killing of Floyd ignited. Those events did not occur in a vacuum, which is partially why we’re seeing unrest that we haven’t witnessed in 60 years.

Not to mention that millions never recovered from the last major crisis while politicians and big business pretended like everything was back to normal after the big market rallies.

Re: More than half of American retailers didn't pay their rent in April and May

#202

Post by _bxg1 »

chkaloon wrote: post #34

I am afraid we are in a real Wile E Coyote moment here. You know, where he's suspended in air for a few seconds before he goes crashing to the ground? Our crash may come in the fall when UI payments stop and the rent floats become unsustainable. About the time the second wave hits. https://66.media.tumblr.com/bbbf0aec68490ae2679ef489709c3d18...

I'm honestly taking advantage of the stock bounce-back we're experiencing right now to move some money back out into cash before things fall back down. The current uptick just feels ludicrous and probably short-lived.

Re: More than half of American retailers didn't pay their rent in April and May

#203

Post by bsder »

save_ferris wrote: post #201
crazygringo wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We've built an insanely fragile economy. Citation needed. Things seem to be functioning pretty well, all things considered. I can still buy virtually everything I need from the local grocery store and Amazon. I've lived in third-world countries where regular products would be out of stock for months at a time under normal circumstances. To me, the economy looks insanely resilient in a global pandemic. > the mere fa…

> To me, the economy looks insanely resilient in a global pandemic. We’re still in the early days of this pandemic, as it usually takes many months for the upfront shocks to fully process through the economy. Numerous reports detail a potential collapse of the commercial real estate market, the government is signaling that it is going to hand out any more stimulus money, and health experts are warning about a second…

> Numerous reports detail a potential collapse of the commercial real estate market

While I'm happy to bail out workers, can we please simply bust out the overleveraged on assets for once?

Part of the reason why the economy has no resilience is that we keep bailing out the irresponsible so there is no incentive to be responsible. Why keep inventory and cash reserves when you can go into 3x debt and get bailed out? Why be responsible when your competitor is basically going to get loan forgiveness instead of going bankrupt and you being able to buy them?

How about some "trickle up"? Bail out the individuals who are basically unleveraged and let the leveraged compete to try to stay afloat or go bankrupt and release the assets to those less leveraged. The real estate doesn't suddenly lose it's value because the owner got busted out.

It's what capitalism is supposed to be--risks are supposed to get upside AND downside.

Re: More than half of American retailers didn't pay their rent in April and May

#204

Post by selimthegrim »

chkaloon wrote: post #34

I am afraid we are in a real Wile E Coyote moment here. You know, where he's suspended in air for a few seconds before he goes crashing to the ground? Our crash may come in the fall when UI payments stop and the rent floats become unsustainable. About the time the second wave hits. https://66.media.tumblr.com/bbbf0aec68490ae2679ef489709c3d18...

Oh great now Zizek is never going to shut up again

Re: More than half of American retailers didn't pay their rent in April and May

#205

Post by selimthegrim »

rootsudo wrote: post #72
ohyes wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an interesting analogy because the roadrunner just runs without looking and everything works out fine. Wile E. Coyote only has problems because he is aware of what a huge mistake he’s made. I don’t know what the behavior analogous to road runner is in an economic sense. Perhaps suspending capitalism? I can’t imagine anyone going along with that.

The problem is we're comparing the economy to cartoon fiction of a bygone era.

Clearly someone has yet to read Dorfman and Mattelart on Donald Duck

Re: More than half of American retailers didn't pay their rent in April and May

#206

Post by 5ociety »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #121
5ociety wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty sure I could do better. Downvote me again. You're making a difference!

The more I listen to you, the more grateful I am that you will never be given the chance. Someone who's so cocksure that he's sure he's smart enough to organize the entire economy is the last person I want to see given the chance.

I don't know if I'm that smart but I suspect I am a lot smarter than you.

Re: More than half of American retailers didn't pay their rent in April and May

#207

Post by RhysU »

save_ferris wrote: post #201
crazygringo wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We've built an insanely fragile economy. Citation needed. Things seem to be functioning pretty well, all things considered. I can still buy virtually everything I need from the local grocery store and Amazon. I've lived in third-world countries where regular products would be out of stock for months at a time under normal circumstances. To me, the economy looks insanely resilient in a global pandemic. > the mere fa…

> To me, the economy looks insanely resilient in a global pandemic. We’re still in the early days of this pandemic, as it usually takes many months for the upfront shocks to fully process through the economy. Numerous reports detail a potential collapse of the commercial real estate market, the government is signaling that it is going to hand out any more stimulus money, and health experts are warning about a second…

Austin, despite the government and technology economy narrative, has been in a service economy bubble for some time as local businesses capture dollars arriving from elsewhere in the form of brunch costs.

Re: More than half of American retailers didn't pay their rent in April and May

#208

Post by nikofeyn »

crazygringo wrote: post #102
ikeyany wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> fragile ... the word is fragile. We've built an insanely fragile economy. Take a look. There's been no war. 100% of the (not so great) US infrastructure that was there before SARS-COV-2 is still there. We've lost about 100k people, which is horrific but in the scheme of things at "USA" scale, and with the skewed demographics, not much of a hit to the economy. And yet the economy is staggering and it's likely to get…

> We've built an insanely fragile economy. Citation needed. Things seem to be functioning pretty well, all things considered. I can still buy virtually everything I need from the local grocery store and Amazon. I've lived in third-world countries where regular products would be out of stock for months at a time under normal circumstances. To me, the economy looks insanely resilient in a global pandemic. > the mere fa…

> Things seem to be functioning pretty well

citation needed.

100,000+ people have died because our country is fragile. unemployment is somewhere between 15-25%. a virus is about the dumbest enemy we could ever hope to face, and we've failed.

the u.s. is in massive debt, the highest in the world. the u.s. has no socioeconomic safety net, and i question your claim that the u.s. could easily provide one if it wanted. the existing "safety nets", such as social security and taxes, are so abused and misused that they serve as explicit counter examples to your claim. roads and infrastructure in the u.s. are falling apart.

in no household would it be advisable to have massive debt upon debt while the house is falling apart and you're living paycheck to paycheck. and yet, that is exactly what the u.s. is doing.

in many respects, the response to the virus has been both the u.s. didn't want to react to it and that the u.s. couldn't react to it. the u.s. does not have the organizational capacity to handle it.

Re: More than half of American retailers didn't pay their rent in April and May

#209

Post by bryanwb »

chkaloon wrote: post #34

I am afraid we are in a real Wile E Coyote moment here. You know, where he's suspended in air for a few seconds before he goes crashing to the ground? Our crash may come in the fall when UI payments stop and the rent floats become unsustainable. About the time the second wave hits. https://66.media.tumblr.com/bbbf0aec68490ae2679ef489709c3d18...

2nd wave isn't a given. There was no 2nd wave to SARS.

Re: More than half of American retailers didn't pay their rent in April and May

#210

Post by 9nGQluzmnq3M »

IAmGraydon wrote: post #196
russellbeattie wrote: post #108

Both of the movies The Big Short and Too Big To Fail have a moment where they're watching people come out of a subway or walk down the street, and say something like, "They don't have any idea what's about to hit them." It sort of feels like that now. Lots of normality still. There is definitely something not right about the stock market not feeling the impact of millions of unemployed and more than half of retail st…

The difference here is that in the financial crisis, The market was in a bubble. Almost anyone you would talk to at the time would tell you the Stock market has never been stronger. A very, very few number of people knew what was coming. Now, every armchair trader is believing they’re reliving The Big Short and they’re the main character. They fail to realize that this is literally the opposite situation- a crash tha…

You're asserting that the crash happened (came to an end) and we're in recovery now. A lot of people, myself included, are less than convinced that's the case: believe it or not, there's still a lot of room for this to get much worse. The pandemic is barely getting started in places like India and South America, and the US is not out of the woods yet.
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