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I hired a team of shoppers to find out how businesses were opening in Dallas

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Re: I hired a team of shoppers to find out how businesses were opening in Dallas

#31

Post by twic »

djsumdog wrote: post #11
davidw wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is already a catastrophe, and it looks like it'll just keep getting worse, unless we get lucky somehow, which I'm not counting on. BTW, most all economists keep pointing the finger back at fixing the public health crisis to fix the economic problems, whatever their political stripes: https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2020/05/sa... But we have no coherent plans to do much about the public health cri…

..or, business could open with the precautions they're taking and .. nothing happens. We see the same fatality rates, grow a little, lower a little, but generally level off. It sucks it's come to this, but all of the states with lock-downs are desperately looking at states easing restrictions to see if these shelter in place orders are really worth it. We've heard that many of the people in NYC getting infected now a…

> We've heard that many of the people in NYC getting infected now are getting infected at home.

I'm not entirely sure what you're getting at, but there is a recent study showing that COVID cases correlate well with commuting in NYC - it's not the case that people who stay at home are getting infected just as much:

https://dash.harvard.edu/handle/1/42665370

(this site is down for me right now, but it was working earlier when i looked at the paper!)

Re: I hired a team of shoppers to find out how businesses were opening in Dallas

#32

Post by Nbox9 »

> Media coverage, showcasing owner sentiment and infection statistics, paint a picture of a large degree of latent fear in the marketplace.

Imagine how traumatic it will be if the death toll spikes up. We have fear because the virus is still active and deadly. If those fears are found to be justified than I suspect even smaller more sane opening up steps will be unpopular.

Re: I hired a team of shoppers to find out how businesses were opening in Dallas

#33

Post by itronitron »

This is a nice example of private business picking up the mantle of what is ordinarily thought of as a government function. All the hostile comments (on the blog) are probably being made by people that favor small government and therefore theoretically in favor of a private company doing the survey. But apparently they don't want anyone telling them what to do.

Re: I hired a team of shoppers to find out how businesses were opening in Dallas

#34

Post by claudeganon »

fastball wrote: post #25
elliekelly wrote: post #2

> And bigger picture, I wanted to know if these are places that I would feel safe taking my family to. I think this is the most important metric as far as “re-opening the economy” goes but it seems to be largely ignored by politicians.

Given that your children are unlikely to be at serious risk from COVID-19, I'm not sure why. Your child is much more likely to be adversely affected (in the long term) by sustained economic stagnation than by this virus.

Tell that to the parents of the children who just died of Kawasaki-like inflammation from the virus in NYC. We’re still seeing novel presentation of symptoms in various cohorts and have no idea of its long term impacts on children or anyone else.

Re: I hired a team of shoppers to find out how businesses were opening in Dallas

#35

Post by sixothree »

elliekelly wrote: post #2

> And bigger picture, I wanted to know if these are places that I would feel safe taking my family to. I think this is the most important metric as far as “re-opening the economy” goes but it seems to be largely ignored by politicians.

Not only that. But even after they "come around", I will be avoiding those businesses that acted recklessly. For instance the Walgreens nearest me employees weren't wearing masks until recently. Some restaurants are open _now_ with table service outside being served by people not wearing masks.

I will never be going to those restaurants. I may never return to Walgreens.

Re: I hired a team of shoppers to find out how businesses were opening in Dallas

#36

Post by z3rgl1ng »

claudeganon wrote: post #16
djsumdog wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

..or, business could open with the precautions they're taking and .. nothing happens. We see the same fatality rates, grow a little, lower a little, but generally level off. It sucks it's come to this, but all of the states with lock-downs are desperately looking at states easing restrictions to see if these shelter in place orders are really worth it. We've heard that many of the people in NYC getting infected now a…

Why do people insist on unnecessary mass deaths when we have examples of how to effectively respond to this disease in countries like South Korea and Taiwan without them? Why do people lean into this falsely-premised fatalism instead of demanding what has been proven to work?

Seems to be because we can’t spin up testing.

Re: I hired a team of shoppers to find out how businesses were opening in Dallas

#37

Post by djsumdog »

timbigman wrote: post #14

Of everyone doing this, I think that he should have more sympathy for those struggling during this time. Don't hire people to find violations. Help out people that are starving

Yea, I agree people should focus on solutions instead of ratting people out. This entire ordeal has produced an insane amount of 'snitching' .. three Australian boys face a $1,000+ fine for having beer together on a roof.

Say you loose your job, your unemployment is stuck in bureaucratic hell, and you just want to have a beer with your two best friends to forgot about how fucked things are. Then you get helicopters and megaphones and a $1k fine. That's insane.

This entire ordeal has been a tragic example of people turning other people in and judging them for all their decisions, without offering people any real help or relief:

https://battlepenguin.com/politics/this-is-not-a-time-of-hon...

This time has really brought out the worst in society and government and we should never look back upon this time with any sense of honor.

Re: I hired a team of shoppers to find out how businesses were opening in Dallas

#38

Post by logfromblammo »

josefresco wrote: post #12
kube-system wrote: post #4

Wow, the comments on that blog are a dumpster fire.

To Mark's credit, he's down in the muck replying to their (batshit crazy) comments and throwing it right back in their faces.

It would be smarter to hire a team of social media experts to do that for him, and rotate out the point person through the decon shower and then into the kittens+puppies room whenever they get too much crazy on them.

Re: I hired a team of shoppers to find out how businesses were opening in Dallas

#39

Post by fastball »

claudeganon wrote: post #34
fastball wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that your children are unlikely to be at serious risk from COVID-19, I'm not sure why. Your child is much more likely to be adversely affected (in the long term) by sustained economic stagnation than by this virus.

Tell that to the parents of the children who just died of Kawasaki-like inflammation from the virus in NYC. We’re still seeing novel presentation of symptoms in various cohorts and have no idea of its long term impacts on children or anyone else.

We have no idea about the long term effects of closing down economies either.

In statistical terms, very few children have died of COVID-19.

We're not even sure that syndrome you mentioned is caused by COVID-19, so it seems a bit premature to tell anything to their parents. Kinda disgusting you'd go there so quickly, in fact.

Re: I hired a team of shoppers to find out how businesses were opening in Dallas

#40

Post by ra1n85 »

mindslight wrote: post #15
claudeganon wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Re-open the economy” talk has reached levels of collective delusion that I honestly find frightening. And it’s not a partisan issue either. We have the example of successful responses in places like South Korea and Taiwan, none of whose standard the US seems intent, or maybe even capable, of meeting. Instead, people in the US cling to phony performances of leadership by their various authoritarians, whether it be An…

Every substantive viewpoint I've seen on the subject comes back to cashflow. Our national propaganda is so strong, that rather than the middle class asking "why do I have to go to work every day just to pay rent to the bank?", they've internalized the system so thoroughly that they're actually protesting to get back on the treadmill.

>Our national propaganda is so strong, that rather than workers asking "why do I have to go to work every day just to pay rent to the bank?"

This is not fair to people that have spent their lifetimes building businesses and are watching them go bust, or people that derive satisfaction from their employment.

Worse, for those that would rather not go back to work and are suffering, your comment comes across as "shame on them for not asking for more". This crisis is hurting so many people, and its impact will be felt for a long time. We don't need comments like this.

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