COVID-19 Outbreak (Update: More than 2.9M cases and 132,313 deaths in US) (4 Viewers)

[Mr. Blue Sky]

LOL. Bit of a tangent but I couldn't agree with this more. My wife is super irritated because her sister and her husband informed her this weekend that they are building a custom home that costs significantly more than ours and will be uber-modern Chip and Joanna Gaines approved.

They are on actual food stamps right now. She is unemployed currently and he is a not very successful realtor. And even at full employment, they make probably 30% of what we do combined.

My wife was on the warpath this weekend - they have a $50,000 truck, a $50,000 conversion van (they have four kids), and will have a more expensive house than us. We drive Hyundais - both are paid off. LOL.

There was no listening to reason; that our house is in a much, much more desirable location (MUCH), that they will likely not end up being successful in that house as history has shown, amongst other huge gaps in lifestyle and future lifestyle that I won't specifically call out because I don't want to be a douche. She just knows that her sister will have shiplap and a modern farmhouse look and she can't see past that. Cracks me up.

I mostly hung out with the dog in the game room and drank booze for all of Saturday. 5 years of marriage. It took me awhile, but I'm learning.

Maybe show your wife this.. Or maybe just check it out yourself.. I just think it’s a good overall message:

Shouldn't The Joneses Be Keeping Up With Us?

Ahh, the old keeping up with the Joneses. Such a popular and well-known part of our vernacular, it actually has its own Wikipedia page: "Keeping up...

www.dividendmantra.com

I’m far from perfect, but at various times in my life (I’m in my mid-40s), I’ve found myself stuck with debt, an expensive car, an expensive home, a high-maintenance girlfriend- or sometimes a combination of all of the aforementioned things... Fortunately, with time and effort, ive been able to catch myself and course-correct before things got too out of hand .. granted, not having kids helps a great deal.. but we should all strive to live more simply IMO, and try to live by the old ‘Collect experiences and not THINGS‘ mantra if we can.

 

[Bayouboy]

How much of our economy is based on people doing exactly that though?

If everyone in the whole country decided at the same time that from now on they were going to live modestly within their means, and not do any frivolous spending until all their debt is paid off and they have a fund of at least 12 months worth of expenses in the bank what would the fallout of that be?

Our economy would crash!!!

 

[St. Widge]

My oldest is 20 and has been going to community college for 2 years. The cost savings is tremendous. I don't know how La is, but Tx requires all public universities to teach the same core subjects. So the classes you take at his community college is the same you take at Texas or A&M or North Texas, etc. He will transfer to a 4 year school after next Fall. Plus we make him have skin in the game by him paying his tuition upfront, then we repay him based on how many grades he has at B or higher. He wasn't a good high school student and we didn't want to waste our own money.

That's a good option. The "problem" for me is that mine wants to be a architect and most of those programs require that you start the program your freshman year. LSU has a 5 year program, but you get out as a certified Professional Architect. And she's a really good student so I'm not really afraid that she will waste the opportunity.

 

[Saint_Ward]

That's a good option. The "problem" for me is that mine wants to be a architect and most of those programs require that you start the program your freshman year. LSU has a 5 year program, but you get out as a certified Professional Architect. And she's a really good student so I'm not really afraid that she will waste the opportunity.

Wrong topic, but, check with the School, often even for Engineering and Architecture, they have partnerships with various 2 year Universities. The issue will be the 2nd year, "Intro to ___" courses. Otherwise, mostly going to be Calculus, Physics, Chemistry, and other Gen Ed Courses.

 

[Dago]

The choice doesn't have to be "re-open, consequences be damned" or "stay closed forever." And legislation to provide income to Americans in the interim would help the situation. So, yes, I have and yes, there are solutions.

Who in here is calling for a re-open with no considerations for the virus?

 

[Saint by the Bay]

Who in here is calling for a re-open with no considerations for the virus?

I'm not going to call people out but there have been a few.

 

[Dago]

I'm not sure of the point of this, so I'm kinda making a guess. But, nevertheless, it also brings up something I think needs to be mentioned as we talk about re-opening. If we're talking about suicide or non-COVID deaths increasing during the pandemic, then we also need to talk about the role that race place in contributing to pandemic, COVID deaths - and those are statistically significant.

And if we do that, then I *definitely* do not think we are talking comparable rates of suicides to COVID-related deaths for African Americans.

They haven't been repressed in direct ways to the same extent as the Depression, but - as you point out - there are adverse effects.

And studies have shown that merely being black in America creates stress. It contributes to hypertension. Food deserts and nutrition becomes an issue for diabetes and hyperlipidemia. Heart disease is adversely impacted. Lack of health coverage and poor access to healthcare.

Here are the results from a study in New York COVID deaths and co-morbidities

And these happen, disproportiionately to blacks, merely by being black and living in the areas they've been largely - as a community - forced into living. This is a multi-generational phenomenon.

So I don't think that suicide deaths for blacks is going to even scratch the surface of the COVID-related deaths for blacks. They might not have been killing themselves at all back during the Depression because, in the words of Alabama, "Somebody told me Wall Street fell, but we were so poor that we couldn't tell"

While there might be, mathematically, more deaths by suicide now vs. then - and I'm not trying to minimize individual deaths by suicide - I don't think we're statistically in an area where it becomes comparable to COVID-related deaths.

And there is a strong sense among many that this call to open is to be interpreted as poor, black people being forced into positions of exposure to satisfy the wants and whims of a middle class who want more leisure options in this pandemic time.

There's something to that for a lot of people. All of this talk hits very differently and feels very different - it's something talked about up here. And I think it absolutely needs to be figured into the discussion.

We've already had a major school district here apologize to the way the plan rolled out has adversely impacted students of color.

My point was that the Great Depression happened before the Civil Rights Movement. There was no representation and no consideration and they didnt have the voice they have now (and didnt speak for themselves)

You have people rioting over the results of an election...there would be massive rioting with a depression now IMO

 

[Dago]

It's amazing that a certain archetype of person will look down on other people for not having 6 months of savings but then rush to bail out comapnies who don't have 6 months of savings because they're too big to fail.

I guess personal responsibility doesn't carry over to the people who run huge corporations.

Speaking as one of those business owners, this is an overly simplistic and (sorry, but true) ignorant viewpoint of small business owners. I have never lived beyond middle class and i spent my 'savings' paying employees for 3 or 4 pay periods without income coming in because the government said they were going to help. The PPP i was offered on the second go round didnt allow me to reimburse myself for the money i paid out and it didnt offer anything that would help pay the bills plus try to reopen

 

[saintology]

A few quick thoughts.

1. It's why their cleaning procedures are important.
2. More important is making people wear masks and consider suspending beverage services.
3. More important is screening people who might be ill and just not letting them fly.
4. Aircraft Air is recirculated with fresh air from outside, and through HEPA filters. The air is fully replaced about 15 times an hour, or every 4 minutes.

How 'stale' is the recycled air in a plane?

Though there is a continual flow of fresh air into the aeroplane, this has to be processed before it's introduced into the cabin.

www.sciencefocus.com

I'm glad you pointed out the air changes per hour from outside air - this seems to be a misconception that is held by a lot of people. For comparison a typical office HVAC system does about 2 air changes per hour. So, outside of the proximity to people, there is no enhanced risk on airplane travel of airbourne transmission with proper precautions/screening.

All that being said - there is no conceivable way that the airline industry isn't changed forever in significant ways by this. I fully expect airplane tickets to go up significantly for a good while. Between the screening measures that will likely have to be in place, PPE, and reduced capacity requirements - I just don't see how we don't see air travel become more and more expensive. Already they've reduced somewhere around 3 quarters of all flights, and are suspending more and more flights. Small hubs will be all but gone with very limited options, along with further consolidation of airlines I'd imagine. None of this is changing soon as far as I can see.

For me personally it sucks, b/c my parents are aging and I try and get back home at least 2x per year, but with a family of 5 flying in from CA that is already an expensive endeavor. Now I wonder what I can afford.....it going to suck big time.

 

[Taurus]

It definitely is bad. But comparing to wars seems a bit strange, why not compare it to health issues? Because COVID-19 attacks through disease.
Is that because it doesn't look at scary when you compare the deaths to things like cancer, of which an estimated 660,000 people will die this year. Or heart disease which is nearly 650,000 per year.

This doesn't mean we don't take COVID-19 seriously, but you are trying to frame it in a way that makes it scarier than it is.

Also is you want to use the war metric, how about compare Germany and Russia's deaths in World War I and II to COVID-19, it doesn't look near as sexy.

Because someone who shall remain nameless and orange called himself a 'wartime President'. Thus inviting comparisons to American wartime casualties.

 

[Loose Cannon]

Speaking as one of those business owners, this is an overly simplistic and (sorry, but true) ignorant viewpoint of small business owners. I have never lived beyond middle class and i spent my 'savings' paying employees for 3 or 4 pay periods without income coming in because the government said they were going to help. The PPP i was offered on the second go round didnt allow me to reimburse myself for the money i paid out and it didnt offer anything that would help pay the bills plus try to reopen

I probably should have made a distinction between business size - you and I have talked, we're both small business owners. I wasn't referring to those types of companies.

I'm talking about things like bailing out the cruise line industry, which is absurd.

 

[Bayouboy]

I'm talking about things like bailing out the cruise line industry, which is absurd.

This will be interesting to see how it plays out. I'm not really for any bailout, personally....but I understand the reason the government decided to do it. The cruise industry should not get a red cent from the US taxpayers. They are based outside of the country and pay very little or any taxes to the USA. Due to their foreign designation, they can hire workers at slave wages (which makes cruises cheap). I would be livid if they were given any financial assistance.

BUT, I'm not dumb. If the money is right (under the table), it can definitely happen.

 

[Brennan77]

Came across this
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As of May 7, 2020, 76,503 Americans are confirmed dead of COVID-19. To put this in perspective:

• 58, 209 Americans died in the Vietnam War (1961-1975)
• 54, 246 Americans died in the Korean War (1950-1953)
• 25, 000 Americans died in the American Revolution (1775-1783)
• 15, 000 Americans died in the War of 1812 (1812-1815)
• 13, 283 Americans died in the Mexican-American War (1846-1848)
• 4,576 Americans died in the Iraq War (2003-2011)

Also: The annual number of deaths in the USA from infectious disease is about 75,000. That’s twelve months’ worth of deaths. We are slightly over the annual death count for infectious disease after only four months and seven days.

Don’t kid yourself that this is normal. This is not even remotely normal.

That would be good perspective if we were dealing with a military conflict. But since we aren't one might think this is simply sensationalism. A better comparison would be other pandemic level spreads of infectious disease, such as the Spanish flu.

I don't think anyone is saying this is particularly normal in the sense that it's not routine from year to year. But it might be considered somewhat 'normal' in the sense that there is historical precedent and the event was somewhat predictable from a long term point of view. It's bound to happen. We just happen to be part of the generation that experiences it.

 

[Booker]

Preview of what's to come?

Germany’s daily coronavirus cases nearly TRIPLE

CORONAVIRUS cases in Germany have almost trebled in the past 24 hours sparking fears of a second wave of COVID-19 infections.

www.express.co.uk

 

[superchuck500]

I'm talking about things like bailing out the cruise line industry, which is absurd.

There was no cruise industry relief. Perhaps some small domestic lines but none of the bigs.