You have commented 339 times on Rantburg.

Your Name
Your e-mail (optional)
Website (optional)
My Original Nic        Pic-a-Nic        Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Bold Italic Underline Strike Bullet Blockquote Small Big Link Squish Foto Photo
Science & Technology
Sweden Has Avoided a Coronavirus Lockdown. Its Economy Is Hurting Anyway
2020-05-15
Posted by:g(r)omgoru

#22   California's boom times are coming to an end.

It was already happening — this has just accelerated the process.
Posted by: trailing wife   2020-05-15 20:02  

#21  Lex just how many Swedes have you dealt with? Willing to bet it's a low number.
Posted by: Woodrow   2020-05-15 19:26  

#20  Gavin Newsom is playing his cards right out of the liberal text book. Give away all your states cash to special interest votes. Wait for the first emergency and ask for a federal bail out for all the years of mismanagement. If the government gives to too you, well then look how great you've helped all your constituents for all these years. If the government tells you too f off, then Orangemanbad,he doesn't care about you.
Posted by: bbrewer126    2020-05-15 17:32  

#19  Even U. Illinois is opening this fall. Nearly the entire South, most of the Midwest, Arizona, Maine, even U. Vermont: all have announced they'll open this fall albeit with testing, quarantines where necessary etc.

Only the UCs and Cal State will be closed. Retards. They're doing their best to destroy California.
Posted by: Lex   2020-05-15 15:48  

#18  California's boom times are coming to an end. This is the last nail in the coffin of what remains of California's middle class. Those who stay will be a thin stratum of remote knowledge workers in tech, the vast numbers of CA public sector union employees, and tens of millions of pauperized dole-recipients.

In short, the Anschluss between California and Mexico is nearly complete.
Posted by: Lex   2020-05-15 15:44  

#17   But that depends on the lockdown being lifted ASAP.


I’ve read that in NYC small business are opening despite the lockdown being once again extended, and the speakeasy culture has reappeared, Lex. In one of the Blue states severql counties have formally informed their governor that they are opening locally, despite state rules against it. So there is a de facto end to the lockdown, despite de jure nonsense.

The rulers of California, however, clearly cannot be kept from their completely unnecessarily self-destructive course, which will only accelerate depopulation. Politico addressed it a few days ago:

How Coronavirus Could Make People Move
The pandemic isn’t just going to change how we live—it’s going to dictate where we live, too.
Posted by: trailing wife   2020-05-15 15:29  

#16  Never completely trust a fart or spell-check.
Posted by: swksvolFF   2020-05-15 13:49  

#15  ^ I took me a second, but I see what you did there, Frank. LOL.
Posted by: Matt   2020-05-15 09:06  

#14  Ducking spellcheck
Posted by: Frank G   2020-05-15 08:13  

#13  ^ yes alas ... I get grief when I try to post a follow-up asterisk-correction, so I let it stand. You should have seen the even worse auto-spell check monstrosities I did catch.

To mods: will the 'burg ever have an edit function for posts?

Axeing Asking for a fiend, er friend
Posted by: Lex   2020-05-15 07:40  

#12  Did anyone else notice the hilarious spell-check error in #4: Nursing home residents dying because of "pregnancy-existing conditions"?

Obviously "previously-existing conditions"...but gave me a great laugh to start the day.

Maybe the Babylon Bee can start a special column for spell-check gaffes.
Posted by: Tom   2020-05-15 07:36  

#11  I certainly hope you're right. But that depends on the lockdown being lifted ASAP.

Little hope of that happening with Pomade Boy in Sacramento.

These idiots just announced they're going to close all the Cal State campuses (23 total) and probably most or all of the flagship University if California campuses as well (10 total).

So it's not enough to destroy millions of California families' livelihoods; their children's aspirations for a better life need to be clipped as well.

Again though I'm glad to see the red states applying reason and opening up.

Over 30 red states have announced their flagship public universities will be open this fall (e.g. TAMU, Purdue, Georgia, Virginia etc). So maybe the Californian high-achieving middle-class families' emigration to other states will become a stampede.
Posted by: Lex   2020-05-15 07:07  

#10  Kroger company has hired 100,000 over the past eight weeks. They've also paid out bonuses to hourly and salaried employees.

Restaurants were swamped for Mother's Day. Sure, their tables were empty, but they were getting so many online orders they were cancelling some.

The economy is tamped down and different, it's not dead. So long as money can flow, it will.

Posted by: Rob Crawford   2020-05-15 06:59  

#9  TW this is devastating - there's no way around it.

Already we have 4.6 million unemployed in California, the majority of whom will not see a paycheck again for the rest of 2020 at least.

At least half, probably more, of these nearly 5 million people were already close to or below the effective poverty level, which per United Way included 31% of California's population even at the peak of the economic boom.

$1200 might buy groceries for a family ... for one month.

In the silver lining category, perhaps many of the millions of illegals will try to leave, but even on that front the outlook isn't promising: Mexico doesn't want them and is - irony of ironies - said to be enforcing border controls against people entering Mexico from El Norte.

It is extremely likely that California will see more deaths due to economic despair than from COVID.

The extended mass lockdown is likely to be seen by future historians as the most disastrous policy decision in California's history.
Posted by: Lex   2020-05-15 06:57  

#8  The unemployment spike is a temporary result of the lockdown; the pain is eased in First World countries by unemployment checks and, in the U.S., the $1200/taxpayer stimulus check. Let’s see what the economy and unemployment look like in six months and a year from now.

The news is full unemployment stories, but this is the first I’ve seen about employment during thus thing except for the WalMart bonus:

NPR: This Charmin Factory Keeps Humming Even As Much Of America Is Hunkered Down
Posted by: trailing wife   2020-05-15 06:46  

#7  ^Just follow the respective economies - think of it as a worship of your Gods.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru   2020-05-15 05:59  

#6  Your Swedish obsession is clouding your judgment, g.

We get it: you hate them for their pro-Palestinian stance, which I abhor too, but that just isn't relevant to this matter.

Leave them alone. Focus on something else for a while - maybe a year - and revisit the issue when we finally have some consistent data.
Posted by: Lex   2020-05-15 05:56  

#5  This is bull, Lex. Just watch Israeli and Swinish Swedish economies.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru   2020-05-15 05:42  

#4  More pseudo-factual bullshit journalism.

Here's reality: California's unemployment rate in May hit 23%, expected to reach 30-32% by end of June.

Sweden's unemployment rate in May hit 7%, and is estimated to reach 9% by end of June.

When with cultural differences, the extreme lockdown policy is causing unemployment to be many times higher - as much as TWENTY POINTS HIGHER - than it otherwise would be. The grim reality - no BS "modeling" required -- is that every additional point of unemployment in this country means thousands of additional deaths due to economic devastation and despair. This is fact. No funny numbers or misattribution or inconsistencies in the data but hard reality.

The mass lockdown is unsustainable. This is obvious now to everyone. Whatever the rationale for it -- a rationale which keeps changing, almost by the week -- this extreme and unwise policy must now be brought to a conclusion, and the sooner the better.

Sweden is simply taking the hit faster than the rest of us -- and inflating its death statistics by counting all the nursing home deaths as COVID when in reality about 25-30% of those extremely frail elderly who end up in nursing homes die within six months because of pregnancy-existing conditions. Sweden's neighbors and most nations aren't counting such deaths as caused by CPVID; Sweden is.
Posted by: Lex   2020-05-15 05:39  

#3  Sure BP, here in Israel our economy was completely destroyed! I'm starving in a dark, while pinning this comment.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru   2020-05-15 05:25  

#2  It looks like the virus is "solving" Sweden's non-adapting Muslim immigrant problem. It is possible their goats and sheep are dying also.
Posted by: Thaith Elmeresing6163   2020-05-15 04:11  

#1  Yes but is it's economy destroyed like the countries that over-reacted?
Posted by: Bright Pebbles   2020-05-15 03:06  

00:00