[BBC] On the afternoon of 25 March, Julia sat down at her laptop and logged into a phony Facebook account. She'd opened it in middle school, to surreptitiously monitor boys she had crushes on. But now, many years later, it was about to serve a much more serious purpose. Wanna bet this tool is a Vegan?
"Can you please look into Smithfield," she typed in a message to an account called Argus911, the Facebook-based tip line for the local newspaper, the Argus Leader. "They do have a positive [Covid-19] case and are planning to stay open." By "Smithfield", she was referring to the Smithfield Foods pork-processing plant located in her town of Sioux Falls, South Dakota. The factory - a massive, eight-story white box perched on the banks of the Big Sioux River - is the ninth-largest hog-processing facility in the US. When running at full capacity, it processes 19,500 freshly-slaughtered hogs per day, slicing, grinding and smoking them into millions of pounds of bacon, hot dogs and spiral-cut hams. With 3,700 workers, it is also the fourth-largest employer in the city.
"Thank you for the tip," the Argus911 account responded. "What job did the worker who tested positive have?"
"We are not exactly sure," Julia wrote back.
"OK, thanks," Argus911 replied. "We'll be in touch."
The next day, at 7:35am, the Argus Leader published the story on its website: "Smithfield Foods employee tests positive for coronavirus". The reporter confirmed through a company spokeswoman that, indeed, an employee had tested positive, was in a 14-day quarantine, and that his or her work area and other common spaces had been "thoroughly sanitised". But the plant, deemed part of a "critical infrastructure industry" by the Trump administration, would remain fully operational.
"Food is an essential part of all our lives, and our more than 40,000 US team members, thousands of American family farmers and our many other supply chain partners are a crucial part of our nation's response to Covid-19," Smithfield CEO Kenneth Sullivan said in an online video statement released 19 March to explain the decision to keep factories open. "We are taking the utmost precautions to ensure the health and well-being of our employees and consumers."
#3
Julia should only take her lap top and do a very rude thing, and while she's about it let's not forget her 'alarm' either. There is a great deal more to the Smithfield story and the situation in SD. This amounts to little more than propaganda apparently to create distrust in the food supply chains. The grocery stores still groan with abundant choices of fresh food.
#6
Tl;dr. Summary: Government bad, business worse, and OrangeManBad.
Posted by: Bobby ||
04/17/2020 9:33 Comments ||
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#7
It's the ninth-largest... which means there are eight larger pork processors in the country. Yet people are obsessing over this one plant temporarily closing and declaring we're about to have a famine.
Too many spoiled and unserious people around.
Posted by: Rob Crawford ||
04/17/2020 10:12 Comments ||
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#9
...well there is a substitute to meet your requirements. Though I'm sure there'll be posters who says its not a real substitute (see - "They've never tried real socialism") ;)
#10
*Shrug* Considering the long going trade imbalance that Chinese Big Businesses, really proxies of the CCP, would have massive cash reserves that would be inconvenient to move back to China -- so buy "stuff" in the USA.
#14
Have read the bod CV outbreak that forced closure of SD packing plant occurred two weeks after a visit by officials from China. Not sure it's true but certainly makes sense.
#15
*Shrug* Considering the long going trade imbalance that Chinese Big Businesses, really proxies of the CCP, would have massive cash reserves that would be inconvenient to move back to China -- so buy "stuff" in the USA.
It's Chinese entrepreneurs trying to shield their assets from seizure by the Chinese regime - a threat that has hung over all wealthy figures in all regimes pretty much since the beginning of time. Edward Longshanks did it to Jewish merchants to whom he owed money, and Philip did it to the Knights Templar. Capital flight to avoid regime thievery is why Hong Kong's richest man, Li Ka-shing, has moved almost all of his assets outside of not just China, but Hong Kong itself.
[Bloomberg] The news, when it reached the Grand Princess early on March 4, barely registered at first. In a letter slipped under passenger cabin doors, Grant Tarling, Carnival Corp.’s chief medical officer, announced that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control had begun "investigating a small cluster" of Covid-19 cases in California that might have been linked to the ship. Thirteen days after leaving San Francisco for Hawaii, the vessel would be skipping a scheduled stop in Mexico on its return voyage and sailing back early to its Bay Area port.
That day, passengers noticed new hand sanitizer stations and crew members wearing gloves, but life on the Grand Princess, which advertises 1,301 cabins, 20 restaurants and lounges, about a dozen shops, and four freshwater swimming pools, otherwise went on as normal. Guests prepared for a ukulele concert, played bridge at shared tables, and took line-dancing classes. That night, Laurie Miller and her husband, John, attended True or Moo, a show featuring an emcee in a cow costume; the following morning, John joined about 200 other passengers in the ship’s Broadway-style theater for a lecture on Clint Eastwood movies. "I’m surprised they’re even letting this event happen," he whispered to a nearby friend. "This is a big crowd."
Around lunchtime on March 5, the ship’s captain, John Smith, announced a quarantine over the ship’s public address system. All 2,422 passengers needed to go to their cabins to shelter in place. Laurie Miller was in the Da Vinci dining room eating chocolate peanut butter ice cream. "Oh my God," she remembers thinking. "This is real." Then she ordered more ice cream.
Other passengers ambled to the ship’s stores and dining areas, too, to take advantage of the perks while they could. "Evvverrrybody went to the buffet," recalls 61-year-old Debbi Loftus, who was traveling with her parents. "I just thought, Oh, crap, the ukulele concert is going to be canceled." Crowds of elderly guests filed to their cabins through narrow hallways and down the stairs of the ship’s 17 decks. Sixty-nine-year-old Karen Dever tried an elevator only to find it packed with fellow passengers. "So much for social distancing!" she joked aloud.
As the lockdown progressed, the ship became a fixture on cable news and social media around the world, livestreamed by frustrated, scared passengers as if it were the Titanic of the TikTok age. Of the first 46 crew and passengers who were tested for the virus, 21 were positive. President Trump suggested they should be prevented from disembarking. At the time the number of confirmed cases in the U.S. was still low, and Trump implied that the vessel’s caseload would make it look like the U.S. was doing a poor job of handling the pandemic. "I don’t need to have the numbers double because of one ship," he said.
#2
They had an e. Coli problem a couple years ago, nobody cared.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 5:06 Comments ||
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#3
My wife and I settled on another cruise line three years ago, and - at first, I was bothered by hand sanitizer being shoved in your face coming on board and outside every dining area. Their caution looks pretty smart, now.
Posted by: Bobby ||
04/17/2020 9:24 Comments ||
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#4
Get on a boat with 4000 people? Towns and villages that large frighten me.
#6
I think they threw il capitano in jail or at least put him on trial. That f-tard was showing off for his girl friend if I recall. Vai en culo, capitano.
#7
When you have a ship full of passengers at sea, what are you supposed to do?
And I'd love to know the source of the quotes from Trump.
Posted by: Rob Crawford ||
04/17/2020 10:22 Comments ||
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#8
Al-Rooters - full quote: 'I don’t need to have the numbers double because of one ship that wasn’t our fault'
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/17/2020 10:35 Comments ||
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#9
It looks like Carnival cruise ships are registered under the Bahamas and Panama as flags of convenience to minimize costs, not the U.S. I imagine that legally they could have been required to sail home, rather than allowed to disembark their passengers here.
#10
Every company in the country has a virus problem of some kind, including Walmart and Kroger. That's what happens when you're big enough to have to deal with masses of people.
[Hot Air] My layman’s understanding is that remdesivir has always been the best hope among scientists for a "miracle drug" that might put a real dent in the death toll. Hydroxychloroquine gets all the press because Trump has seized on it for whatever reason, but the evidence of its efficacy so far is mixed. The French study that put the drug on the world’s radar screen as a potential silver bullet against coronavirus was later withdrawn by the journal that published it because of flawed methodology. Some small studies from China indicated that it may have benefits against COVID-19, but another Chinese study released this week pointed the other way: "The pill didn’t help patients clear the virus better than standard care and was much more likely to cause side effects, according to a study of 150 hospitalized patients..." A new French study also showed few benefits from the drug, with less than a two-percent difference in mortality rates among patients admitted to the ICU who received the drug and those admitted to the ICU who didn’t.
Part of the hope for hydroxychloroquine was due to the fact that it’s already on the shelf, available for off-label use. Remdesivir is still in the trial stage. But the FDA is watching it closely, knowing its potential, and Gilead is moving it along as quickly as possible, knowing how much demand there’ll be if trials confirm its efficacy. The company’s running a study right now involving 2,400 COVID-19 patients who are severely ill at 150 different clinical sites. Today’s big news comes from just one of those sites, a hospital at the University of Chicago. That’s the catch — the new data doesn’t reflect the outcome from the whole study, just one hospital’s experience. But that hospital is respected. And its head researcher sounds very encouraged by what she’s seen.
#2
And, since people in many remote and unregulated areas will self medicate and not report, these "magic numbers" will only matter to a credentialed idiot.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 5:22 Comments ||
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#3
and Allasquish is a never-trumper RINO cuck, so, of course HCQ can't work...because Trump
I've pretty much quit reading HA, and several of the other VIP-required blogs
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/17/2020 7:16 Comments ||
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#4
I don't read:
Instamoron - because I'm banned for calling Tesla owners a cult.
Ace of Spades - Commenters talking about raping your dead mother.
Hot Air - Only communist concern Commenters need apply.
Red State - The dark matter portion of the Never Trump universe.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 8:01 Comments ||
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#5
While we rush life-saving drugs into production, probably including a COVID vaccine, remember Thalidomide, Vioxx, and the 1976 swine flu vaccine that had a lot of bad side effects and started the anti-vaxxer movement.
Just don't forget - everybody has an axe to grind.
Posted by: Bobby ||
04/17/2020 9:39 Comments ||
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[Babylon Bee] In an alarming turn of events, workers at a Wuhan research lab were seen adjusting a sign that read "92 Days Since Accidentally Releasing a Virus," taking down the 92 and replacing it with a zero.
"Everything is still great here," said President Xi Jinping to selected members of the press. "Nothing alarming has happened here... and certainly not for a second time." Xi was wearing a hazmat suit, but he claimed that was because it was laundry day and that was the only thing he had left that was clean. The American press felt no need to ask any follow-up questions.
A number of "Have You Seen Me?" posters depicting a coronavirus and giving a number to call were spotted around Wuhan, though again Chinese officials say there is nothing unusual there and nothing to worry about and if you develop a sneeze, isolate yourself -- preferably in an airtight room -- immediately.
The Wuhan lab that adjusted the sign has been studying bat-related viruses for some time, though the main thing they've learned so far is how not to store viruses.
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/17/2020 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under: Commies
#1
Hah! I'm up a dollar.
Posted by: Bobby ||
04/17/2020 0:32 Comments ||
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#2
The Bee has been serving up some softballs lately. I think they're taking pity on us.
[Martin Armstrong] President Trump played a very smart move against the FAKE NEWS contingent. He outlined broad new federal guidelines for opening up the country that will put the onus on governors to decide how to restart the economies in their states amid mounting fallout from the coronavirus outbreak. The federal guidance doesn’t set a specific timeline, and Trump wouldn’t hypothesize what the country will look like by milestone dates like Memorial Day, the Fourth of July and Labor Day. But Trump predicted there are 29 states that can begin the opening soon and several that could start the process right away, though he didn’t name them.
I had to laugh when Trump used the very reports claiming 2 million Americans would die which was put out by Neil Ferguson from Imperial College which received donations from Bill Gates to flip their negativity back on the press. We did a great job, Trump said, and we are coming in with well under 100,000 deaths because he closed the borders. It was sort of a mental martial arts contest using the force of your opponent against them.
Shifting the burden back to the governors was a brilliant move. New York City, which under governor Andrew Cuomo just weeks ago was blaming Trump and pleading that it would need 40,000 ventilators to handle a projected flood of critically ill COVID-19 patients that never appeared, now says things are going so well New York is shipping hundreds of ventilators to other states. It’s always a question of who gets the blame.
I watched the questions and you could see that they were all negative. I watched the CBS version and they immediately had their analyst from the Associated Press who instantly began to try to tear Trump apart. He said when the President claimed to have the authority to order the states to report, "we knew that was wrong then" and now he deferred to the Governors "proving he was wrong." Quite frankly, I am really disgusted with these people.
I find it personally offensive for these journalists to harp on this nonsense that Trump was wrong when it is plainly the FAKE NEWS. What Trump has done was political. The draconian measures being carried out by each state will be attributable to the governor for the 2020 election — not Trump. Then we will probably see these horrible corrupt journalists flip it around and blame the lock-downs and loss of local jobs like in New York on Trump in time for the 2020 elections. Personally, I believe they are carrying out Sedition against the United States. Trump made it very clear, there was NEVER a bed capacity problem. He sent hospital ships to New York, but they were not used. He had the Army Corps of Engineers build beds in stadiums – they were never filled. The entire theory we needed to be locked down because there were not enough beds was totally BOGUS!!!!! When is the press going to point this out? We have been lied to and why?
Where is the journalist willing to tell the truth just once! This is the CDC's own graph showed bed capacity was the justification for the lockdown. The press bash Trump claiming he was wrong, but not a single word about this chart to justify the lockdown, to begin with, will ever appear in main-stream media.
#2
We have a new class of bitter clingers now - those who bitterly cling to the idea America must be reduced to third world economic status because Tony Fauci and scarf woman say so.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 2:35 Comments ||
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#3
Shifting the burden back to the governors was a brilliant move
#4
p.s. I'm tired of people badmouthing Fauci. The man is doing his job - advising the president as to epidemiological consequences of a likely actions - to the best of currently available knowledge. It is his job to consider economic consequences* - what's why Trump has economic advisers. And then Trump, whose job it is, decides (and shifts the inevitable blame to governors - he is a genius).
*I do have a message for all the economists who suddenly became experts on epidemiology. Zip your ignorant yaps. You have no more understanding of epidemiology and virology than an dog journalist. In fact, you have no understanding of your own area of expertise - as demonstrated by a Nobel Laureate Krugman.
#6
Lots of people are tired of yet another non elected clerisy messing with their lives in a detached academic way. If they and those who back them get away with only hurt feelings it will be a tribute to common decency, not slavish obeisance to mythical mathematical models.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 3:33 Comments ||
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#7
IMO, Trump left decision to governors because there are going to be tens of thousands new deaths once the quarantine is lifted. That's my prediction. Care to make your own, MM - so we can wait and see?
#8
People die every day. Only recently has it become a reason to abandon reason. We didn't shut down the economy for HIV. We did regulate who could donate blood. The current shotgun approach to covid is a bad answer to the wrong question.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 3:49 Comments ||
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#9
It short, you aren't willing to commit to a definite statement.
#13
I explained, in one of my posts, about the difference between qualitative and quantitative. If you had anything - even remotely resembling intellectual honesty - you'd look at the stats for Sweden/Holland: where they went your way.
Here's another "easily punctured" prediction for you: the "Economy", as you know it, is dead. It's never coming back.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 4:32 Comments ||
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#20
^ makes as much sense as magic numbers. Zero Hedge "only Murica bad" quality rant.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 7:44 Comments ||
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#21
One of the problems with this whole discussion about the Whu Flu is the lack of good information that is applicable across the board.
I think people (other than me) are a bit sick and tired of the idea that "We must listen to the experts." When the experts don't all agree.
There is a known type of issue with academics and their research that can be summed up by the witticism that at school you learn more and more about less and less till you know everything about nothing.
Too many mono-maniacs pushing their one true "answer" when the problem is systemic and not susceptible to a point solution. Note that does not mean just the virus but the whole mess which is as much political as it is biological.
Fauci and scarf woman can speak to the biological (and they aren't the only ones, and their stories have changed) but not the economic or politic sides and it is up to Trump and the govs to add all the pieces together to come up with a plan.
#22
I'll take up the charge and repeat a prediction, also make another one.
Old, existing prediction (made on Mar. 22): the US will likely top out at not more than 34,000 COVID fatalities. (Worst case would have been ~88,000 but we won't come close to that unless CDC thoroughly cooks the books.)
New, additional prediction: however, the US will register more than 80,000 additional non-COVID deaths that could have been prevented had our leaders not panicked. This number will come mainly from
1) 10,000 preventable non-COVID deaths in New York City due to NYC authorities' neglect of other patients requiring urgent care, which by my estimates using CDC data amounts to ~3,000 such deaths through Apr. 11, or about 70-75% of NYC's tallies of COVID-probable deaths.
2) another 10,000 deaths due to a 20-25% spike in the suicide rate due to economic ruin (per recent studies, 22% was the probable increase that occurred in the early years of the Depression)
3) another 60,000 deaths eventually from economic ruin and the resulting unbearable stress and despair: heart attacks, addiction, domestic violence, violent crime.
Posted by: Bobby ||
04/17/2020 8:28 Comments ||
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#24
And, how is this "prediction" more significant than picking a horse or some lottery numbers? After all the shouting the larger human enterprise must go on. The dead will be buried and more vinyl siding will be sold (though hopefully not Chinese made)
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 10:07 Comments ||
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#25
re: #23
it ain't rocket science, it's harder.
the leadership problem is that you have to weigh all the conflicting data and opinions and come to a conclusion that is a best fit for you population and authority.
How would you "model" the problem and include Pelosi's slow walking the laws? Or the Govs responses based on their personal election issues? That's something Trump has to factor in. Now add the CCP, WHO with the DNC....and the hole keeps getting deeper and changing shape.
#27
Shifting the burden back to the governors was a brilliant move
Maybe I've been reading the Constitution wrong all of these years, but isn't that where the 'burden' belonged in the first place, or at least the primary burden?
#29
^ It is, but if they could blame deaths on OrangeManBad, they would. Now it feels like a victory to them (and the onus as well)
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/17/2020 10:24 Comments ||
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#30
Try and keep your state shut down when the adjacent one is open and thriving?
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/17/2020 10:25 Comments ||
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#31
#29 was responding to #27
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/17/2020 10:26 Comments ||
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#32
Try and keep your state shut down when the adjacent one is open and thriving?
That's exactly what will happen when New Hampshire (my home state) opens up before Massachusetts. Will be interesting to watch, if that's the right word for it.
#38
#28, noticed it long before, went some rounds. He's a good guy but way too full of himself, Bill Gates without the accidental billions. I'm just an opinionated dumb schmuck who doesn't see any wisdom in any credentialed oaf's shadow.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 10:36 Comments ||
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#43
Doesn't matter whether Fauci (Fauxi) is believable or even correct. He's an unelected advisor and at no point should anyone suggest his opinion should automatically become the law of the land. That simple. Even a magic numbers guy like grom should get it. Not saying a Democrat governor is smart enough to digest it.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 10:48 Comments ||
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#44
Well, whether or not I trust "Fauxi", he is an advisor, and advisors assist their bosses to make informed decisions. But even doctors often refer patients to get a "second opinion".
#45
Life is going to go on. Governors are going to find out they don't have unlimited authority. People like grom will call those who go back out in the streets killers. This time next year we will be talking about something entirely else.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 11:03 Comments ||
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#46
Hopefully we will be talking about how refusing to sell the Chinese treasury bills has sobered up the American gummint. Won't happen, but it's a nice dream...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 11:05 Comments ||
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#47
People (Americans?) generally have the attention span of a gnat with their fast-food/Twit mentality. I agree. This will be forgotten. The only concern is the overall economy. If this is such a "consumer-driven" economy, will people show more concern about their household budgets (which will hit the earnings of the various companies) or will they go hog-wild and run out and, for example, buy three of the latest and greatest iPhones? We'll see.
#48
The iPhone cohort is ripe for a $5000.00 phone. I'd say Joe and Jill will be a bit more pecunious, maybe even niggardly....
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 11:18 Comments ||
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#49
I said it yesterday "Fauci advises, Trump decides" - too bad you can't pay attention to anything that doesn't fit your prejudices Mr "I don't read (#4) :
Instamoron - because I'm banned for calling Tesla owners a cult.
Ace of Spades - Commenters talking about raping your dead mother.
Hot Air - Only communist concern Commenters need apply.
Red State - The dark matter portion of the Never Trump universe."
#57
But it will all be blood money if one single person dies of COVID-19 after the stupidtine ends.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 11:57 Comments ||
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#58
I see grom is still predicting dire death for us all. This has all been utter bullshit. New York City, New Orleans, and a handful of other places should have had their own plan to deal with the weight they were bearing, and most of the rest of the country should have gone on with their business. The petty mayors and governors aren't going to give up the raw *power* they grabbed easily, but its time for freedom loving Americans to push back. End this bullshit now.
#71
It's a valid debate. Too bad it has to get so personal, not to mention political. It's gotta be a tough call for Trump. He has to make decisions in real time based on information that is often less than perfect. How would Joe do in the same circumstances? How would anybody do? It can't be easy.
We might find some middle ground. Old folks like me should perhaps stay home. My kids might be ready to go back to work. The gray area is the kid who still lives with us. If he goes back to work then we could get exposed through him and I don't want to get exposed.
At a plant like Smithfield, a compromise might be cutting production in order to enforce social distancing, although PPEs might have been a better idea for that place.
The N95 might well become the latest fashion trend. Mass transit might need to be rethought. Telecommuting might need to be done a lot more.
Letting the governors decide sounds good in theory because each state bears different risks. Realistically, some governors are bound to make better calls than others(cough, cough, Democrats).
Bottom line is: we simply CANNOT afford to do this indefinitely and we CANNOT do it every time some new bug gets loose in China. If we need more hospitals, ventilators and PPEs then get on with it. We certainly need more research into vaccines and cures. Most importantly, we need a LOT less exposure to China.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
04/17/2020 14:00 Comments ||
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#73
Raj, you work with real numbers, not bullshit picked out of the air. Well, maybe. But your numbers don't put millions out of work on a bad guess.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 14:55 Comments ||
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#74
This mess is the same as your doctor asking if you have a gun in your house. Since the Trump flag stealing doctors, you can now respond "I'll answer that question after you show me your rap sheet, doc."
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 15:14 Comments ||
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Also contained therein is a link to the full proposal.
tw - I just posted something that got eaten up by a Rantburg filter. Can you remove the offending word and repost it for me? Thanks in advance.
Probably it is not available to me, Raj — Fred very wisely does not let me anywhere near the levers of power, and I have no more idea of the secret forbidden words than you (although I assume many are related to pharmaceuticals).
#76
Raj, if you mean the Vox article, that is sitting in the hopper for tomorrow in all its glory. Otherwise I don’t see anything with your name on it.
#78
"Oh, honey let's do a vacation where they don't wear masks!" Really? That's embarrassingly dumb to even bring up.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 16:26 Comments ||
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#79
It is, and it is already happening. People from locked-down Wichita are traveling to the countryside. Even better, they like getting selfies with the turkeys. It is turkey season and they walk right into the line of fire.
h/t Instapundit (not just puppy blender)
[FP] - On April 7, a Chinese company suffered a surprising setback in the United Kingdom. Following an uproar by British legislators, an arm of the Chinese state-owned investment firm China Reform had to abandon its bid to dominate Imagination, a leading British technology firm that makes smartphone chips. Even if that effort failed, others are likely to succeed.
That’s because many Western manufacturers of popular products will face financial uncertainty as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, making them easy prey for Chinese companies, which are already on a corporate buying spree in the West.
...across Europe, North America, and other advanced economies there are countless cutting-edge firms in key sectors such as biotech and electronics that are neither as rich nor as well funded as Imagination. And like most other companies, they’ve been hit by the standstill that coronavirus has imposed on the economy. A recent survey of more than 10,000 Japanese firms, for example, showed that 63 percent predicted the coronavirus would have a negative impact on their business performance.
...China Reform’s majority stake in Imagination is part of a major Chinese acquisition spree in Europe and North America over the past few years. Last year, for example, Chinese entities invested 11.7 billion euros (nearly $13 billion) in European Union countries, the vast majority of it in mergers and acquisitions and only a minimal share going to forming new companies. In 2018, Chinese entities invested some $25 billion in the United States. Government support makes it even easier for Chinese companies to buy foreign firms.
...
[ZERO] In response to a likely worldwide recession, governments have turned on full blast the fiscal and monetary spigots. A $2 trillion spending plan has just been approved in the USA, central banks are on a buying spree, and the $1200 stimulus payment is just helicopter money.
Since the government does not have a magical tree of plenty and can only redistribute from the left pocket to the right by taxing, borrowing, or printing money, how does this make any economic sense or make any country better off?
Government and Keynesian economists will tell you it’s to protect us from the coming dangers of hoarding; specifically, that banks will stop lending and just let funds sit. Keynes brought hoarding to the forefront of economics in his The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money; a concept that the classical economist considered to be irrelevant.
In a circular flow economy, the value of output must be equal to income. Income represents an ability to purchase goods and services and can be divided into three categories: it can be consumed, saved, or hoarded. Consumption is using income to obtain goods and services for current personal satisfaction. Savings is (correctly) defined as a transfer of purchasing power from one group to another.
The saver is giving up his current access to goods and services to be able to consume more of them in the future. These transfers allow investors to use these claims to purchase plants and equipment to produce goods and services in the future. The last category is hoarding, which in the Keynesian view is the equivalent of stuffing money in your mattress for a rainy day. It is the only claim on income that is not used to purchase currently produced goods and services.
This Keynesian nonsense about hoarding has been around for nearly a century and has led to some very bad economic decisions over the last eighty years. In reality, hoarding is just saving, and a simple example will show how the fear of hoarding is grossly overblown. Hoarding simply increases the value of dollars in circulation and is hardly anything to panic about.
Suppose there are ten pencils and only $10. Supply and demand will ensure that the price of each pencil will be $1 each. If the price of each pencil was $2, you could only afford to buy half of the pencils, and the unsold pencils would drive the price down. If the price was only 50 cents, then people would still have $5 looking for pencils to buy, driving their price up.
Now suppose that people hoard or stuff their mattresses with $2 and we only have $8 left to buy ten pencils. The price for each pencil will normally decline to eighty cents, putting us back in equilibrium. The Keynesian fear, though, is that prices are rather inflexible or adjust poorly, such that the price remains at $1 and we are left with two unsold pencils. There's not enough demand at the old prices. Keynesians advocate government spending to replace this lost demand.
#2
Neo-Keynesians demand the government maximise rent-seeking via stealthy ways.
They keep enough capitalism to skim from and progressive big government funding taxes on workers they can loot from and tax-cut outs for the ways they live.
#3
But owning hard assets, especially real estate is eeeevil, right BP?
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 5:34 Comments ||
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#4
Because - mathematical model.
Posted by: Bobby ||
04/17/2020 9:52 Comments ||
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#5
I'm sure there are thousands of examples of similar stories, but I will never forget a married young woman, husband didn't work and with a toddler son. She just couldn't wait to spend her income tax refund (a few thousand dollars) on a big-screen TV. That was her goal. To each his/her own, I suppose, but don't come crying to me or the State that you are down on your luck thanks to no fiscal discipline/profligate spending.
I hope this latest crisis makes many Americans reconsider their spending (charging?) habits. Earning $0.13 per year on your savings account isn't much of an incentive though.
#6
To the young lady, that income tax refund was her form of savings. She could easily have increased withholding at the beginning of the year to have a few dollars more to spend each month. But she did not, in order to have the lump sum at the end.
According to this article from 2019, so recent but from before the current excitement, the answer is more complicated than the excitable Zero Hedge writer would have us think.
Of the Americans who have savings accounts, the median balance of transactional accounts is $4,500. The average balance is $40,200. This is according to the Federal Reserve’s Survey of Consumer Finances, which is conducted every three years, most recently in 2016.
The Fed defines transactional accounts as checking, savings, money market and call accounts, as well as prepaid debit cards. Retirement and brokerage accounts, for instance, would not qualify as transactional accounts.
House equity is also not counted, though I seem to recall that for most Americans their house equity is the largest financial instrument in their portfolio.
Because most of them never grew up in the 50's. See what the average citizen had back then and felt they were doing good. People saved to buy the next piece of furniture or basic appliance. We had home economics in schools for a reason. Credit was hard. Compared to today, that was poverty.
#8
I remember when my dad was buying a new Pontiac back in 1969. The salesman asked him how he was going to finance it. There were a lot of things we wanted but he insisted on living within his means.
"Finance it?" he said. "I'm gonna pay for it all right now."
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
04/17/2020 14:14 Comments ||
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#9
Why save? Government is constantly devaluing your savings by printing money, so spend it while it still has value.
#11
According to this. only 15% of American household financial assets are in cash, other categories including credit, corporate and non-corporate equities, and whatever other comprises, claiming a total of $88 trillion shared among us. An interesting set of graphs.
[Townhall] Professor Yitzhak Ben Israel of Tel Aviv University, who also serves on the research and development advisory board for Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, plotted the rates of new coronavirus (aka COVID19 or Chinese Plague) ...the twenty first century equivalent of bubonic plague, only instead of killing off a third of the population of Europe it kills 3.4 percent of those who notice they have it. It seems to be fond of the elderly, especially Iranian politicians and holy men... infections of the U.S., U.K., Sweden, Italia, Israel, Switzerland ...home of the Helvetians, famous for cheese, watches, yodeling, and William Tell... , La Belle France, Germany, and Spain. The numbers told a shocking story: irrespective of whether the country quarantined like Israel, or went about business as usual like Sweden, coronavirus peaked and subsided in the exact same way. In the exact, same, way. His graphs show that all countries experienced seemingly identical coronavirus infection patterns, with the number of infected peaking in the sixth week and rapidly subsiding by the eighth week.
Continued on Page 49
#1
"The numbers simply do not support quarantine or economic closure."
We saw this from the very beginning, with the ONLY reliable data set that's been produced to date, the "ideal incubation environment" that was the self-imposed 24-day ship-quarantine on the Diamond Princess.
17% infection rate (iirc, 636 out of 3,711 passengers & crew) - exact same as the Germans recently found in their sample
A grand total, from these 636 infections, of 4 lab-confirmed (by WHO and CDC) deaths i.e. a 0.63% case fatality rate (95th percent confidence interval) - which is more or less what we're seeing now, again and again, around the world.
A "spike" - and then subsistence. As has has happened again and again with every Chinese-sourced virus over the past two decades. Rapid spikes, and equally rapid declines.
Based on this solid, unimpeachable data set, there was never any reason to believe that the US fatality rate would exceed 35,000 deaths under any reasonable scenario or 88,000 deaths under the most dire / doomsday scenario.
And yet we have allowed our leaders to cast aside any kind of balanced, judicious consideration and wantonly destroy the sustenance of 60 million of our brothers and sisters. Madness.
When will we bring an end to this gross incompetence?
#2
A look at stats at worldometer shows that the perfessor cherry-picking his data.
p.s. There are no "Yitzhak Ben Israel" on the lists of TAU faculty. There is Prof. Isaac Ben-Israel who is Maj. General (ret), head of Israeli Space Agency & professor in the Pol. Sci. faculty.
The only other Ben Israel is Ruth who's emeritus professor in Law Faculty.
#4
The link in TownHall article is to an article in Hebrew (which could've been written by Isaac Ben-Israel) which "proves" that coronavirus infection growth is not exponential. We know it's not exponential - it has an exponential phase.
To summarize: there's no bigger shitshow (😎) than an expert who doesn't realize he's outside his area of expertise.
#5
BLUF: NYC authorities' incompetence accounts for most of the damage we have seen in this country. First, they're very likely overcounting COVID as the cause of death. Second, they have almost certainly caused about 75% as many ADDITIONAL DEATHS -- ca. 3,000 total -- in NYC through April 11 by neglecting other urgent care needs during this time. Note that even with overcounting, COVID deaths account only about 55-60% of the increase in NYC fatalities vs prior years.
Longer version:
The CDC helpfully benchmarks each state's total 2020 fatalities vs its average total fatalities at the same point for the 2017-2019 period. Not one state shows a significant increase above the benchmark percentage of '100' for its year to date total deaths.
How can this be happening during a pandemic? Is the CDC instructing hospital pathologists to re-classify pneumonia deaths as COVID?
Also, the CDC helpfully breaks out New York City separately from the rest of New York State. There we do indeed see a spike vs the three-year benchmark: 163% of average or ca 7,000 additional deaths. But COVID only accounts for 4,000 deaths.
So that means NYC, in fighting COVID, has caused an additional 3,000 deaths -- most likely because, per Columbia's Dr Irwin Redlener, director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness, “[People] may be dying because of reduced care for other non-COVID diseases” like diabetes, heart attacks or other chronic conditions. “Those to me, should be somehow tallied as we’re looking at the death toll of COVID.”
IOW, NYC's panicked and incompetent response to COVID has almost certainly caused almost as many deaths from neglect of other conditions -- 3,000 additional deaths from non-COVID vs 4,000 COVID.
Also, we know that NY State health authorities in December 2019 were predicting an enormous rise in flu cases and flu deaths in NYC in 2020 vs 2017-2019. How many non-COVID influenza deaths have been wrongly coded in NYC as COVID?
CDC itself notes that "COVID-19 deaths may ... be classified or defined differently in various reporting and surveillance systems. Death counts in this report include ... deaths where COVID-19 is listed as a 'presumed' or 'probable' cause.")
Are the NYC authorities over-counting COVID as a 'presumed' cause?
Also look at California, which should be the epicenter given its 100,000+ travelers to and from China throughout December-February and its enormous homeless population and creaking urban hospital system, per CDC has registered a grand total of ... 354 deaths.
In a population of ca. 40 million, not even 1,000 deaths. For this the economy of California has already been cratered. Millions of California families are facing ruin now.
ScrappleFace via Instapundit
A growing movement of liberty-loving Americans has started to rise up and demand that government immediately lift COVID-19 pandemic stay-at-home orders so people can return to the soul-sucking dead-end jobs that previously had them fondling a revolver, or thinking about driving for Uber.
"We will not be held down any longer by these repressive, un-Constitutional restrictions on our freedoms," said one township man, who declined to give his name out of fear of losing his mid-level management position at an out-bound call center (from which he’s currently furloughed).
Stay-at-home orders and other restrictions on public gatherings and movement, he said, are "just a foot in the door for the authoritarian statists who dream of stripping us of the right to spend 40 hours per week doing something we hate so we can get vested in our 401(k) plan and eventually quit our jobs and live our dreams, you know...some day."
[Red State] - Last night, Donald Trump’s team unveiled its guidelines for states that wished to re-open their economies to the working public. It is, without a doubt, a step in the right direction, as it gives us a clear plan and allows for local control of the move to get American citizens safely back to work.
Of course, for some people, it is either simply not fast enough or just a reminder that it didn’t have to happen at all, public health experts be damned. Backseat drivers of Civilization
One of the more alarming opinions you see floating around social media, often shouted through the megaphones of pundits who have largely ignored or attacked the experts, is that the illnesses and deaths we would see from reopening the economy immediately are a necessary risk we have to take for the greater good. The people who make statements like this would also call themselves "pro-life," though sacrificing human life and calling it a victory for the economy is truthfully no better than sacrificing the unborn and calling it a victory for women’s rights. You are dehumanizing some for the greater good of all.
The idea that you are "destroying America" by not opening the country up immediately is absurd. The country has survived worse, and will continue to survive despite this.
...At no point has any sane person suggested keeping the economy shut down forever. That is as impossible as expecting life to continue the way it did before this virus was unleashed on us. I’ve said before that we need a plan, and it appears the Trump team once again listened to their health and economic experts and developed a good one.
We can’t just open up overnight. That would create an even worse surge of infection than we’ve already gone through once. To say "Damn the risks!" and go full speed into re-opening right now is reckless and will result in more getting sick and dying.
And, yes, I am fully aware that recessions and depressions will also result in human suffering. This is not an ideal situation. But the risks of causing this virus to surge again outweigh the risks of the economy staying closed another two weeks. Americans can survive that, and we can rebuild from that. We can’t rebuild from a plague devastating our population, which is what we risk.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 13:09 Comments ||
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#2
To paraphrase grom, I'm tired of hearing about how lives are more important than the economy. These unborn children need to get working on the huge debt we are leaving them...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/17/2020 13:17 Comments ||
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#3
Young people have to LIVE their lives, too, what little time there is on this planet...6-12 months is a good chunk out of one's adult life.
#5
^Nonsense. Did WWII produced a command economy? In fact, since the current POTUS is republican - who's going to support his introduction (assuming he tries) of command economy?
#8
I wouldn't want impatient and paranoid conservative yahoos braving it in the face of the still powerful vector, just to ensure their liberties are not taken away. Especially when the liberals are safely ensconced in their homes.
As the article says, you have survived worse; and life will go on for everybody despite the economy taking a hit. Even if every friday night won't be pizza night, people won't be lying in hospitals and makeshift ICUs at the mercy of machines and experimental meds. If the virus hits the economy, you can rebuild it. If it tilts the demographic in favour of clever little buggers who screamed Trump was dirty but stayed indoors, in this crucial election year no less... think about it.
#9
^Nonsense. Did WWII produced a command economy?
Only look at Michigan to see the desire to arbitrarily classify what is important and what is not, what you can have access to and what you can not. That is a command economy.
#10
Correct me if I'm wrong P2k, but it didn't start in the 50es (i.e., after the war). If fact, until the oil crisis of 1973, Detroit (IMO - I used to own Oldsmobile Delta 1972) made the best cars in the world.
#13
Totalitarians will take advantage of emergencies.
Not in USA? Never let a crises go to waste?
Going back to January living right now! is a really bad idea, likely to water hammer the medical piping and possibly blowing the whole system.
Now what is making people jumpy, and this goes for the my rights! aspect as well, is the finish line keeps getting moved.
Recovery goals are conspicuously absent in mass media. Add a lot of inconsistent directives - every apocalypse story every has a chapter about seeds, but seeds are non-essential? Declarations that Easter church gatherings are illegal is tough enough, but made by the people who have been consistent in their mocking of Cross Worshipers, and then seeing state troopers sicced on them? Makes you wonder if they went straight state trooper, or asked to sheriff to get involved and sheriff declined? Cell phone tracking without probably cause is still an issue even if 'unnecessary travel' is against the law. Am I guilty unless access to my phone data proves I'm innocent?
#15
/\ You know that I think? I think some people don't handle confinement very well.
Unfortunately it would appear you are correct, and I am one of them. I am however, complying with the guidelines/directives, etc. There are worse situations under which one could be forced to live, I can assure you.
#16
I agree, just pointing out what's in the road. Quarantine and distancing are historically proven acts to defend against outbreaks, and a good call here.
Lot of people not good at self quarantine, nigh self discipline, especially those young immortals. Mentioned in another tread; friend was on a turkey hunt, was four hours into it when a car from a problem county some 150 miles away pulled up to his hunt, got out, and started taking pictures of the turkeys and thus ruining the hunt.
I think they were lucky to only get an ass chewing, not only ruining the hunt but their county tag was identified, bringing their crap out here.
Also, if these city children go off one of our dirt roads, its my ass and friends who have to cut them out of their car, face to face cheek to cheek.
[PJ] The politically-correct crowd has claimed another scalp.
Quietly and without fanfare, the makers of Land O Lakes butter rubbed out the lovely maiden that was the centerpiece of the company's logo for 100 years.
In the middle of the logo now is a big zero.
That stands for the amount of sense that it makes to get rid of a lovely image that offended few if any Native Americans, for whom it was supposedly removed.
"You know who loves being represented in American culture? According to a survey of 4000 Native Americans by NAGA, Native Americans do," the red-headed libertarian tweeted. "You know who doesn’t love Native Americans being represented in American Culture? Woke suburban white women."
#3
Just one more product I won't purchase any longer. And that's just it. Where was the outrage from the Native American community? I never heard it. Just stupid.
#7
The politically-correct crowd has claimed another scalp.
*sigh* I wish someone would explain a few things to the moron executives so desperate to be "hip" (or "woke", or whatever the hell the current equivalent is):
(1) the "politically correct" crowd consists of about five guys in their mom's basement running an army of bots.
(2) if you don't engage and just ignore them, they'll eventually move on to the next "outrage".
(3) if you give in, you're marked forever as an easy target.
(4) giving in will immediately piss off half of your customers, who may find other choices on the shelf.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[Babylon Bee] In an alarming turn of events, workers at a Wuhan research lab were seen adjusting a sign that read "92 Days Since Accidentally Releasing a Virus," taking down the 92 and replacing it with a zero.
...the twenty first century equivalent of bubonic plague, only instead of killing off a third of the population of Europe it kills 3.4 percent of those who notice they have it. It seems to be fond of the elderly, especially Iranian politicians and holy men...
[PJ] The politically-correct crowd has claimed another scalp.
