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How Many People Are You Willing to Kill to Open the Economy?
Well, how many?
You tell me; How many more are going to die?
This study by Drexel University says that there would have been 233,000 more deaths if we didn’t self-quarantine.
Hmmm, let me see. “Based on models developed by epidemiologists working with the New York Times.” Now that’s a publication known for statistical prowess and unbiased scientific research. Did they also find that the virus was caused by racism? Does Drexel University not have its own statisticians and medical researchers? Why are they relying on the New York Times?
Ahh…I don’t know.
And, of course, every other model thrown at us during this fiasco has been incredibly accurate, right?
Well, no, but. . .
Does this story have any information on the methods they used to create the model? The dataset used? Who at the New York Times created the model and what their qualifications are? Who at Drexel University used the model and what their qualifications are? How about the people who reported this? Do we know if they even asked any of these questions?
No, but . . .
But it was a Scientific study released by a University, so SCIENCE!, right?
No! I mean . . .
And you can’t prove a negative, so it’s unfalsifiable. If you can’t prove it wrong, it’s got to be right. That’s the cornerstone of the scientific method, isn’t it?
I guess. Even so, if you open up, people are going to die.
And if we stay locked down, there will be no more deaths.
Of course not, don’t be silly.
So how many more if we open? You made the assertion.
I just know that Texas had more cases and more deaths the day after they opened up.
They had more cases because more people were being tested. Deaths occur an average of two weeks after diagnosis, so that has nothing to do with the loosening of restrictions.
If the economy opens up there will be more deaths!
Ok, I’ll agree with you. There will be more deaths, though you can’t say how many. And of course no one is going to die because of the economic disaster caused by the shutdown, right?
That’s a choice they make. The people who die of the virus don’t have a choice.
Are you talking about suicides?
No one has to kill themselves.
I’m sure all the depressed people out there will be glad to hear that. But I’m also talking about deaths from drug overdoses and domestic violence. Plus things like colonoscopies, mammograms, PAP smears, biopsies, CTs and MRIs are being put on hold because they’re “elective” procedures. But nobody is going to die due to a missed or delayed diagnosis, are they? And poverty doesn’t shorten life at all does it?
Okay, open the economy! You’ve just got to tell me which member of your family you are willing to sacrifice.
That’s easy. I’ll sacrifice myself to keep my kids and grandchildren from living in poverty and despair. Because I’m the person you’re trying to protect. It just seems odd that you’d throw all the “marginalized communities” under the bus to protect old rich white males like me. Thanks!
There’s just one thing I want to ask, Whoopie. You still have your job, your mansion, all your assets. Since you want poor people to suffer, what have you sacrificed to protect me?
Published in Healthcare
It’s still a good question.
Poverty certainly does exist in the USA. Often military families are forced to use food banks to get by.
Twelve million households were foreclosed on during the Great economic Collapse.
And some economists believe that we might be looking at a twelve year downturn unless someone has the ability to override ASAP the lockdowns and get Americans back up and working now. The restaurant industry looks like it will go under. Ditto things like cruises and weddings.
Mr. T: I pity the fool virus that tries to take out Boss Mongo . . .
Poverty is a relative measure in that the official definition of poverty guideline for public assistance in the United States is $12,760 for an individual $17,240 for a household of 2, HH of 3 = $21720, etc, until a household of 8 = $44,120 and then add $5,600 for every additional household member after 8.
https://aspe.hhs.gov/poverty-guidelines
My point being, yes it is difficult to live on the poverty guideline income levels particularly near larger metro areas in the US, and many living in poverty are well below the guidelines or have no income at all ….. but the “poverty” guidelines income levels as defined by the United States Department of Health and Human Services ASPC would not be poverty level income in many places in the world.
Whether or not I agree with you is not relevant – it’s what the target audience thinks. It seems that many of the people who are arguing that people must be kept in lockdown are the same people who are convinced that poverty is widespread and growing. I am arguing to their own expressed concerns. Expressed concerns that they seem to have forgotten in their obsession with the Covid-19 Wuhan virus.
Well how very elitist of you. It is true that even the poorest among us has running water, often both hot and cold. And a TV and gaming station.
But on my Meniere’s group on FB, one woman has been in absolute terror since the lockdowns occurred. People right now in big cities in “the ghetto” don’t know what to do as it is going crazy there. Do you hide in the closet till the gang coming up your sidewalk goes away? Or is it be better to break forth with loud music and hope they won’t take on a homeowner?
Spend an hour walking in that person’s shows. Just imagine being that woman and then tell me if that is how you would want to live.
Meniere’s is a disease that often takes years to diagnose. Unless you have quite a bit of financial security before it hits, you tend to end up poor. Employers find a way to fire you, as the ringing in the ears makes it impossible to hear what is being said to you. Also drop attacks – which are massive bouts of dizziness that can hit suddenly and put you on the floor without warning are another thing many employers do not want. So then the individual ends up living on $ 733 a month disability.
I essentially agreed with you:
“yes it is difficult to live on the poverty guideline income levels particularly near larger metro areas in the US, and many living in poverty are well below the guidelines or have no income at all …”
and I simply made the point that what the United States HHS officially classifies as “poverty” would not be considered poverty for billions of people living on the same planet.
But some people never miss an opportunity to win the argument which was never made.
I’m tired of the Jake Tourett’s Tapper’s “how-many-bodies?!” verbal tics. And the Leftists’ Trump criticisms of “Oh, yeah? You mean the guy who killed 90,000 people? And crushed the economy?”
Really. What would Trump’s detractors have done differently – even in hindsight – that would have made the outcome better, for either lives lost or the economy? And what would the number of deaths have been under any other president? Or governor. Or expert congressional team?
Could Biden’s team have reduced the death toll to just a thousand? Would Cuomo or Murphy have have done any better? Would Whitmer or Newsom had only one-tenth, or one hundredth, the deaths? Yes?
How? How exactly?
What would have been the better plan than Trump’s? Even in hindsight, what would excellence or even competence have looked like?
What angers me is the media/Democrat nexus pretending that they didn’t originally mock the President for shutting down travel from China, calling him racist, and telling the citizens they had nothing to worry about and go to Chinatown and go enjoy Mardi Gras. Now they’re trying to peddle the lie that the President was slow to respond even though he saw the threat long before they did and was criticized for it.
What angers me is the media/Democrats giving Cuomo a tongue bath even as he is directly responsible for thousands of deaths, while blaming the President for those same deaths.
They hope to memory-hole their own awful response to the Commie Flu. They think we don’t see it.
No it doesn’t.
Poverty is a condition characterized by increased risk of death due to infectious disease, exposure, or hunger – That is my working definition.
Here is one from Heritage.
Note they leave off the infectious disease part.
The money ‘graphs
A 2 month reduction in economic activity did not end these things.
What does this even mean? The whole industry gone the way of the buggy whip manufacturers?
Wow, look at all those shopping results! Nope, people still make buggy whips – and people will still choose not to eat homemade goods.
I don’t think you get it. Reports show that even if all the lockdown restrictions were lifted tomorrow, then some 40 to 60% of people would not be willing to eat in a restaurant. Of course this is due to how the media has made COVID intot he scariest thing out there ever.
Many legit restaurants often barely get by. Some do spectacularly, but often this is due to being money laundering operations for drugs. (Not at all uncommon in many places like NYC, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Chicago, and other places near airports that supply point of entry for drugs.)
Anyway many of us in Northern Calif were just starting to recover from the damage done by the 2006 to 2011 economic collapse. Add in the many seasons of wildfires – aided and abetted by Jerry Brown’s ridiculous policy of waiting til a fire was totally out of control to call in the airplanes equipped with water tankers, and you have entire communities devastated by so much evil. On top of being burned out, people left homeless have no affordable housing available.
Yet these same people are told that the best thing for Calif would be to have more immigrants arrive here. Current state policies now encourage that. Arrive now from south of the border – you immediately gt $ 500 a month to tide you over til the economy recovers, plus food stamps, plus housing vouchers.
Although I can somewhat appreciate that people in the US do not face the desperate, floors of dirt and only three bowls in the pantry style of poverty that has gone on in Central America and Africa, there is also a type of suffering that occurs when people are wiped out due to natural disasters or sky high medical bills presented by medical facilities who have mis-diagnosed the patients. You are not immune. You may think you are, but I have known some fabulously well to do people who have lost everything due to circumstances beyond their control.
So if you ever do lose everything, I hope in your grief someone is there to cheerfully remind you that at least you have running water.
But what about the day after tomorrow? And the day after that?
And even if the percentage stayed the same for all time, 40 percent of the restaurant industry would probably survive.
Supply and demand would see to it that there were sufficient restaurants for me to eat in. The invisible hand works, if you let it.
So let it.
If I lost everything, I probably wouldn’t even have running water – temporarily. Then I would get up, dust myself off – find a place with running water and get back to work.
But in my grief, I would be happy for someone to share a ray of hope.
Beats all the Debbie Downers out there.
I’d guess for the more reluctant ones, it’s going to sort of go like this:
Do I know anyone who has eaten out in a restaurant? (Yes) (No)
Did they eat out 10-14 days ago? (Yes) (No)
Are they sick and/or dead yet? (Yes) (No)
The more people they know who can answer ‘yes’ to the first two questions and ‘no’ to the third, the more likely they are to decide to dip a toe back into the restaurant waters by sometime in early June.