Some children are affected. But the numbers are very low as a %. 3 children in NY state might be a huge increase in Kawasaki, but it is not a substantial number from a public health perspective. We will not achieve perfection here. But millions and millions of children not having enough to eat because of an economic collapse will be more damaging than very small numbers of children getting things like Kawasaki or the blood clotting issues we've seen.
It would be wonderful not to make such determinations, but we are in a lose lose situation and you want to make the less bad choice.
As an aside, I'm sending my 6 children back to school this week and I am comfortable doing so. I do not live in the US though...
The WSJ did a great writeup on how these symptoms are actually pointing not to a respiratory virus, but a blood virus that thickens blood. This could change our entire approach to treatment.
I haven't been following this entire thread, but convenience surveys in New York and LA have indicated a death rate at or below 1%. 20% of NY had antibodies and 4% of LA - you can look at deaths to draw a connection. Even 1% is a lot of people though and the morbidity is pretty serious as well. This would be 3 million American citizens. All that said, I am in favor of targeted opening. So far children don't seem to get infected easily or spread the disease easily, so we should open schools. We should have special protocols to protect old age homes - they get hit particularly hard.
@[Danny Straus](user:5566) Oh, and the US has been subsidizing Americans for a long time. As per the article, the bottom quintile makes an average of <$5000 and received >$45,000 in transfers. The problem is that they are often locked out of making more by the risk of losing the transfers.
@Flat Broke, this brings those jobs out of the shadows and actually inverts the traditional gray market challenge. It creates an incentive to go legal for the bottom of the pile, not just the those who have scale. The benefits (reading the economic Hernando De Soto) could be huge.
@[Danny Straus](user:5566) The US 'ran out of money' a long time ago. So long as no other asset is preferred over US dollars, they can continue to print them and they will continue to have value. The more important question is what that money means. I wrote a piece about that as well...
Again, the *spending power is subsidized*. So the actual value of the job to the worker is higher than their pay rate from the company. Rather than government paying unemployment or welfare the governments pays a supplement to low-wages.
If higher value jobs are available, Americans shouldn't be doing work Chinese could.
But let's take a situation in which higher-value jobs (those Americans are worth paying > minimum wage) do not exist.
Then we have two choices:
1) Have Americans consumers pay Chinese labor while tax revenue supports the American jobless (and non-productive/fulfilled) with transfer payments because they aren't worth minimum wage
2) Have Americans pay American labor what they would pay the Chinese while tax revenue boosts their pay. The benefit is that Americans have jobs and productivity despite being worth less than minimum wage.
When economic options improve, American labor will price itself out of the lower end jobs. They won't do work worth $3/hr if they can do work worth $10/yr. Despite the lack of a minimum wage, nobody in Switzerland is making clothes (except for very high end luxury accessories).
In that case, we can either let subsidies largely disappear or we could raise thresholds and go back to the world where you could support two kids on a high-school education - as used to be the case with automotive employees. Either way, we'll have a far healthier economic ecosystem.
In 2019, unemployment among those with only a high-school education was 150% as high as it was for those with master's degrees. I'd presume more of those people would want to work, but that they aren't worth it. The spread is even larger for those with less than a high school diploma. Some number of these people can't find work because they aren't worth employing at present rates.
There is an entirely different benefit, of course: a far simpler tax system and the streamlining that would allow.
If you have a million dollars would you prefer to pay somebody $10/hr to do $3/hr in work or would you prefer to buy assets?
The answer, of course, is to buy assets. So if people are only worth $3/hr, they can't get work. Of course, the money ends up coming out of your pocket anyway - government transfers to the bottom fifth of Americans average over $45,000. People just don't work at all for the money.
This system enables you to pay $2.50/hr for $3/hr in work while bumping up the spending power of that payment so it spends like $10/hr.
Old way: No work, no fulfilling activity, still a subsidy
New way: Work, fulfilling activity and still a subsidy
Why does it cut wages? Currently, if you aren't worth minimum wage, then you will be automated, offshored or just not hired. If you are, you'll be paid that wage. The problem is 20+% of the workforce isn't worth minimum wage and another significant chunk are only worth what they are being paid because the government is paying their salaries for the next few months.
This would mean many people who have *no* wage get one - just one that is subsidized.
Going back to the Switzerland example, they have no minimum wage but very few people make less than $37,000/yr (after tax).
House prices are an entirely different issue. They are a monetary issue. Lots of cash floating around with significantly cheaper production of the goods people make leads to asset inflation. The money has to go somewhere. Very low interest rates just create more money through leverage. More money with fewer places - other than assets - to put it.
A low-salary subsidy combined with consumption tax and massive simplification of taxation systems should lead to significant real creation of goods and services. If excess cash is spun off in such a boom, house prices (or stocks or some other asset) will rise as a result.
Of course, nothing can really be predicted. That's just my analysis.
Latest Comments
Why No Democrat Will Admit The Truth About COVID-19
Some children are affected. But the numbers are very low as a %. 3 children in NY state might be a huge increase in Kawasaki, but it is not a substantial number from a public health perspective. We will not achieve perfection here. But millions and millions of children not having enough to eat because of an economic collapse will be more damaging than very small numbers of children getting things like Kawasaki or the blood clotting issues we've seen.
It would be wonderful not to make such determinations, but we are in a lose lose situation and you want to make the less bad choice.
As an aside, I'm sending my 6 children back to school this week and I am comfortable doing so. I do not live in the US though...
The WSJ did a great writeup on how these symptoms are actually pointing not to a respiratory virus, but a blood virus that thickens blood. This could change our entire approach to treatment.
Why No Democrat Will Admit The Truth About COVID-19
I haven't been following this entire thread, but convenience surveys in New York and LA have indicated a death rate at or below 1%. 20% of NY had antibodies and 4% of LA - you can look at deaths to draw a connection. Even 1% is a lot of people though and the morbidity is pretty serious as well. This would be 3 million American citizens. All that said, I am in favor of targeted opening. So far children don't seem to get infected easily or spread the disease easily, so we should open schools. We should have special protocols to protect old age homes - they get hit particularly hard.
The Road To A Post-Corona Boom - Part 1
@[Danny Straus](user:5566) Oh, and the US has been subsidizing Americans for a long time. As per the article, the bottom quintile makes an average of <$5000 and received >$45,000 in transfers. The problem is that they are often locked out of making more by the risk of losing the transfers.
The Road To A Post-Corona Boom - Part 1
@Flat Broke, this brings those jobs out of the shadows and actually inverts the traditional gray market challenge. It creates an incentive to go legal for the bottom of the pile, not just the those who have scale. The benefits (reading the economic Hernando De Soto) could be huge.
The Road To A Post-Corona Boom - Part 1
@[Danny Straus](user:5566) The US 'ran out of money' a long time ago. So long as no other asset is preferred over US dollars, they can continue to print them and they will continue to have value. The more important question is what that money means. I wrote a piece about that as well...
talkmarkets.com/.../some-of-my-best-friends-are-economists
The Road To A Post-Corona Boom - Part 1
Again, the *spending power is subsidized*. So the actual value of the job to the worker is higher than their pay rate from the company. Rather than government paying unemployment or welfare the governments pays a supplement to low-wages.
The Road To A Post-Corona Boom - Part 1
I lay it out as a simple comparison:
If higher value jobs are available, Americans shouldn't be doing work Chinese could.
But let's take a situation in which higher-value jobs (those Americans are worth paying > minimum wage) do not exist.
Then we have two choices:
1) Have Americans consumers pay Chinese labor while tax revenue supports the American jobless (and non-productive/fulfilled) with transfer payments because they aren't worth minimum wage
2) Have Americans pay American labor what they would pay the Chinese while tax revenue boosts their pay. The benefit is that Americans have jobs and productivity despite being worth less than minimum wage.
When economic options improve, American labor will price itself out of the lower end jobs. They won't do work worth $3/hr if they can do work worth $10/yr. Despite the lack of a minimum wage, nobody in Switzerland is making clothes (except for very high end luxury accessories).
In that case, we can either let subsidies largely disappear or we could raise thresholds and go back to the world where you could support two kids on a high-school education - as used to be the case with automotive employees. Either way, we'll have a far healthier economic ecosystem.
In 2019, unemployment among those with only a high-school education was 150% as high as it was for those with master's degrees. I'd presume more of those people would want to work, but that they aren't worth it. The spread is even larger for those with less than a high school diploma. Some number of these people can't find work because they aren't worth employing at present rates.
There is an entirely different benefit, of course: a far simpler tax system and the streamlining that would allow.
The Road To A Post-Corona Boom - Part 1
If you have a million dollars would you prefer to pay somebody $10/hr to do $3/hr in work or would you prefer to buy assets?
The answer, of course, is to buy assets. So if people are only worth $3/hr, they can't get work. Of course, the money ends up coming out of your pocket anyway - government transfers to the bottom fifth of Americans average over $45,000. People just don't work at all for the money.
This system enables you to pay $2.50/hr for $3/hr in work while bumping up the spending power of that payment so it spends like $10/hr.
Old way: No work, no fulfilling activity, still a subsidy
New way: Work, fulfilling activity and still a subsidy
The Cost Of Our Coronavirus Insanity
More from the WSJ on the costs of our reaction. This just makes me want to cry...
www.wsj.com/.../coronavirus-global-food-crisis-shortages-11589385615
The Road To A Post-Corona Boom - Part 1
Why does it cut wages? Currently, if you aren't worth minimum wage, then you will be automated, offshored or just not hired. If you are, you'll be paid that wage. The problem is 20+% of the workforce isn't worth minimum wage and another significant chunk are only worth what they are being paid because the government is paying their salaries for the next few months.
This would mean many people who have *no* wage get one - just one that is subsidized.
Going back to the Switzerland example, they have no minimum wage but very few people make less than $37,000/yr (after tax).
House prices are an entirely different issue. They are a monetary issue. Lots of cash floating around with significantly cheaper production of the goods people make leads to asset inflation. The money has to go somewhere. Very low interest rates just create more money through leverage. More money with fewer places - other than assets - to put it.
A low-salary subsidy combined with consumption tax and massive simplification of taxation systems should lead to significant real creation of goods and services. If excess cash is spun off in such a boom, house prices (or stocks or some other asset) will rise as a result.
Of course, nothing can really be predicted. That's just my analysis.