Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
I’ve read claims on the web that the job losses in the US were due to the virus itself, and to the fear of the virus making people cut back on activities. The claims are that the job loss is more from that, and not so much a result of the American Lockdown. So I thought I’d take a look at the weekly new claims for unemployment insurance. Of course, the different states have been hit differently by the changes. Here’s the graph of weekly new unemployment claims for one of the least affected states, Oregon.
Figure 1. Weekly new unemployment claims, Oregon, since 1999. “Usual” refers to the one-year period preceding the record rise.
I saw that and I thought something was wrong with the program I’d written to download and graph the data. But nope. In fact, every single state’s new unemployment claims looks just like that. I said YIKES! I’d heard that things were bad, but I had no idea things were that bad.
Now, there are a few interesting things about Figure 1. First, you can see the results of the 2007-2009 global financial crisis in the increased unemployment peaking in 2009. We thought unemployment was bad at that time … and it was.
Since then, new unemployment claims had been steadily decreasing.
You can also see that this increase in Oregon unemployment was not caused by the coronavirus. Nor was it caused by fears of the coronavirus. It was a result of the American Lockdown.
Finally, Oregon is doing better than almost all other states, and it is still seeing eleven times the number of unemployed as was typical for the previous year. Wow. That’s the good news?
Next, here’s a state from the middle of the pack, California. It has seen a seventeen-fold increase in unemployment, with over two million people out of work in California alone.
Figure 2. Weekly new unemployment claims, California, since 1999. “Usual” refers to the one-year period preceding the record rise.
Just as in Oregon, the jump in unemployment was sudden, and coincided with the American Lockdown.
Here’s the truly crazy part. There have been just under a thousand deaths in California. Bending the curve didn’t save them, nor was it supposed to save them. Instead, it was supposed to have delayed the hospitalizations and deaths so they hit over weeks rather than days. We don’t know, and may never know, the extent of that delay if any.
We do know that most of the deaths are among the group you might call “at death’s door”.
So in California, we’ve thrown at least two million people out of work in order to delay, but not prevent, the deaths of a thousand or so people, most of whom had other serious illnesses.
Am I the only person who thinks that making two million people jobless, merely to delay but not prevent a thousand deaths, is a bad deal for society?
Let me close my look at state-level data with a state that you’d think would have seen increased unemployment from the virus itself, and not just by governmental action. Between fear of flying, fear of crowds, and fear of the virus itself, I expected Hawaii to show a different pattern from the two above. Here’s their unemployment record:
Figure 3. Weekly new unemployment claims, Hawaii, since 1999. “Usual” refers to the one-year period preceding the record rise.
To my surprise, no increase in unemployment due to the virus itself. But once again unemployment is way, way up, thirty times the usual amount Normally Hawaii sees four thousand new claims every three weeks, as they saw right up to the week ending March 21. But now they have over a hundred thousand unemployed in three weeks and counting … madness.
Finally, here’s the corresponding graph for the entire US.
Figure 4. Weekly new unemployment claims, US, since 1999. “Usual” refers to the one-year period preceding the record rise.
Twenty-one times the normal three-week count of new unemployment claims … and fifteen million unemployed.
But wait, as they say on TV, “There’s More!”
As with all such data, it takes a bit of time for the Fed to collect it and post it up. The most recent data on all of the graphs is the most recent data the Fed has posted—I pull the data from the Fed site for each graph as I create it. That data is for the week ending April 4th. I’m writing this on the 18th of April. So there are two weeks of unposted data up to the present.
We have to assume that the new unemployment claims won’t be back to pre-lunacy levels any time soon. During the week ending two weeks ago (2020-04-04 in Figure 4) there were Six. Million. New. Unemployment. Claims.
And there were another six million the week before that. For that two weeks, the US was losing jobs at a rate of almost a million more unemployed EVERY DAY!
So perhaps ten million still in the pipeline, 15 million filed claims already. That’s 25 million unemployed …
The human carnage in that number, twenty-five million, the wrecked dreams, the failed businesses, the broken relationships, the stress on marriages, the increase in suicides and domestic violence …
There are about 130 million people working full-time in the US. As of two weeks ago, governmental action had thrown more than ten percent of them out of work, with more since then.
This sudden spike in joblessness is totally unprecedented. It needs to be stopped immediately. Hundreds of thousands more unemployed every single day that this madness continues is simply not acceptable. Too much pain, far too little gain.
Here’s my plan. You had to know I have a plan. Here’s my plan.
Whenever any governmental official forcibly throws people out of work by unilaterally making their business illegal, that official and everyone under their purview should immediately lose all salary, benefits, housing, insurance, transportation, and any other benefits.
Now I can hear you thinking, “How can Willis justify that?” Simple. It’s under the same doctrine they use. They’ve divided human activities into two groups. Only one of these groups is permitted. The other is forbidden.
Of course, everyone making a living doing something which is now forbidden is suddenly thrown out of their job. Wife and husband work for a now-forbidden company? Sorry … go home and fight with each other.
And to return to the question of how I could justify throwing all those government people out of work?
The answer is in the fact that the two groups of activities, one permitted and one forbidden, the government calls these two groups “Essential” and “Non-Essential” activities.
I rest my case.
So. What should we do?
I say put on any and all health and sanitary regulations we can think of that do not pull the wheels off of the economy. We don’t have to destroy the economy in order to slow the progress of the virus.
I say every part of the economy depends on every other part. As a result, excessive “staging” will retard the resurgence of the economy.
I say that “staging” is more judgment calls by the unqualified that will still outlaw people’s jobs.
I say that every day that the pluted bloatocrats governmental officials dither and sit on their thumbs and spin, more than half a million more people lose their jobs. Unconscionable.
I say that another layer of specialists and meetings and committees is simply putting or keeping people out of work.
And as a result of all of that, I say what I’ve said from the start …
End the American lockdown now. Not next month. Not next week. Now. Not in “stages”. Not in “phases”. Now.
Lots of talk about May 1. Gotta love the symbolism. May Day. I hope we’re back to work well before that.
But if not, let me suggest a peaceful workers revolt, the one where on May 1st we all just go forward to work. Not back to work. Forward to work. Everyone goes to their usual place of work on May 1st. No fanfare. Wear masks. Social distance. Wear gloves. Testing where appropriate. Whatever you need. And go forward to work.
Will that lead to flareups of coronavirus? I suspect so. However, future flareups will happen whether we go to work all at once or bit by bit. That virus will not go gentle into that good night no matter what we do …
Protip for those in charge. Historically, and for good reasons, in epidemics governments have used extraordinary powers to quarantine the sick. This was done to slow the spread of the disease, just as we’re attempting to do today.
Currently, however, it’s the healthy who are getting quarantined …
And to return to today’s point—quarantining the sick doesn’t destroy the economy and drive 25 million people out of work. Here are some of the measures cities used during the Spanish Flu:
Lots of things we can do to flatten the curve without flattening the economy in the process.
Finally, a plea for some perspective on this pandemic. As pandemics go, it’s not a rock star. Here’s a comparison.
I’ve lived through two pandemics with far higher death counts, and today they are hardly even remembered …
My best to you all, stay healthy, stay well, smell the flowers …
w.
The Small Print: When you comment please quote the exact words you are discussing. It avoids endless misunderstandings.
Willis,
Please check your units on the left-hand axis of in figures 1-4 “New Unemployment Claims (millions).” The axis number of 10000 becomes 10000 million or 10,000,000,000. There aren’t that many people on the planet.
It’s interesting that many hours have passed and 178 comments have been posted and this is the first to call attention to the error.
(there may be others but searching the comments on “million” — which was how I found this one –returned only this comment.)
I scanned comments & didn’t see it either. Surprised I was the 1st.
PS – the x-axis label on figure 4 may be correct.
“You can also see that this increase in Oregon unemployment was not caused by the coronavirus. Nor was it caused by fears of the coronavirus. It was a result of the American Lockdown.”
Jumping to Conclusions maybe?? Are you that guy in Office Space that invented the game? Was Italy, Spain, France, or Belgium unemployment a result of “the American Lockdown.” Sweden only looks good likely because it’s a Northern-tier country. Sweden’s mortality rate is 2.4 standard deviations above the average of the northern-latitude countries. Telegraph that to the coronavirus hot zones with lockdowns in the more temperate climates.
Thanks, Farmer, fixed. Like Speed, I’m amazed it took so long for someone to notice.
w.
Izaak Walton, April 10, 8:02 PM: You need to state explicitly what value you place on a human life before you can ever start to claim that the cure is worse than the disease.
My response: The cost side of cost/benefit analysis should be measured in lives, not dollars….
Izaak Walton, April 18, 6:32 PM: I still want to know what value you put on a human life?
We don’t seem to be getting anywhere here, Izaak. The benefit is lives lengthened with respect to the novel virus. The cost is lives shortened from other causes. In our original exchange, you asked:
…do you have an estimate for the number of deaths that would result from doing nothing? And how that compare with your estimates from the number of deaths due to the lockdown?
I’m afraid my response may have been unclear, but the answer is “no”, there is insufficient data to make a reliable estimate for either option. But the possibility of an irrational lockdown causing more casualties than it saves, seems to me entirely plausible. Various pathways to this outcome have been mentioned in current discussions.
I wrote before about irrational aspects of the California lockdown as they affected me: Dental work incomplete because the dentists office was closed; car with stolen plates grounded because the DMV offices are closed; follow up on melanoma with respect to suspicious lesion postponed for a couple of months.
I can now add another example. LA County schedules hazardous household waste roundups at various times and places throughout the year. Having waited for months, I loaded up the trunk of my car yesterday and drove to the advertised site here in Azusa. Only to find that the pickup had been cancelled.
This cancellation is so ridiculous it is almost funny. If the readers have never participated in one of these roundups, let me explain. First, you’re not allowed to get out of your car. The material you are getting rid of is to be in the trunk. You just pop the trunk the sanitation workers, clad in their own protective clothing, unload it, and you drive out. The closest you come to anybody is when they hand you a survey through the window on your way in, and pick it up on the way out. The survey could be easily discontinued. The only significant effect of this cancelling the collection is to put more people out of work.
In the meantime, I’ll be driving around with a trunkload of hazardous household waste.
Is everybody stupid? don’t answer that, I know they are. Shut down the economy and you get job losses. There is no language that you use can rationalize this and come up with any other answer than, you shut the damn thing down.
http://ncov.mohw.go.kr/bdBoardList_Real.do?brdId=1&brdGubun=12&ncvContSeq=&contSeq=&board_id=&gubun=board_id=&gubun=
The reason for job losses is an American concept of “at will” employment, that is companies can fire employees whenever they want. It is obvious that pandemics is such e moment. So if you live in a place with “at will” employment be ready to get fired if anything goes bad.
Wrong. Businesses need good employees to make the business work for the owner. They don’t fire people just because they can. Now, if you are a marginal employee working just hard enough to get by and not get fired, then you can be replaced by a better employee, which happens with or without any kind of crisis. In such a case, everyone wins except the marginal employee who brought the firing upon them self. And that is the reason “at will” employment works so well. Dead weight employees do not last very long.
Due to “at will” employment the employees firing is the easiest-to-make cost cut possible. Especially due to legal reasons. All other alternatives are more expansive, more prolonged and can end up with a costly court battle.
For example during a lockdown it would make the most sense to get rid of paying rent in locations that are locked down anyway as the primary way to cut costs for corporations. But the real estate marked does not have the “at will” clauses enshrined by laws, that would make it possible for tenants to get rid of lease at their will. So any such attempt would end up with a court battle and a possible huge loss.
Same with let’s say intellectual property and licensing fees – no “at will” suspension of license fees, even if you don’t use the software due to current circumstances, or give up on licensing and pay a penalty. Same with time-constrained utility deals, telecom deals etc. – where you sing for N years, and the only way to get rid before the term in a deal i via paying a penalty fee.
Thus firing employees in “at will” legislation becomes the only legal way to quickly lower costs without paying any penalty fees, going to court etc. So it is used exactly for that purpose, as the first measure.
TomR
Are you suggesting that businesses not have a legal method of quickly reducing their expenses in an emergency, thereby risking going bankrupt, and not being able to provide employment for the employees they would have retained with the alternative?
From the article: “You can also see that this increase in Oregon unemployment was not caused by the coronavirus. Nor was it caused by fears of the coronavirus. It was a result of the American Lockdown.”
The American Lockdown was the result of fears of the coronavirus.
A must watch judge janine minutes ago https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhQM6NBzTW4
You are right, she covers just about all of it.
Yep, she nailed it.
From the article: “Am I the only person who thinks that making two million people jobless, merely to delay but not prevent a thousand deaths, is a bad deal for society?”
You didn’t know how many deaths would result from the Wuhan virus when it first appeared. It’s easy to criticize “after-the-fact”.
You wouldn’t be saying anything if the Wuhan virus had killed 500,00 Californians by now.
When the virus first appeared you didn’t know whether it was that lethal or not. Noone did. Only a fool would assume the Wuhan virus was not very deadly when it first appeared. President Trump is not a fool. His American Lockdown was the right course of action. Your criticism based on the number of deaths known now is missing the point.
Any sane leader would have done social distancing under the circumstances. Monday-morning quarterbacking of this issue is getting a little bit ridiculous. And it’s not helpful because it misses the point and confuses and stresses people unnecessarily.
Thanks, Tom. I fear you missed my message, likely my lack of clarity. Let me give it another shot.
It is entirely possible to take a number of strong medical actions to slow the virus without pulling the wheels off of the economy. That’s the goal—take all possible actions, but for heaven’s sake, DON’T DESTROY THE ECONOMY, duh …
The first of these actions is to test, contact trace, and quarantine people with contagious infections. We’re doing it backwards—we’re quarantining the HEALTHY instead of the SICK.
The next is to strongly encourage the wearing of masks in public. Where I live it’s a new county ordinance. I think that sucks, seems like overkill, but there it is.
And given keeping physical social distance, with those and other interventions the economy can go forwards. I gave a list of possible interventions that don’t destroy the economy in the head post.
w.
“It is entirely possible to take a number of strong medical actions to slow the virus without pulling the wheels off of the economy. That’s the goal—take all possible actions, but for heaven’s sake, DON’T DESTROY THE ECONOMY, duh”
Well, we don’t know that we have destroyed our economy with the actions taken yet, now do we. Although Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats are trying their best to throw a monkey wrench into the works.
I think we are in good shape with the economy considering the circumstances, and if we get back up and running here in the next few weeks and months, then we are going to be fine.
I was a little bit concerned about my previous post where I mentioned “fools” and got to thinking maybe you might think that was directed at you, but it was not. I certainly don’t consider you a fool and you have never advocated “rolling the dice” with a new virus, so that statement did not apply to you, but I just wanted to make sure you knew that. I have great respect for your opinion and love reading your posts where I learn something new just about every time.
I do think it is important not to undermine the basic premise of the lockdown using comparisons of numbers of flu victims verses numbers of Wuhan virus victims. And by focusing on those differences, it casts doubt on the lockdown mechanism in people’s minds, and in this situation where people are already stressed, I don’t think it is a good idea to put these doubts in their minds causing them to think they are not doing the right thing by social distancing.
The unknown infectiousness of the disease and its lethality is the reason for the lockdown. The difference between the flu and Wuhan virus is a separate issue, which should not be conflated with the primary reason for the lockdown.
If another unknown virus appears, could we handle it differently than the way we handled this one? Yes, and no, We are currently putting in place a mechanism to combat unknown viruses. Everything we need that we were short of at the begiinning of this pandemic is being ramped up quickly to the point that in the near future we are going to have all the medical equipment we need and we will have all the testing we need to combat a new virus right out of the gate. I imagine a box of N95 masks will be a staple in most people’s homes in the future, just in case.
But, we still have to assume an unknown virus is very infectious and very lethal until we can determine otherwise, and it might be necessary to socially distance again in the future. But, if that happens, society will have had experience of doing this, and the quarantine may only last a short time because we will be prepared by that time, and if our economy recovers nicely after this Wuhan virus incident, then people will have confidence in this type of lockdown action in the future, seeing it as necessary and temporary and successful.
Maybe I’m missing something, but it seems to me the solution is simple. Those people with the factors likely to increase their potential of dying from the virus should continue to shelter in place, those who are afraid should not go to work and those who are ready, willing and able to work, should.
Sounds so simple.
It’s important to isolate and prevent introduction of the virus into nursing homes and hospitals for that example. Fast anti-body screening would be a very useful tool.
We are just doing what China set us up to do. They shut down, set the precedent. Then they fed numbers to their lackeys in academia to make absurd charts showing 500,000 brits and 2,200,000 Americans might die. Their lackeys in the media fed those charts to the people. The “experts” all of which love them some communism set Trump up to force him to give guidance to shut down the economy to flatten the curve and save the healthcare system. Once it was proven that the healthcare system was adequate and we could reopen, they moved the goalpost to preventing deaths until September.
China is in control and will remain in control. They are the major nation on the planet still open for business.
Sweden did not lock down, it is a smaller nation, and we are basically following their path. Which means the lock down did not save us anything.
Looking at our elected representatives on TV, they don’t seem to look any worse lately. I guess that the arts of makeup and of hairdressing are essential on thet level.
This lock down was ass backwards. It should have been lock down the elderly and compromised, and allow the economy to continue, since now the cure is most definitely worse than the disease. A lot of the pre-mature deaths have been from carelessly operated seniors/retirement and old folks homes. Much more care and attention should have been focused there beginning mid Feb. This is one of the big lessons we need to learn from this. It would also help for every normal flu season.
This will be what we should learn from this going forward, is that locking the relevant affected potential victims out of harms way, (seniors and vulnerable) and ensure that they don’t become infected. Yes, that may cost something as well, but it is far less than destroying the economy and all the healthy people for no good reason. We never get back much of this lost opportunity that has disappeared forever now. How many years will it take to recover, and we are all less well off economically as the increase in money supply will just be devalued from our accumulated savings. There will be the cause of future intense inflation from this, and we will all be losers forever because of the following of experts.
Many of us said this very thing here 4-6 weeks ago, before they locked the economy down. I know I am high risk, so I have acted appropriately and locked myself away in the great wide open, under blue skies a 100 miles from most people.
President Trump got bamboozled by his experts, but when you rely on the narrow focus of experts, this is what you get. He will have an out though, because he did what the majority of experts and politicians recommended, which was to lock the economy down. Not much political opposition to what has happened either, so President Trump won’t wear this long term. He was damned if he did, and damned if he didn’t. Let’s learn from this. We can’t just cut off our nose to spite our face every time a significant crisis comes along.
Earthling2
You stated, “It should have been lock down the elderly and compromised, …” It is not the place of government to force well people into ‘house arrest’ with the threat of institutional confinement. The government has a responsibility to protect the weak and vulnerable from those who are, or might be, a threat to their well-being. Now, any rational person in the high-risk category would take precautions to keep themselves well. It is the responsibility of government to provide information, to all, on the risks present, and to make suggestions on behavior to minimize that risk, particularly for the most vulnerable. I don’t want a government that is prepared to shoot me to keep me from hurting myself.
The government mandates working conditions that it is incumbent on employers to comply with, such as providing Personal Protective Equipment for employees, providing hazard and safety training, and having first aid and respirators available, as appropriate. The government doesn’t have the right to forbid people from working in hazardous conditions, only to set standards and enforcement that minimizes the risk to employees. It is the government’s duty to go after criminals, not to lock up their potential victims.
Nor sure I understand your point Clyde, other than the choice of words regarding being locked down, in regards to nursing and retirement homes which Willis was relating to the economy and majority of healthy people being locked up under mass quarantine. Up/down, don’t know that it matters about choice of words in this matter as what I was saying is keep the elderly and frail at risk in the nursing homes out of harms way by not exposing them to the virus. They are the demographic risk group getting hammered by this plague, being vulnerable with both age and comorbidities. That should have been a much easier task to isolate that smaller demographic than the entire population. Much more easier than tanking the economy and tens of millions of people out of work and having to go on relief and and now the extra QE money supply issues going forward. Maybe I misunderstood your point, or you misunderstood mine.
Willis: Thank you again for your thoughtful comments. I must admit, however, that while I usually look forward to your missives because they generally are reflective of the world as it is and certainly anchored to your own very interesting experiences, the following “challenges” that notion….
You say:
”
And as a result of all of that, I say what I’ve said from the start …
End the American lockdown now. Not next month. Not next week. Now. Not in “stages”. Not in “phases”. Now.”
Ok. My initial response to this is…what universe are you occupying where you think that this is a possible action right now, here, in the United States, with the current 380 million odd inhabitants (no substitutions allowed..:))? I relish many of the posts and (some of) the comments on WUWT because I think they generally adhere to knowledge and actions that might actually exist, or at least be plausible. We are in the midst of a group panic. The sheep smell (or think they smell) a wolf. They (we) are not going to just settle down and keep eating the grass no matter what you and I might think is a more rational action. Calling people who are panicking the equivalent of “stupid” (my word, not yours) will not reduce the panic. Panic always subsides (or at least quiets down until the next sniff of “wolf” :)). The key is to be part of the solution…and that solution is to minimize the damage the panic creates. Once we are in a grazing situation again, we can effectively work on mitigating the next panic.
Two suggestions:
1) Don’t effectively call people who are in a panic “stupid” (again, MY word, NOT yours). It doesn’t help. Think of how we can mitigate the panic damage, and reduce the level of panic. I think we do that by acknowledging that we really don’t have a good idea of what is going on. Is there a wolf, or not? We reduce the fear causing the panic not by declaring there is no monster under the bed, but by coaxing the “panicee” to perhaps peak under the bed….with somebody holding their hand. We have to acknowledge that our flashlight is weak however….
2) Once grazing has resumed, then we can engage is meaningful debate about how we 8 billion or so inhabitants of earth can deal with the fear of the unknown. I think we do this by lobbying and teaching and mentoring that not having an answer is not always a bad thing, and thus avoided.
I reiterate a previous post I made. I make a personal appeal to you Willis. You don’t know me from Adam. I only know a bit about your from your writings. I ask you to take the following seriously as one rational being to another:
“Hi Willis
Thank you again for a thoughtful missive.
I will be frank, however, that the most valuable “take away” (for me) from your discussion is not the details of your position, but in the differences between your discussion and the other interesting missives of Christopher Monckton, David Middleton, Dr Roy Spencer, Eric Worrall…and others that I have missed. Add Dr Fauci and Dr Birx. Certainly not an all inclusive list by any means…just some of the most obvious people I have paid some attention to.
I will admit right up front that I do not “believe” there is any clear “right” answer(s) to dealing with Covid-19 disease. It is a chaotic mix of poorly understood biology, combined with intrinsically chaotic politics, with a large measure of ego thrown in. In other words, a typical human reaction to any problem dealing with disease.
If I were in charge, my first action would be to lock the above mentioned folks in a room and LISTEN to them for a couple days. A moderator might be nice to minimize bloodshed (:)). I would be focusing on what the differences are between their various positions. From this I think one could draw useful information about what we don’t know. This then would lead to a slightly better ability to understand what we do know. From there, I think one could begin to formulate an incrementally “better” way forward.
I harbor no illusions of some binary solution here. The most honest assessment is: It’s complicated, and I really have very little idea of what is going one, and therefore I have very little real ability to manage a path forward. This is the intrinsic status of humanity, but I do think we make incremental progress. There are, after all, nearly 8 billion of us, and we clearly live longer than we used to. Some measure of progress (to some…)”
Regards,
Ethan Brand
My previous comment is very general in nature. I provide below a specific example of my version of peeking under the bed. To all WUWT adherents concerned about “lock downs” in your state (or country), follow the bread crumbs and try to understand the legal basis of the “lock downs”, and specifically how you might lobby to improve things before the next panic.
Comment I wrote to my local Michigan Representative, Daire Rendon:
”
Dear Representative Rendon
Thank you for your reply.
I have two comments:
1) Current situation (ie Covid-19) Emergency. As you note, the EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT ACT Act 390 of 1976
explicitly requires the approval by both houses of the legislature to approve the Governors ability to continue a state of
disaster or emergency beyond 28 days. An additional 14 days has been approved (expire on April 30). I will highly
encourage both houses (and you specifically) to not approve any additional time without explicit agreement from the
Governor to reign in some of the more egregious elements of the last stay at home order. I do note that the
construction of 30.403 only vests the legislature with the authority to approve an extension of the state of
disaster/emergency and does not vest the legislature with any of the executive powers/responsibilities associated with
the declaration. Messy. Once you have granted an extension, regardless of any stated desires or requirements
pertaining to the extension, the Governor continues to enjoy the ability to do as she pleases within the overarching
purpose of Act 390 and Act 302 (more on this on my second comment). In other words, however the legislature might
want to reign in the governor, once an extension is granted, she is perfectly entitled by law to ignore such restrictions.
Good luck!
2) Future changes to Act 390 and 302. I think changes to the two Acts is clearly needed. Overall, the two are
somewhat in conflict due to overlapping purposes. Act 302 should be revoked (but I suspect is was not because of the
firearms element in item (3). Act 390 should be revised to provide for some level of legislative input into executive
action after the initial declaration period has expired. Obviously this is fraught with problems. The overall purpose of
390 and 302 is to provide for immediate and unimpeded capability to deal with emergencies. For the vast majority of
cases we can all deal with the inconsistencies and problems for short term declarations. The problems rapidly escalate
with longer term problems. I might suggest that 390 be amended to mandate some sort of executive/legislative council
to approve and or oversee executive actions as a optional condition for declaration extension. As an alternative, perhaps
allowing for a super majority (60%?) vote by both houses to override specific actions by the executive. At any rate any
change to 302 and 390 will be difficult as it deals with two messy areas, Emergencies, and Executive Power. I encourage
you to lobby for these kind of changes in the long run…I expect that the only circumstance that would allow such
changes would be Republican control of both houses and the executive…a situation I am sure will eventually return to at
some point in the future.
You have a really difficult job. Thank you for all your hard work!
Regards,
Ethan Brand”
This was followed by another comment from more research:
“Dear Representative Rendon
Pursuant to my last email, I found the following law: DECLARATION OF STATE OF ENERGY EMERGENCY (EXCERPT)
Act 191 of 1982 ( which contains some logical limitations on the executive powe)r:
“10.85 Executive order, proclamation, or directive issued by governor; rescission or amendment; duration; continuation
for extended period; dissemination; notification of legislature.
Sec. 5.
(1) The governor may issue an executive order, proclamation, or directive having the force and effect of law to
implement this act. The governor may rescind or amend an executive order, proclamation, or directive.
(2) An executive order, proclamation, or directive issued under this act shall be effective for the duration of a state of
energy emergency as provided in section 3(2). If the legislature approves an extension of a state of energy emergency
pursuant to section 3(3), an executive order, proclamation, or directive shall continue in effect for the extended period
unless by a concurrent resolution adopted by a record roll call vote by a majority of the members elected to and serving
in each house of the legislature disapproves the executive order, proclamation, or directive, or unless the executive
order, proclamation, or directive is rescinded by the governor pursuant to subsection (1).
(3) An executive order, proclamation, or directive issued under this act shall be disseminated promptly by means
calculated to bring its contents to the attention of the general public and shall be filed promptly with the secretary of
state and the department of state police.
(4) The governor shall notify the legislature promptly of an executive order, proclamation, or directive issued under this
act.”
Given the existence of 10.85 (2), it might be a bit easier to revise 30.403 to add the same restrictions.
Regards,
Ethan Brand”
Keep asking questions, ask why people disagree, listen to their answers.
Regards,
Ethan Brand
Willis
You suggested “… a peaceful workers revolt …” I like the sentiment, but what happens when they get to their office building and find it is locked up? Or, if they are in a service industry, and customers don’t show up because they are too afraid to venture out? The business owners need indemnity from the government, and the potential customers need assurance that it is relatively safe to venture out with protective gear. The government created the problem and it is going to have to be part of the solution.
Thanks, Clyde. The gov’t should just pick a day and say “OK, May First, everyone goes forward to work. Every part of the economy depends on every other part, so all parts need to come back. Citizens, shop with gloves, masks and hand sanitizer, but shop. Don’t be stupid. Don’t touch your face. No passionate bat-sex. Avoid mass gatherings for a few months. Vulnerable groups, you know who you are, take precautions. Forwards. Let’s go to work.”
It seems that the state governments are gradually noticing that with no economy there are no taxes, duh … and the reality is setting in of nearly A MILLION NEW UNEMPLOYMENT CLAIMS EVERY DAY for the latest two weeks of record (and that’s just to April 4th).
My guess? There are and will continue to be more business deaths than deaths FROM coronavirus.
w.
Willis
I’m a former Californian, but now living in Ohio. The governor has announced that there are going to be cutbacks in government agencies to cope with the anticipated drop in taxes.
No passionate bat-sex
but passionless bat-sex is ok?
>So in California, we’ve thrown at least two million people out of work in order to delay, but not prevent, the deaths of a thousand or so people, most of whom had other serious illnesses.
That is not the reason for lock downs. Lock downs are imposed to avoid overwhelming the health facilities. Have you seen what happened in Lombardy ? People dying in halls because there was no space? coffins in storage because the funeral facilities were also overwhelmed? Doctors deciding euthanasia of the old by choosing according to age and probability of recovery?
Was the economy of Lombardy functioning normally?
Then they imposed lock downs.
The problem is not between deaths and the economy. It is whether a country can survive without a health system. Lockdowns are because the powers that be decided that the country cannot survive without working health facilities.
The real question is “would the economy and jobs survive if there were no lock downs and the virus raged until it burnt out? “( herd imunity). I do not know the answer.
Have you modeled the interval until herd immunity is reached? The numbers coming from a boat , say 50% are asymptomatic, of those 50% with symptoms how many will be over 60? Of those how many will be high level executives ? What is the survival rate for over 60 years old, if there is no health care? Johnson would have died if there were no hospitals.
What about schools if 50% of teachers are sick with home leave? Productivity in factories? People buying and selling ? Will the markets work with 50% of people indisposed ( I am not talking of deaths , which also will be there, because no health care a lot more deaths)etc etc.
I do not know the answer. But considering that economy is mostly psychology, the possibility of a great recession if the health sector fails will also have millions of unemployed.
It needs modeling.
“The problem is not between deaths and the economy. It is whether a country can survive without a health system. Lockdowns are because the powers that be decided that the country cannot survive without working health facilities.”
it is more than just the health system collapsing.
Its your police force getting infected and being off the job
Its your food workers getting infected
Its basically all your essential workers getting infected,
They don’t have to die for their to be mass disruption.
This is an impossible calculus
we don’t want to face these kinds of questions because it’s beyond math and science and logic.
There is no controlled experiment to tell what the optimum thing to do is
There is no past experience with a new virus to guide your choices.
There is a world of anecdotes ( look at Sweden, no look at Korea! no look at NYC,
No look at Hong Kong! what about Japan! etc etc), but no clear path that we can all
agree on.
we think information will solve this, but we don’t trust information.
Willis, I can’t believe anyone is seriously suggesting that the epidemic itself is causing even a miniscule fraction of the economic and job loss that the lockdowns are. Over 20 million jobs have been lost, that is all due to the business closure and stay-at-home orders. In my home state of Minnesota, almost 20% of all jobs are gone. These are readily available statistics, look at the astonishing number of jobs in restaurants and bars, the hotel industry, the airline industry, sports and other entertainment and retail establishments. The layoff percentage and number of those jobs is astonishing, as is also easily accessed. Even in industries like health care, there have been been substantial layoffs. Consumer spending is 70% of the economy, we have eviscerated that. Every business I know, including the ones I have invested in or am on the board of, is having to lay people off because of astounding revenue declines. This is truly economic suicide.
The economic costs of the actual epidemic on the other hand, are miniscule in comparison. Health payers have discovered that due to postponement of non-emergency services, health costs are actually down, not up. There is some cost to absenteeism, and there would be some effect on consumer spending just from the fear factor, but nothing like the revenue loss businesses are currently experiencing. A useful comparison would be Sweden, where if you leave out export driven revenue loss, the economic hit is far less. So I just can’t see how anyone can argue that job loss is driven by the epidemic rather than the lockdowns. We didn’t see anything like this with swine flu or other large epidemic years in which there was no lockdown or stay-at-home order.
I’m happy for you to go ahead and remove or ignore the lockdown in the US.
The rest of us will be about a month or so behind you (perhaps depending on your results).
In South Africa, add the ‘excessive force’ applied by police and army to citizens who break the lockdown. And the “Tw*t in the Hat” of a Police Minister who is running riot against “stuff he doesn’t like”. So, during the three week lockdown and its extended two weeks, we can’t console ourselves with drink or smoke. Sale and transport of alcohol has been banned, so our wineries can’t export. Sale of cigarettes has been banned, so smuggling across the borders is rife. And the Minister would like the ban to be permanent! Apparently, he has never learned the lessons of the USA’s “Great Experiment” of Prohibition. As if the Cape’s gang problem isn’t currently bad enough!
Willis – I scanned through the comments to see if the following was mentioned but didn’t spot it:
It is my ‘theory’ that unemployment caused by the Government lockdown is very different from the usual unemployment and the statistics, reactions, etc are NOT comparable.
This unemployment is caused , not by the absence of jobs- the usual case – but by the absence of workers directly restrained by the government from performing their jobs.
Since the cause is so different, statistical comparisons like ‘this unemployment rate is the WORST ever’ etc are not relevant at all.
The government in typical monopolistic fashion simply prevented a large portion of the population from creating wealth – at all, ANY wealth. For a political “feel good” purpose.
Spot on. This isn’t an unemployment as a result of economic conditions (IE lack of jobs), it’s unemployment as a result of governmental conditions (IE government preventing workers from working) which is a unique situation, we really haven’t had that happen before. So any comparisons are, to be frank, highly suspect.
We don’t lack jobs. Once government allows the workers to get back to work and businesses to get back to business, a the majority of those unemployed will be employed once again. To be sure, it won’t be as many as were employed previously:
– there will be a number of businesses that simply didn’t survive the government stop work mandate. Sadly, those jobs will be gone.
– there will be a number of businesses (particularly cruises and other large gathering events) that will be slow to recover as the customers will be slow to going back to those kinds of events due to safety fears. such businesses will likely need less workers until their businesses get back up to normal speed.