Wheels and tires

Tim McNamara writes:

On Wed, 25 Mar 2020 20:45:42 -0500, AMuzi wrote:
On 3/25/2020 7:40 PM, John B. wrote:

Given that the virus "new case" rate in the U.S. is now the highest
in the world (as of March 26, 2020, 00:12 GMT) the question of
whether the restaurants go out of business because of a shutdown or
whether they go out of business because their customers catch the
virus is probably immaterial.


Sure of that?

We're a large nation so having a large number may not be a large rate
(as compared with, say, 60 million Italians).

Updated hourly:

https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html

You can look at cumulative confirmed cases globally and by nation, some
data broken down to the county level, as well as by daily increase. The
US's current daily increase is very steep- about 20% daily in the past
few days and accelerating as expected. Thus far we are not "flattening
the curve" significantly since many of those people were infected before
the advent of social distancing, etc. If the measures are successful,
they will start to show up visibly in the trend curves in another 1-2
weeks. By then we'll be at about 200,000 infected Americans at the
current rate. Hopefully the rate of infection slows soon!

Had Trump been more on the ball and willing to listen to people who are
actually competent, there might have been a more effective response
sooner. But like so many Republicans, he values money more than lives.

Not a Trumper, but I don't really understand why Trump is a dog and
Cuomo, who tried even harder to delay, is a hero to the press.

The good news for Americans thus far is that the case fatality rate in
the US seems to be about 1/3 that of the world at large. That may
change as folks get into what seems to tend to be the worst parts of the
illness (days 7-10). And mst hospitals are not yet overwhelmed in the
US, except I would imagine in New York and the northeastern seaboard
they are seeing that.

One of our big problems at this stage seems to be infected hospital
staff:

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/03/...d-coronavirus/

AMuzi writes:

On 3/26/2020 3:23 PM, Tim McNamara wrote:
On Thu, 26 Mar 2020 09:23:43 +0700, John B
wrote:

As for "hair on fire"... hardly :-)

"Hair on fire" is Fox Newsspeak for anyone saying they don't think Trump
is the Greatest President in Human history, especially criticism based
on what Trump actually says instead of what he and his supporters
pretend he said. Covfefe! It was a perfect call! And you should
believe Vladimir over American intelligence professionals, he only has
our best interests at heart.


I take no position as it's very early in this thing. Too early for an
afternoon of tea and medals, too early to hang the inept.

But I did note the hue and cry about 'fascism' when we were the first
country to restrict travel from China in January.

On, I believe, the recommendation of Dr. Anthony Fauci, who said:

The president has listened to what I have said and what the other people
on the task force have said. When I have made recommendations he has
taken them," Fauci added. "The idea of just pitting one against the
other is just not helpful."

https://thehill.com/homenews/media/4...-against-trump

On 3/26/2020 9:49 PM, Radey Shouman wrote:
Tim McNamara writes:

On Wed, 25 Mar 2020 20:45:42 -0500, AMuzi wrote:
On 3/25/2020 7:40 PM, John B. wrote:

Given that the virus "new case" rate in the U.S. is now the highest
in the world (as of March 26, 2020, 00:12 GMT) the question of
whether the restaurants go out of business because of a shutdown or
whether they go out of business because their customers catch the
virus is probably immaterial.


Sure of that?

We're a large nation so having a large number may not be a large rate
(as compared with, say, 60 million Italians).

Updated hourly:

https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html

You can look at cumulative confirmed cases globally and by nation, some
data broken down to the county level, as well as by daily increase. The
US's current daily increase is very steep- about 20% daily in the past
few days and accelerating as expected. Thus far we are not "flattening
the curve" significantly since many of those people were infected before
the advent of social distancing, etc. If the measures are successful,
they will start to show up visibly in the trend curves in another 1-2
weeks. By then we'll be at about 200,000 infected Americans at the
current rate. Hopefully the rate of infection slows soon!

Had Trump been more on the ball and willing to listen to people who are
actually competent, there might have been a more effective response
sooner. But like so many Republicans, he values money more than lives.

Not a Trumper, but I don't really understand why Trump is a dog and
Cuomo, who tried even harder to delay, is a hero to the press.

The good news for Americans thus far is that the case fatality rate in
the US seems to be about 1/3 that of the world at large. That may
change as folks get into what seems to tend to be the worst parts of the
illness (days 7-10). And mst hospitals are not yet overwhelmed in the
US, except I would imagine in New York and the northeastern seaboard
they are seeing that.

One of our big problems at this stage seems to be infected hospital
staff:

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/03/...d-coronavirus/


Since you mention Andrew Cuomo, I just read his 2014
statement about dropping the NY Medicaid rate to 56% of
Medicare rate (Medicare rate being break-even or a loss to
many MDs and hospital systems) making NY the fourth lowest
in the nation. Moreover he launched a series of policy
changes to reduce emergency room visits (which are indeed
expensive as compared to other care).

He explicitly said and I quote, "Will it mean hospital beds
are reduced? Yes, because that is the point of this
exercise. You will have a decrease in beds."

These and other policies have reduced the number of
hospitals in NY by 13% since 2010. Earlier in 2020 Mr Cuomo
announced that NY was short $4 billion in Medicaid and
proposed to reduce payments to providers further.

Now of course he's making the case that management of
hospital facilities, staff and equipment in New York, the
State which invented 'Certificate of Need", is Mr Trump's
problem.

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

On 3/26/2020 9:54 PM, Radey Shouman wrote:
AMuzi writes:

On 3/26/2020 3:23 PM, Tim McNamara wrote:
On Thu, 26 Mar 2020 09:23:43 +0700, John B
wrote:

As for "hair on fire"... hardly :-)

"Hair on fire" is Fox Newsspeak for anyone saying they don't think Trump
is the Greatest President in Human history, especially criticism based
on what Trump actually says instead of what he and his supporters
pretend he said. Covfefe! It was a perfect call! And you should
believe Vladimir over American intelligence professionals, he only has
our best interests at heart.


I take no position as it's very early in this thing. Too early for an
afternoon of tea and medals, too early to hang the inept.

But I did note the hue and cry about 'fascism' when we were the first
country to restrict travel from China in January.

On, I believe, the recommendation of Dr. Anthony Fauci, who said:

The president has listened to what I have said and what the other people
on the task force have said. When I have made recommendations he has
taken them," Fauci added. "The idea of just pitting one against the
other is just not helpful."

https://thehill.com/homenews/media/4...-against-trump



Indeed, from small business owners to generals in the field
to Presidents, one assembles hopefully competent advisors,
takes their counsel but at the end a decision must be made.

Our human culture shows an important aspects of that;
dithering is itself a decision of sorts and often the worst
choice.


--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

On Thu, 26 Mar 2020 18:52:24 -0700, jbeattie wrote:

Tenant defaults are a huge problem with multi-family, and one that me
and my brothers are facing right now on several leveraged properties.

Been there and NOT done that. I've seen close to the current situation
many times in my life. A similarity is the business who slave to Just In
Time and never keep a spare of anything on site. Sooner and often
frequently production stops as they wait for spares to arrive.

We'll probably get $1M or so in financing to keep the properties afloat
until rents stabilize. This is a Black Swan event for a lot of
businesses -- and not because of poor planning.

Disagree. it is because of lack of planning and rose glass approach to
the possibilities.

Every business is leveraged
Most are. I try to avoid them as when they trip, I loose,

-- a retail business with no income will burn through even
robust savings if it has to pay months of rent on unproductive space,

That is a risk they entered into willingly.

and there is no rent holiday for commercial tenants.
That is a decision for your landlord.
I may soon face tha decision. i'm just waiting to see what the situation
is when GovCo finally stops dancing.

The response to COVID-19 has caused wages to plummet and may cause at
least some service businesses to disappear.
Remember the buggy whip makers and saddlers.?
What is different to normal?
Change isn't smooth.

Maybe that's needed to protect the population and maybe not.
If you want future customers, then you need to protect as many as
possible. Otherwise, the survivors might just return the non-assistnce by
buyng elsewhere.

Regardless of whether it is the
right choice, one cannot deny the serious consequences of shutting down
the economy and the effect on ordinary wage-earners and well-run small
businesses.
You are confonding three things.
Firstly the USA doesn't give a farthing about ordinary wage earners.

Secondly, a well run small business will survive by definition. From
what I've seen of small business here, Most are flimsy franchises that
are bleading money to franchisor and landlords and only survive when the
economy is booming. They wanted the dream so badly,they igrnored reality.

Also, many think they can be like "Henry Ford"; "you can have every
colour you want so long as you take black", in a world where the
competion offers every oter colour and black and delvers it for a lower
cost.

I think the public health should prevail, but that doesn't
mean we just ignore the economy,
At one stage, the economy was the people, then t became mamon.
If your business isn't about the people, then it deserves to crumble when
the economy hiccups.


particularly since there are health
consequences of being poor.

Never a truer wwas spoken about the USA.
"Is "Poor-Wash" the new fashin standard.

On Fri, 27 Mar 2020 07:31:45 +0700, John B. wrote:

On Thu, 26 Mar 2020 08:58:50 -0500, AMuzi wrote:


With about 60 million Italians, of whom about 7,000 deaths are
attributed to the Chinese Bioweapon virus, an equivalent proportion of
USAians would be just under 40,000 dead. As of today it's roughly
1,000. A thousand dead people is a real problem (to them, anyway) but
it's not of the scale Italy has suffered.

(I avoid repeating any of the lying lies spewed by the Chinese
propaganda machine. Make a guess yourself.)
:-)
And, strangely enough, the Chinese avoid repeating the lies spewed by
the U.S. propaganda machine :-)

Jorry John, but they would if it was officially sanctined news.
Hence the brief news that it was planted by the Us miltary during the
Miltary Games and then "No comment".

John B. wrote:
On Thu, 26 Mar 2020 20:09:24 +0000 (UTC), Ralph Barone
wrote:

Radey Shouman wrote:
Ralph Barone writes:

John B. wrote:
On Wed, 25 Mar 2020 19:26:32 -0500, AMuzi wrote:

On 3/25/2020 12:43 PM, Tom Kunich wrote:

[snip on-topic bicycle stuff]

On Tuesday, March 24, 2020 at 3:18:09 PM UTC-7, Joerg wrote:

I can't figure out what Newsome thinks he's doing saying that a couple
of weeks from now isn't long enough to keep businesses shut down. Its
been two weeks already and in another couple of weeks all of the
restaurants, the largest business sector, will be dead.


If your auntie was Nancy Pelosi, you could try your hand at
being Governor too!

Given that the virus "new case" rate in the U.S. is now the highest in
the world (as of March 26, 2020, 00:12 GMT) the question of whether
the restaurants go out of business because of a shutdown or whether
they go out of business because their customers catch the virus is
probably immaterial.
--
cheers,

John B.

It’s a tough call. Either way people are going to be uncomfortable or die,
but my guesses are with the shutdown being the better choice. Considering
that pandemics are just compound interest with a very high interest rate
and a very short compounding period (take out a loan at 250% interest per
week and tell me how that works out for you), I’m surprised at the lack of
serious response from the guy running things south of 49.

Interesting analogy. Going a bit further, it seems immunity and
bankruptcy are two sides of the same coin, while death works the same
for both compounded debts and pandemic illness. Looks like we elected
an experience-qualified guy after all.


I guess, except his “go-to” move is declaring bankruptcy and letting the
other people deal with the mess.

So, if you’re paying 250% a week interest on a loan, when is a good time to
start selling stuff on Craigslist for a two week repayment program? The
correct answer is As Soon As You Borrowed The Money. The second best answer
is Right ****ing Now!

Perhaps an even better solution is "don't borrow money at 250% a
week". That would be, 1100% over one year :-)
--
cheers,

John B.



Actually, 250% per week interest, compounded weekly is a number so ****ing
big it would make your head spin.

On Thursday, March 26, 2020 at 8:27:06 PM UTC-7, news18 wrote:
On Thu, 26 Mar 2020 18:52:24 -0700, jbeattie wrote:

Tenant defaults are a huge problem with multi-family, and one that me
and my brothers are facing right now on several leveraged properties.

Been there and NOT done that. I've seen close to the current situation
many times in my life. A similarity is the business who slave to Just In
Time and never keep a spare of anything on site. Sooner and often
frequently production stops as they wait for spares to arrive.

We'll probably get $1M or so in financing to keep the properties afloat
until rents stabilize. This is a Black Swan event for a lot of
businesses -- and not because of poor planning.

Disagree. it is because of lack of planning and rose glass approach to
the possibilities.

Every business is leveraged
Most are. I try to avoid them as when they trip, I loose,

-- a retail business with no income will burn through even
robust savings if it has to pay months of rent on unproductive space,

That is a risk they entered into willingly.

and there is no rent holiday for commercial tenants.
That is a decision for your landlord.
I may soon face tha decision. i'm just waiting to see what the situation
is when GovCo finally stops dancing.

The response to COVID-19 has caused wages to plummet and may cause at
least some service businesses to disappear.
Remember the buggy whip makers and saddlers.?
What is different to normal?
Change isn't smooth.

Maybe that's needed to protect the population and maybe not.
If you want future customers, then you need to protect as many as
possible. Otherwise, the survivors might just return the non-assistnce by
buyng elsewhere.

Regardless of whether it is the
right choice, one cannot deny the serious consequences of shutting down
the economy and the effect on ordinary wage-earners and well-run small
businesses.
You are confonding three things.
Firstly the USA doesn't give a farthing about ordinary wage earners.

Secondly, a well run small business will survive by definition. From
what I've seen of small business here, Most are flimsy franchises that
are bleading money to franchisor and landlords and only survive when the
economy is booming. They wanted the dream so badly,they igrnored reality.

Also, many think they can be like "Henry Ford"; "you can have every
colour you want so long as you take black", in a world where the
competion offers every oter colour and black and delvers it for a lower
cost.

I think the public health should prevail, but that doesn't
mean we just ignore the economy,
At one stage, the economy was the people, then t became mamon.
If your business isn't about the people, then it deserves to crumble when
the economy hiccups.

The businesses that are most "about the people" are shuttered right now, and some are looking at permanent closure. I don't know what kind of business you are in, but I've never been in any business that is sitting on a pile of cash. Most business are not Apple.

The mom-and-pop bike shop which turns enough profit to support its owners and employees cannot weather zero cash flow for long. Same goes with the local coffee shop and restaurant. These are not poorly run businesses, they're just small businesses. Most businesses have access to credit, but if you're looking at permanent damage from the shut-down, you may not want to take on new debt -- particularly if you're just hanging on by a thread anyway because of Amazon and the internet. Even for small businesses that survive, the hit will be huge and will depress wages, defer maintenance, growth, etc., etc. There will be permanent work-force reductions to cover new debt and the inevitable tax hit from a $2T bail-out of the entire nation.

-- Jay Beattie.

On 3/27/2020 8:59 AM, jbeattie wrote:
On Thursday, March 26, 2020 at 8:27:06 PM UTC-7, news18 wrote:
On Thu, 26 Mar 2020 18:52:24 -0700, jbeattie wrote:

Tenant defaults are a huge problem with multi-family, and one that me
and my brothers are facing right now on several leveraged properties.

Been there and NOT done that. I've seen close to the current situation
many times in my life. A similarity is the business who slave to Just In
Time and never keep a spare of anything on site. Sooner and often
frequently production stops as they wait for spares to arrive.

We'll probably get $1M or so in financing to keep the properties afloat
until rents stabilize. This is a Black Swan event for a lot of
businesses -- and not because of poor planning.

Disagree. it is because of lack of planning and rose glass approach to
the possibilities.

Every business is leveraged
Most are. I try to avoid them as when they trip, I loose,

-- a retail business with no income will burn through even
robust savings if it has to pay months of rent on unproductive space,

That is a risk they entered into willingly.

and there is no rent holiday for commercial tenants.
That is a decision for your landlord.
I may soon face tha decision. i'm just waiting to see what the situation
is when GovCo finally stops dancing.

The response to COVID-19 has caused wages to plummet and may cause at
least some service businesses to disappear.
Remember the buggy whip makers and saddlers.?
What is different to normal?
Change isn't smooth.

Maybe that's needed to protect the population and maybe not.
If you want future customers, then you need to protect as many as
possible. Otherwise, the survivors might just return the non-assistnce by
buyng elsewhere.

Regardless of whether it is the
right choice, one cannot deny the serious consequences of shutting down
the economy and the effect on ordinary wage-earners and well-run small
businesses.
You are confonding three things.
Firstly the USA doesn't give a farthing about ordinary wage earners.

Secondly, a well run small business will survive by definition. From
what I've seen of small business here, Most are flimsy franchises that
are bleading money to franchisor and landlords and only survive when the
economy is booming. They wanted the dream so badly,they igrnored reality.

Also, many think they can be like "Henry Ford"; "you can have every
colour you want so long as you take black", in a world where the
competion offers every oter colour and black and delvers it for a lower
cost.

I think the public health should prevail, but that doesn't
mean we just ignore the economy,
At one stage, the economy was the people, then t became mamon.
If your business isn't about the people, then it deserves to crumble when
the economy hiccups.

The businesses that are most "about the people" are shuttered right now, and some are looking at permanent closure. I don't know what kind of business you are in, but I've never been in any business that is sitting on a pile of cash. Most business are not Apple.

The mom-and-pop bike shop which turns enough profit to support its owners and employees cannot weather zero cash flow for long. Same goes with the local coffee shop and restaurant. These are not poorly run businesses, they're just small businesses. Most businesses have access to credit, but if you're looking at permanent damage from the shut-down, you may not want to take on new debt -- particularly if you're just hanging on by a thread anyway because of Amazon and the internet. Even for small businesses that survive, the hit will be huge and will depress wages, defer maintenance, growth, etc., etc. There will be permanent work-force reductions to cover new debt and the inevitable tax hit from a $2T bail-out of the entire nation.

-- Jay Beattie.


+1
All that's true plus this problem is exponentially larger.

Consider the guy who owns a strip mall with 6 tenants not
paying rent. The quarterly insurance is due, the mortgage
meter is running. Cabbies, Lyft and jitneys aren't making
their payments because they're hardly working. With schools
closed, working mothers are unable to pick up newly opened
jobs, still have rent and grocery expense. I'm not much for
live theater but it was moving to read about the tens of
thousands of people from cleaners to stage hands to
electricians to marketing who are suddenly out of work. And
the rent is due. Some Bernie types have replied, 'just
suspend rents', which sounds cute except the landlord's
children also eat every day. Or would prefer to anyway. And
his meter is running too.

For the next hundr5ed years or more, economists will examine
all this in great detail, especially the wonderful 'natural
case studies':
https://www.thelocal.se/20200310/tim...oped-in-sweden

Much like the adjacent counties in Indiana with and without
annual time change.

One wonders how a society decides to ignore 12,500 dead:
https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-res...-pandemic.html

And then commit national suicide 11 years later under
not-worse circumstances. That decision has been made but I
wonder what spurred this attitude change?

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

AMuzi writes:

On 3/26/2020 9:54 PM, Radey Shouman wrote:
AMuzi writes:

On 3/26/2020 3:23 PM, Tim McNamara wrote:
On Thu, 26 Mar 2020 09:23:43 +0700, John B
wrote:

As for "hair on fire"... hardly :-)

"Hair on fire" is Fox Newsspeak for anyone saying they don't think Trump
is the Greatest President in Human history, especially criticism based
on what Trump actually says instead of what he and his supporters
pretend he said. Covfefe! It was a perfect call! And you should
believe Vladimir over American intelligence professionals, he only has
our best interests at heart.


I take no position as it's very early in this thing. Too early for an
afternoon of tea and medals, too early to hang the inept.

But I did note the hue and cry about 'fascism' when we were the first
country to restrict travel from China in January.

On, I believe, the recommendation of Dr. Anthony Fauci, who said:

The president has listened to what I have said and what the other people
on the task force have said. When I have made recommendations he has
taken them," Fauci added. "The idea of just pitting one against the
other is just not helpful."

https://thehill.com/homenews/media/4...-against-trump



Indeed, from small business owners to generals in the field to
Presidents, one assembles hopefully competent advisors, takes their
counsel but at the end a decision must be made.

Our human culture shows an important aspects of that; dithering is
itself a decision of sorts and often the worst choice.

"If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice".