Secret gyms and the economics of prohibition

Re:Secret gyms and the economics of prohibition by thewarrior on Wednesday August 19, 2020 @04:27PM (#24215931)

I don’t have a clear number for many. But the hospitalization rate is 1-2 %. And if we assume that half of them have long term symptoms thats around 1 %.

You can do one thing to reduce your viral load. Wear a mask. N95 will do better than a surgical mask. But even mask wearing seems controversial. These things are really hard to study so you need to err on the side of caution.

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Re:Secret gyms and the economics of prohibition by xkbarkar on Wednesday August 19, 2020 @04:37PM (#24216069)

Keep in mind that the current being on the safe side cautions have devastating effects on the vulnerable populations outside of the comfort of US and EU homes. "6,000 children could die every day as a direct consequence of the pandemic, that’s one child every 15 seconds, if we don’t act now." https://www.unicef.ie/stories/impact-covid-19-children/

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Re:Secret gyms and the economics of prohibition by thewarrior on Wednesday August 19, 2020 @04:39PM (#24216097)

Not locking down in the US will not save the lives of children in Yemen

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Re:Secret gyms and the economics of prohibition by bpodgursky on Wednesday August 19, 2020 @04:57PM (#24216330)

This isn't true. The US threw away vast amount of food because of supply chain disruption, and a lot of raw production was interrupted. The US is a massive food exporter.

If the price of soybean, or wheat, or pork goes up 15% internationally as a result of US supply disruptions, that doesn't starve any Americans, but it absolutely causes deaths in Yemen, which is already in the middle of a famine.

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Re:Secret gyms and the economics of prohibition by nuclearnice1 on Wednesday August 19, 2020 @05:17PM (#24216657)

You’ll be happy to know that soybean and swine prices are at 10 year lows and wheat is up slightly but lower than a year ago. [1,2,3]

I think your concern is real and well placed. When the economy is frozen for a pandemic, you have a demand shock and a supply shock, what happens to prices? I think this was genuinely unclear early in the pandemic. Interesting additional details here [4,5]

[1] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/PSOYBUSDQ

[2] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/PPORKUSDM

[3] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/PWHEAMTUSDQ

[4] https://www.bloomberg.com/amp/opinion/articles/2020-05-27/pa...

[5] https://mobile.twitter.com/paulkrugman/status/12416894220909...

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