Citizens seem to be clamoring for shutdowns to prevent the spread of COVID-19. There is one major difficulty, however. Once an economy has been shut down, it is extremely difficult for the economy to recover back to the level it had reached previously. In fact, the longer the shutdown lasts, the more critical the problem is likely to be. China can shut down its economy for two weeks over the Chinese New Year, each year, without much damage. But, if the outage is longer and more widespread, damaging effects are likely.
A major reason why economies around the world will have difficulty restarting is because the world economy was in very poor shape before COVID-19 hit; shutting down major parts of the economy for a time leads to even more people with low wages or without any job. It will be very difficult and time-consuming to replace the failed businesses that provided these jobs.
When an outbreak of COVID-19 hit, epidemiologists recommended social distancing approaches that seemed to be helpful back in 1918-1919. The issue, however, is that the world economy has changed. Social distancing rules have a much more adverse impact on today’s economy than on the economy of 100 years ago.
Governments that wanted to push back found themselves up against a wall of citizen expectations. A common belief, even among economists, was that any shutdown would be short, and the recovery would be V-shaped. False information (really propaganda) published by China tended to reinforce the expectation that shutdowns could truly be helpful. But if we look at the real situation, Chinese workers are finding themselves newly laid off as they attempt to return to work. This is leading to protests in the Hubei area.
My analysis indicates that now, in 2020, the world economy cannot withstand long shutdowns. One very serious problem is the fact that the prices of many commodities (including oil, copper and lithium) will fall far too low for producers, leading to disruption in supplies. Broken supply chains can be expected to lead to the loss of many products previously available. Ultimately, the world economy may be headed for collapse.
In this post, I explain some of the reasons for my concerns.
[1] An economy is a self-organizing system that can grow only under the right conditions. Removing a large number of businesses and the corresponding jobs for an extended shutdown will clearly have a detrimental effect on the economy.
Figure 1. Chart by author, using photo of building toy “Leonardo Sticks,” with notes showing a few types of elements the world economy.
An economy is a self-organizing networked system that grows, under the right circumstances. I have attempted to give an idea of how this happens in Figure 1. This is an image of a child’s building toy. The growth of an economy is somewhat like building a structure with many layers using such a toy.
The precise makeup of the economy is constantly changing. New businesses are formed, and new consumers grow up and take jobs. Governments enact laws, partly to collect taxes, and partly to ensure fair treatment of all. Consumers decide which products to buy based on a combination of factors, including their level of wages, the prices being charged for the available goods, the availability of debt, and the interest rate on that debt. Resources of various kinds are used in producing goods and services.
At the same time, some deletions are taking place. Big businesses buy smaller businesses; some customers die or move away. Products that become obsolete are discontinued. The inside of the dome becomes hollow from the deletions.
If a large number of businesses are closed for an extended period, this will have many adverse impacts on the economy:
- Fewer goods and services, in total, will be made for the economy during the period of the shutdown.
- Many workers will be laid off, either temporarily or permanently. Goods and services will suddenly be less affordable for these former workers. Many will fall behind on their rent and other obligations.
- The laid off workers will be unable to pay much in taxes. In the US, state and local governments will need to cut back the size of their programs to match lower revenue because they cannot borrow to offset the deficit.
- If fewer goods and services are made, demand for commodities will fall. This will push the prices of commodities, such as oil and copper, very low.
- Commodity producers, airlines and the travel industry are likely to head toward permanent contraction, further adding to layoffs.
- Broken supply lines become problems. For example:
- A lack of parts from China has led to the closing of many automobile factories around the world.
- There is not enough cargo capacity on airplanes because much cargo was carried on passenger flights previously, and passenger flights have been cut back.
These adverse impacts become increasingly destabilizing for the economy, the longer the shutdowns go on. It is as if a huge number of deletions are made simultaneously in Figure 1. Temporary margins, such as storage of spare parts in warehouses, can provide only a temporary buffer. The remaining portions of the economy become less and less able to support themselves. If the economy was already in poor shape, the economy may collapse.
[2] The world economy was approaching resource limits even before the coronavirus epidemic appeared. This is not too different a situation than many earlier economies faced before they collapsed. Coronavirus pushes the world economy further toward collapse.
Reaching resource limits is sometimes described as, “The population outgrew the carrying capacity of the land.” The group of people living in the area could not grow enough food and firewood using the resources available at the time (such as arable land, energy from the sun, draft animals, and technology of the day) for their expanding populations.
Collapses have been studied by many researchers. The book Secular Cycles by Peter Turchin and Sergey Nefedov analyze eight agricultural economies that collapsed. Figure 2 is a chart I prepared, based on my analysis of the economies described in that book:
Figure 2. Chart by author based on Turchin and Nefedov’s Secular Cycles.
Economies tend to grow for many years before the population becomes high enough that the carrying capacity of the land they occupy is approached. Once the carrying capacity is hit, they enter a stagflation stage, during which population and GDP growth slow. Growing debt becomes an issue, as do both wage and wealth disparity.
Eventually, a crisis period is reached. The problems of the stagflation period become worse (wage and wealth disparity; need for debt by those with inadequate income) during the crisis period. Changes tend to take place during the crisis period that lead to substantial drops in GDP and population. For example, we read about some economies entering into wars during the crisis period in the attempt to gain more land and other resources. We also read about economies being attacked from outside in their weakened state.
Also, during the crisis period, with the high level of wage and wealth disparity, it becomes increasingly difficult for governments to collect enough taxes. This problem can lead to governments being overthrown because of unhappiness with high taxes and wage disparity. In some cases, as in the 1991 collapse of the central government of the Soviet Union, the top level government simply collapses, leaving the next lower level of government.
Strangely enough, epidemics also seem to occur within collapse periods. The rising population leads to people living closer to each other, increasing the risk of transmission. People with low wages often find it increasingly difficult to eat an adequate diet. As a result, their immune systems easily succumb to new communicable diseases. Part of the collapse process is often the loss of a significant share of the population to a communicable disease.
Looking back at Figure 2, I believe that the current economic cycle started with the use of fossil fuels back in the 1800s. The world economy hit the stagflation period in the 1970s, when oil supply first became constrained. The Great Recession of 2008-2009 seems to be a marker for the beginning of the crisis period in the current cycle. If I am right in this assessment, the world economy is in the period in which we should expect crises, such as pandemics or wars, to occur.
The world was already pushing up against resource limits before all of the shutdowns took place. The shutdowns can be expected to push the world economy toward a more rapid decline in output per capita. They also appear to increase the likelihood that citizens will try to overthrow their governments, once the quarantine restrictions are removed.
[3] The carrying capacity of the world today is augmented by the world’s energy supply. A major issue since 2014 is that oil prices have been too low for oil producers. The coronavirus problem is pushing oil prices even lower yet.
Strangely enough, the world economy is facing a resource shortage problem, but it manifests itself as low commodity prices and excessive wage and wealth disparity.
Most economists have not figured out that economies are, in physics terms, dissipative structures. These are self-organizing systems that grow, at least for a time. Hurricanes (powered by energy from warm water) and ecosystems (powered by sunlight) are other examples of dissipative structures. Humans are dissipative structures, as well; we are powered by the energy content of foods. Economies require energy for all of the processes that we associate with generating GDP, such as refining metals and transporting goods. Electricity is a form of energy.
Energy can be used to work around shortages of almost any kind of resource. For example, if fresh water is a problem, energy products can be used to build desalination plants. If lack of phosphate rocks is an issue for adequate fertilization, energy products can be used to extract these rocks from less accessible locations. If pollution is a problem, fossil fuels can be used to build so-called renewable energy devices such as wind turbines and solar panels, to try to reduce future CO2 pollution.
The growth in energy consumption correlates quite well with the growth of the world economy. In fact, increases in energy consumption seem to precede growth in GDP, suggesting that it is energy consumption growth that allows the growth of GDP.
Figure 3. World GDP Growth versus Energy Consumption Growth, based on data of 2018 BP Statistical Review of World Energy and GDP data in 2010$ amounts, from the World Bank.
The thing that economists tend to miss is the fact that extracting enough fossil fuels (or commodities of any type) is a two-sided price problem. Prices must be both:
- High enough for companies extracting the resources to make an after tax profit.
- Low enough for consumers to afford finished goods made with these resources.
Most economists believe that an inadequate supply of energy products will be marked by high prices. In fact, the situation seems to be almost “upside down” in a networked economy. Inadequate energy supplies seem to be marked by excessive wage and wealth disparity. This wage and wealth disparity leads to commodity prices that are too low for producers. Current WTI oil prices are about $20 per barrel, for example (Figure 4).
Figure 4. Daily spot price of West Texas Intermediate oil, based on EIA data.
The low-price commodity price issue is really an affordability problem. The many people with low wages cannot afford goods such as cars, homes with heating and air conditioning, and vacation travel. In fact, they may even have difficulty affording food. Spending by rich people does not make up for the shortfall in spending by the poor because the rich tend to spend their wealth differently. They tend to buy services such as tax planning and expensive private college educations for their children. These services require proportionately less commodity use than goods purchased by the poor.
The problem of low commodity prices becomes especially acute in countries that produce commodities for export. Producers find it difficult to pay workers adequate wages to live on. Also, governments are not able to collect enough taxes for the services workers expect, such as public transit. The combination is likely to lead to protests by citizens whenever the opportunity arises. Once shutdowns end, these countries are especially in danger of having their governments overthrown.
[4] There are limits to what governments and central banks can fix.
Governments can give citizens checks so that they have enough funds to buy groceries. This may, indeed, keep the price of food products high enough for food producers. There may still be problems with broken supply lines, so there may still be shortages of some products. For example, if there are eggs but no egg cartons, there may be no eggs for sale in grocery stores.
Central banks can act as buyers for many kinds of assets such as bonds and even shares of stock. In this way, they can perhaps keep stock market prices reasonably high. If enough gimmicks are used, perhaps they can even keep the prices of homes and farms reasonably high.
Central banks can also keep interest rates paid by governments low. In fact, interest rates can even be negative, especially for the short term. Businesses whose profitability has been reduced and workers who have been laid off are likely to discover that their credit ratings have been downgraded. This is likely to lead to higher interest costs for these borrowers, even if interest rates for the most creditworthy are kept low.
One area where governments and central banks seem to be fairly helpless is with respect to low prices for commodities used by industry, such as oil, natural gas, coal, copper and lithium. These commodities are traded internationally, so it is not just their own producers that need to be propped up; the market intervention needs to affect the entire world market.
One approach to raising world commodity prices would be to buy up large quantities of the commodities and store them somewhere. This is impractical, because no one has adequate storage for the huge quantities involved.
Another approach for raising world commodity prices would be to try to raise worldwide demand for finished goods and services. (Making more finished goods and services will use more commodities, and thus will tend to raise commodity prices.) To do this, checks would somehow need to go to the many poor people in the world, including those in India, Bangladesh and Nigeria, allowing these people to buy cars, homes, and other finished goods. Sending out checks only to people in one’s own economy would not be sufficient. It is unlikely that the US or the European Union would undertake a task such as this.
A major problem after many people have been out of work for a quite a while is the fact that many of these people will be behind on their regular payments, such as rent and car payments. They will be in no mood to buy a new vehicle or a new cell phone, simply because they have been offered a check that covers groceries and not much more. They will remain in a mode of cutting back on purchases, not adding more. Demand for most kinds of goods will remain low.
This lack of demand will make it difficult for business to have enough sales to make it profitable to reopen at the level of output that they had previously. Thus, employment and sales are likely to remain depressed even after the economy seems to be reopening. China seems to be having this problem. The Wall Street Journal reports China Is Open for Business, but the Postcoronavirus Reboot Looks Slow and Rocky. It also reports, Another Shortage in China’s Virus-Hit Economy: Jobs for College Grads.
[5] There is a significant likelihood that the COVID-19 problem is not going away, even if economies can “bend the trend line” with respect to new cases.
Bending the trend line has to do with trying to keep hospitals and medical providers from being overwhelmed. It is likely to mean that herd immunity is built up slowly, making repeat outbreaks more likely. Thus, if social isolation is stopped, COVID-19 illnesses can be expected to revisit prior locations. We know that this has been an issue in the past. The Spanish Flu epidemic came in three waves, over the years 1918-1919. The second wave was the most deadly.
A recent study by members of the Harvard School of Public Health says that the COVID-19 epidemic may appear in waves until into 2022. In fact, it could be back on a seasonal basis thereafter. It also indicates that more than one period of social distancing is likely to be required:
“A single period of social distancing will not be sufficient to prevent critical care capacities from being overwhelmed by the COVID-19 epidemic, because under any scenario considered it leaves enough of the population susceptible that a rebound in transmission after the end of the period will lead to an epidemic that exceeds this capacity.”
Thus, even if the COVID-19 problem seems to be fixed in a few weeks, it likely will be back again within a few months. With this level of uncertainty, businesses will not be willing to set up new operations. They will not hire many additional employees. The retired population will not run out and buy more tickets on cruise ships for next year. In fact, citizens are likely to continue to be worried about airplane flights being a place for transmitting illnesses, making the longer term prospects for the airline industry less optimistic.
Conclusion
The economy was already near the edge before COVID-19 hit. Wage and wealth disparity were big problems. Local populations of many areas objected to immigrants, fearing that the added population would reduce job opportunities for people who already lived there, among other things. As a result, many areas were experiencing protests because of unhappiness with the current economic situation.
The shutdowns temporarily cut back the protests, but they certainly do not fix the underlying situations. Instead, the shutdowns add to the number of people with very low wages or no income at all. The shutdowns also reduce the total quantity of goods and services available to purchase, regardless of how much money is added to the system. Many people will end up poorer, in some real sense.
As soon as the shutdowns end, it will be obvious that the world economy is in worse condition than it was before the shutdown. The longer the shutdowns last, the worse shape the world economy will be in. Thus, when businesses are restarted, we can expect even more protests and more divisive politics. Some governments may be overthrown, or they may collapse without being pushed. I fear that the world economy will be further down the road toward overall collapse.
OK, Fast…you asked for more….no problem…you got MOAR….
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=T70dnUMhz8g
A different spin on the current wheels coming off the Feds cart….how much longer can they keep it together?!
“Fears of global crude storage hitting capacity are now dominating markets, sending oil prices falling towards $15.”
[It’s worth clicking the link because it contains a nice summary of current events in the oil industry]
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Storage-Fears-Drive-Oil-Below-18.html
“Schlumberger Ltd., the world’s largest oil-field-services company, cut its shareholder dividend 75% and is restructuring businesses, cutting jobs and closing facilities to cope with a historic energy rout.”
https://www.wsj.com/articles/schlumberger-to-cut-jobs-slashes-dividend-75-in-historic-oil-rout-11587127703
“The US shale industry is expected to shrink by more than 2m barrels a day following a collapse in global oil prices which has forced oil producers to shut down their fracking rigs.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/apr/17/us-shale-industry-expected-shrink-oil-price-falls
“TD analyst Menno Hulshof sees even worse damage ahead. “We are now estimating that total Western Canada oil shut-ins grow to more than 1.5 million barrels per day in the coming weeks to months.””
https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/conoco-s-cuts-seen-as-appetizer-for-big-cuts-to-oil-sands-output-1.1423037
“Traders are storing an estimated record 160 million barrels of oil on ships – double the level from two weeks ago as they seek to tackle a glut of stocks created by a slide in global demand from the coronavirus, shipping sources say.”
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-oil-tankers-storage/crude-oil-held-in-sea-storage-hits-new-record-at-160-million-bbls-sources-idUSKBN21Z2A2
At least there is some way the ships can earn some revenue!
Lots of interesting things below the article, including link to Coronavirus Causes Mass Layoffs In Renewables Sector
In other words, in an era when nearly every company is losing money, the tax credits used as subsidies are not really worth very much.
“…the shutdowns that began months ago in China, where so many items come from, are only just now starting to show up in some supply chains. For some industries, this is the worst possible moment for supply chains to break.”
https://www.marketplace.org/2020/04/17/supply-chains-are-pulled-limit-covid19/
“More than 4 trillion consumer products are made, shipped and retailed globally every year. Yet end-to-end traceability of each item through its lifecycle journey – from manufacturing to the consumer to recycling, resale or disposal – is, for the vast majority of goods, a black hole of insight.
“A manufacturing plant knows what it just made. A warehouse knows what it receives and dispatches. A shipping provider knows it is carrying a container of clothing. And a retail store knows what inventory it’s holding.
“But the information is largely siloed within each supply chain player’s organization, making it hard to follow the custody of every item across its lifecycle.”
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/04/covid-19-globally-connected-supply-chain-system-interoperability-whitepaper/
We hugely depend on a an international supply chain. As I look at this paper, however, it is all about a new system to track supply chains. This is not the issue. It is that the system is breaking right now.
“There is no evidence to suggest that recovered coronavirus patients and former asymptomatic carriers who have coronavirus antibodies in their blood will have long-term COVID-19 immunity, the World Health Organization said in a press conference on Friday.”
https://www.forbes.com/sites/marleycoyne/2020/04/17/coronavirus-antibodies-may-not-make-you-immune-who-warns/#33bca23133a8
We can just as easily say “there is no evidence to suggest … do not have immunity”.
Or, more generally, “there is no evidence”.
I don’t agree with you. Evidence is gradually building up that assumptions some people have made about immunity are false.
If people do not have immunity we will need to keep funding the WHO for a long, long time. The evidence suggests that this is the aim of their scaremongering.
I think this is important. Way too many people have assumed that we can stamp out COVID-19. If antibodies don’t stick around very well, and in fact, the disease keeps coming back in the same person, all of the work being done on vaccines are likely to provide at most benefit.
Amusing that the head of the WHO is as crooked as a dog’s hind leg….
A request.
How do you insert an image into a reply? i.e. for an image that is stored on my computer as as a .jpg or .png file and not linked to a web address.
You cannot. You need to upload the images to websites like imgur.com and then paste the link here. It will automatically be loaded as an image
Thanks!
Deep Green Resistance.
I recently ran across a link to this group whose goal is to end industrial civilization and thought they were insane, but I’ll bet they are happy as pigs in shyt now:
https://deepgreenresistance.org/en/who-we-are/about-deep-green-resistance
“Our task is to create a life-centered resistance movement that will dismantle industrial civilization by any means necessary.”
From their FAQ:
“What Is Deep Green Resistance?
Deep Green Resistance is an analysis, a strategy, and the only organization of its kind. As an analysis, it reveals civilization as the institution that is destroying life on Earth. As a strategy, it offers a concrete plan for how to stop that destruction. As an organization, Deep Green Resistance is implementing that strategy.
The goal of DGR is to deprive the rich of their ability to steal from the poor and the powerful of their ability to destroy the planet. This is a vast undertaking but it needs to be said: it can be done. Industrial civilization can be stopped.”
The corona virus is doing their work for them and doing the pushing.
“That which is falling, deserves to be pushed” – F. Neitzsche
The problem with groups like Deep Green Resistance – is that they are blinded by ideology – like most such groups from either side. Mankind is in a mess – and the Corona Virus is a shot across the bows. 1) there are far too many of us. 2) we cannot continue to burn fossil fuels. 3) Renewable energy will not/cannot allow our current form of civilization to continue (or allow those wanting to attain our western consumer driven civilization to even get near it). 4) we are subject to the same laws of nature as every other organism, our massive population growth and technological growth is purely due to 1) Exploitation of fossil fuel resources, and 2) the Haber Bosch process of fixing nitrogen – which has allowed the agricultural revolution (which is of course dependent on exploiting fossil fuels). We have also mined out the accessible phosphorus reserves – (and pissed most of it back into the oceans!). So, sadly the big, and unavoidable crash will come – probably faster than we wish. What to do? – learn to grow food and tend your garden. Sadly I’ll be long gone – I’d love to watch the denouement.
“Sadly I’ll be long gone”
Sorry to hear you expect to die very soon.
Agree on conclusion part of yours, if humanoids are ever to soldier on long term, only as small scale (low impact) farmers with tiny trades and crafts network around it.
Are you suffering from late stage terminal cancer or something like that? Sorry to hear ….
No, late-stage terminal awareness. It’s a lethal condition.
Oh – well then barring getting run over by a bus … you should be on hand for the Big Show.
There’s also a movement devoted to “Voluntary Human Extinction.”
This is likely a honey pot and website only front .org
Because should they be for real (threat), they would have been Assanged immediately..
https://twitter.com/i/status/1246523324206911489
https://twitter.com/i/status/1249164152645586945
https://mikerivageseul.files.wordpress.com/2018/11/pitchfork-clipart-torch-718732-7517571.jpg
No pitchforks this time!
As shown on that Nancy video, showing her car sized (and prized) set of freezers and fridges filled with boutique chocolate ice cream, that’s the life you can get as family member of old East Coast Italian clan hired by global financiers to enter the political theatrics aka farming the masses.
While docile sheep instead of rioting are spending hours and even days inside their gas-guzzlers while parked in the waiting line of emergency food distribution..
Perfect system if you can keep it. And they evidently still can.
Yep … and the East Coast liberal zombies love her…. and the people keep on voting.
Oh that’s another thing re my post on intelligence…. anyone who votes at other than a local level…
Well that is a sign of low intelligence…. I don’t give a shi t if rocket scientists vote — they are just plain s t u pid…. according to the FE IQ Test….. and that’s the ONLY IQ test that matters
Visitors are barred entry to hospitals. All non Covid19 related illnesses and elective surgeries have been cancelled. So unless they have an overflowing Covid19 problem then they’re going to look empty. Comparing a post Covid19 hospital’s traffic to a pre Covid19 hospitals traffic is a non sequitar. All this means is all the hiding in our houses actually flattened the curve. It’s not a conspiracy. We’ll have to wait for the 2nd wave to find out how bad it actually is, that is if the economy holds together long enough for that to happen. Right now it appears as if we’re likely to have an economic collapse in totality by summer.
I just posted a long article about how 3M people die from booze each year — 7M from smoking and 11M from eating garbage diets….
Tens of millions would be hospitalized because of the above.
DOES THE GOVERNMENT SHUT THE COUNTRY DOWN??????????????????????
DOES THE GOVERNMENT BAN THOSE??????????????????????????????????????
Any number of deaths for any of those ‘other’ causes will look minor if Coronavirus was allowed to spread throughout the community, something you don’t seem to understand.
Yes the current hospitalization and death rates are small, society/governments are trying to keep it that way and are being successful here in Australia.
Really 11 million will die from Wuhan in America? How many will die? 20M – 50M?????
Did that happen in Sweden????
Has it happened in Bali????
Most of the world is doing jack sh it about this Wuhan virus…
Show me tens of millions of dead people…. Or shouldn’t that be 100s of millions if you are going to project the US numbers (that you are suggesting would be way more than 11M from eating garbage if they were no lockdowns)
Seriously if you cannot understand this then what are you doing on OFW??????
Do you think that you can catch intelligence by hanging out with genius IQ people?
Sorry but I’m going with this over your illogical MSM regurgitation:
“Lockdown was appropriate when there was so little data…but the data is now clear, this is not the disaster we feared and prepared for. Elimination of this virus is likely not achievable and is not necessary.” Thornley said the risk to most working people was low and likened it, for most people, to a seasonal influenza virus.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/120984583/coronavirus-lockdown-rules-should-be-relaxed-health-experts-say
You cannot stop the spread of a respiratory disease within a family, and you cannot stop it from spreading with neighbors, with people who are delivering, who are physicians—anybody. People are social, and even in times of social distancing, they have contacts, and any of those contacts could spread the disease. It will go slowly, and so it will not build up herd immunity, but it will happen. And it will go on forever unless we let it go.
https://www.thecollegefix.com/epidemiologist-coronavirus-could-be-exterminated-if-lockdowns-were-lifted/
It truly is amazing … some people are just impervious to logic and facts…. all they are capable of doing is parroting what they read on the NYT and BBC.
They have zero interest in questioning what they are reading — and no doubt zero ability to question.
Even when others attempt to assist them — as one might assist a 90 year old women cross the street — or a 6 year old understand a simple math problem…. they cannot ‘get it’
Unreal. Truly unreal.
Feel free to exhibit Lash Reflex now.
And ANOTHER empty NYC hospital ER
https://twitter.com/i/status/1246899734159273987
Lie AFTER LIE AFTER LIE…..
Look – MORE empty hospital tents — where’s the NYPost — surely they will want to do a story on more Full EMPTY Hospital Tents!
https://twitter.com/i/status/1249092972462788608
NYC – empty ER waiting area
https://twitter.com/i/status/1250214076053172225
woo hooo!!!! security pulls gun on someone driving past the covid area…. (which is a ghost town)
https://twitter.com/i/status/1250106747664175104
https://twitter.com/i/status/1249148499322683393
https://twitter.com/i/status/1250043536751411205
So the first is a waiting room?
Where you spend a few minutes before being sent home or to ICU for a few weeks. In many countries you’re not allowed to enter the waiting room if you could possibly have corona
Except I don’t think that anyone can really determine who could possibly have corona. Anyone can! People who seem to be over it. People who seem not to have any symptoms, but have picked up the virus through necessary contracts. The nurses and doctors in the facility, working with people who don’t seem to have corona, but really do.
In Sweden, since 28/2 you have to book an appointment before being let into hospital.
Maybe that is the reason we don’t die to bigger extent than countries with hard lockdown (except you could sit in a waiting room with corona).
Does it look busy???? Does it look like the country should be shut down?
Why are cigarettes still for sale, when nicotine kills 7 million people every year? https://bit.ly/2XAvGRU
How many tens of millions do you think end up in the hospital due to smoking related illnesses each year?????
Do we ban smoking? Do we shut down America??????
THINK!!!! Use your BRAINS!!!!!!!
What is missing from the ceaseless coverage of this pandemic is a reasoned discussion about the typical victim.
I believe that we in NZ have had well over a 1000 cases, and about 11 deaths. Most (all?) of the deceased are elderly, many from the same dementia ward.
We are also about 75 years on from the end of WWII. There are many elderly around today who would have had a gestation and early childhood characterised by privation. The vulnerability of the 75-80 yr old Spanish, Italian, French (Europeans generally?) elderly may be a direct result of their early years.
This pandemic has been characterised as a war; I hear medical using military terms often. The first victim of war is the truth. The truth is NZ massively over-reacted to this event – hysteria – and the victims will be the young whose job prospects have been flushed down the drain.
Actually, it’s the other way around. He who was subject to (brief) starvation is much more enduring and healthy throughout the life. In fact the ICUs are filled with generally very old people or merely aged people but with smoking, drinking, junk food overeating induced co-morbidness..
Perhaps a fasting incident can benefit many in this world of excess, but not if the deprivation is at a key stage in the lifecycle. Plenty of congenital issues due to poor nutrition during pregnancy.
Its not as simple as ‘the other way around’. It is many ways around.
I tried fasting one day a week for a period while in Bali … then I applied logic to the situation:
Why would fasting be healthy particularly if all you put into your body is nutritious food?
While in Bali we grew everything we ate in our organic garden — all our eggs were produced organically (expensive organic chicken feed)…. we ate minimal meat but we bought from a small scale producer who farmed organically….
So why deprive my unit of rocket fuel?
Is it not akin to starving an engine of petrol?
It just didn’t make sense.
And then there are those people who eat garbage all year then check into a detox retreat and drink veg juice for a week…. Better than nothing but maybe they might consider not living on garbage the rest of the year?
https://i.pinimg.com/736x/41/83/b0/4183b04805e98c556d34c89001988cb7.jpg
My personal experience here; I have been party to 2 conversations where there were deaths’ attributed to Cov-19. However, in both cases the victims were elderly people who suffered strokes and died, then tested positive for the virus.
The published stats are lies; ‘you can torture any set up numbers to get whatever statistic you are looking for’ is a quote by a statistician on radio NZ from not so long ago- pre Covid.
They are attributing any and all deaths to Covid, whereas in previous flu seasons there was no imperative/hysteria to do so.
Quoting the official ‘ deaths due to Covid’ is the realm of the useful idiots…IMHO.
Who says Trump is so bad?
LIBERATE MICHIGAN!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 17, 2020
https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2020-04-17/liberate-michigan-trump-tweets-2nd-amendment-coronavirus-pandemic
LIBERATE NZ!
— Fast 700IQ Eddy (@FastEddyGenius) April 18, 2020
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/04/17/gov-abbott-announces-strike-force-to-reopen-the-lone-star-state-we-will-open-texas/
governor aiming to reopen the Republic of Texas…
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/04/17/alabama-committee-recommends-reopen-of-alabama-businesses-immediately/
“immediately” is already too late…
but they gotta “reopen” sooner or later…
When the goal is CDP… you always want to be well behind the curve when making all decisions
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/covid-19-patients-need-to-be-tested-for-bacteria-and-fungi-not-just-the-coronavirus/
“Many studies have already found that a significant number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients have and are continuing to develop dangerous secondary bacterial co-infections such as bacterial pneumonia and sepsis.”
“An estimated one in seven COVID-19 patients will develop a secondary infection while hospitalized. Further, a separate study found that only about 50 percent of patient deaths were due to the original viral infection, while the other 50 percent were caused by subsequent secondary infections.”
being “hospitalized” can carry big health risks…
An obsession with anti-biotics, anti-bacterial soaps/detergents etc has destroyed our natural defensive biome and replaced it with impoverished dregs. I have linked to an article before which noted this feature of ‘systems failure’ and the cytokine (?) storm.
Lastcall = l
…must have pressed the key too soon.
Hospitals are awful places for the sick to be held in; superbugs, I believe lung damage from mis-use of ventilators, heroic medical interventions (remember sometimes you have to des.troy a village to save it..?) and iatrogenic deaths. The medical system is not a health system by any stretch of the imagination!
People died in large numbers of pneumonia long before the advent of anti-bac this and that.
Just as they suffered from asthma, died of sudden fevers, TB, long-term parasitic infections, etc.
It’s a dangerous planet, and the idea of a super-fit and superior early human is a myth and nothing more – nearly all organic life is very fragile and brief.
https://news.trust.org/item/20200417234139-r4248
“U.S. coronavirus deaths topped 35,400 on Friday, rising by more than 2,000 for the fourth day in a row…”
so here is the slow and careful comparison to the USA 2017/18 flu season…
then, about 60,000 Americans died of flu “related” causes…
if an arbitrary 120 days is used for this so-called season, then that would be about 500 per day…
that correlates well to the actual WEEKLY stats from back then where the peak in flu “related” deaths was about 7,000 in the highest week…
if we divide 7,000 by 7, which is the number of days in a week, the result is 1,000…
therefore, the 2017/18 flu season peaked at about 1,000 “flu related” deaths per day…
now, turning to 2020, the “C19 virus related” deaths for the past 4 days have been over 2,000 each day…
now, let’s compare 1,000 to 2,000…
and the result, using a calculator or just doing an approximation, is that 2,000 is much higher than 1,000…
and the necessary footnote is:
there was no social distancing and lockdown in 2017/18…
and we still had an economy in 2017/18 that didn’t need hide behind a pandemic.
the economy wasn’t quite as close to the edge in 2017/18…
and back then, the main spreading virus wasn’t as bad…
obvious stuff…
forward to early 2020, both elements are worse…
too bad our “leaders” pushed the economy over the cliff with the lockdowns… (though there is an interesting theeory that many/most of the public might have withdrawn from any unnecessary economic activity anyway)…
in retrospect, let-it-rip would have been much better…
too late now…
As I have stated many times, COVID19 is between flu and Ebola in terms of lethality (closer to flu) and more contagious. However, the economic collapse is unparalled in global human history.
7M die from smoking in a year in the US. How many tens of millions need hospitalization?
We don’t shut down the US economy.
Imagine what the numbers were when almost everyone smoked…..
If you add all the deaths from pneumonia together whatever the cause of it… you can get a pretty nice sized number… then you blame all the deaths on Wuhan… = FEAR PANIC
https://israelseen.com/shows/2016/06/Lies-Damn-Lies-and-then-theres-Statistics-Mark-Twain-620×385.jpg
https://nypost.com/2020/04/09/central-park-coronavirus-field-hospital-near-capacity/
https://thenypost.files.wordpress.com/2020/04/central-park-hospital-2.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=1286
The Funnies
https://twitter.com/OdiliTime/status/1249602054252707840
Love it. More please.
https://www.theguardian.com/global/video/2020/apr/16/armed-protesters-demand-an-end-to-michigans-coronavirus-lockdown-orders-video
So, am I surprised? Not at all. Everything to know about how the Fed is bailing out Wall Street, State and Local Governments, Central Banks, and their Very Rich Crony Friends ..video by George Gammon, who claims it’s his most important one currently.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aTewPJ5b-5o
After viewing it, you will see alphabet soup spinning in your mind….
I watched this one today. Super good video, highly educational and he does a good job of explaining the differences between communist resource dispersal vs capitalist. The main thing him and others like Peter Schiff don’t understand though is that the Fed isn’t doing this to just help out their corporate pals, they’re doing it to attempt to keep the entire financial system afloat because they have no other choice. If we “take the medicine” like many of these fellas suggest, it would be the end of industrialized civilization.
https://themostbeautifulworld.com/blog/data-coronavirus
https://coronacircus.com/
Here are two sites exposing the H O A X. Thought I would share with the fine readers here.
There are many indicators that this is not a hoax as well. Why does Trump keep trying to open the economy if this is a hoax? Why are other EU countries trying to reopen things? Trump almost incited riots today, was that part of “the plan” as well? You really think there’s some secret group of individuals that have control of all world governments, all 200 of them with infected individuals?
I will say this, we aren’t going to have to wait very long to find out what’s going to happen because there’s really only 2 possibilities in the US. They’re going to start reopening things in a couple of weeks and either infections will take off again or they won’t. Either way the economic collapse is going to just keep on chugging along. And how exactly does this secretive group staging a controlled demolition plan on keeping the useful parts of the economy open for themselves? Seems too risky and like the entire global economy will collapse, killing them and everyone else. But let’s wait and see what happens.
First site – well done except his conclusions are illogical… obviously this cannot happen…. also fails to take into consideration the sh i t show was on the verge of collapse + we are outta cheap energy….
But otherwise nicely done….
Their plan is domination through a war of attrition over our finance, liberties and food supply.
1) Shutdown the world;
2) Collapse the economy;
3) Turn the world into a real-life hunger game;
4) Having the 1% at the top feeding us and giving us money.
But there are several things going on that throw a wrench into that logic. If the plan is to collapse the economy, why on Earth is the Federal Reserve creating 10 bailout facilities and keeping all of the corporations heads’ above water? Why are they buying debt, junk bonds, stocks, and more if someone is trying to collapse the system? Wouldn’t it collapse faster if the Federal Reserve just didn’t do anything? In fact the market would be at 0 right now and everything would be bankrupt. Collapse would’ve already happened.
And this is happening globally. All central banks are engaged in QE, all world governments are inflating their stock markets and bailing out financial institutions. If someone wanted collapse, why would they allow or even instruct this to happen? If the IMF, Fed, and others just didn’t do anything, collapse would’ve already happened. Why are they assisting all these millions of businesses, corporations, and companies if they WANT collapse to happen? Why are they buying mortgaged backed securities? Wouldn’t collapse happen faster if everyone lost their homes?
Why is OPEC trying to cut oil if a powerful group of individuals wants collapse? It seems they want to inflate the price of oil and float fossil fuel companies. Wouldn’t they just let oil go down to 0 if they wanted to cause a collapse? Don’t get me wrong, things are collapsing anyways and they were before Coronavirus but you could easily hasten it by everyone pumping the maximum extent possible.
Why are several different states in the US discussing opening back up if they wanted a collapse to happen? The quickest and best way to have collapse is for none of us to ever work again. So why are they making plans to open back up again? Why are they giving everyone more unemployment and free money if they wanted collapse to happen? Wouldn’t the fastest way to collapse be to simply watch it unfold and do nothing? It seems the governments and central banks are trying to keep the economy from going under, not hasten its demise.
I noticed ourfiniteworld and its comments was mentioned in the article. Your website Z? Gail has always had superb talent for expressing a analysis of situations without getting involved in drama. It is a talent that is much appreciated by myself. It lends itself to credibility. While i have nothing against the information and OPINION expressed in themostbeutifulworld its tone is very much different than ourfiniteworld. The names are similar. Please dont pull Gail and ourfiniteworld into your personal agenda. This is first and foremost a forum for discussing oil and economics. While Gail basically does not censor (except for my offpoint posts) in these unique times it is respectful to not to involve ourfiniteworld with personal agendas. Why cant the content of your (?) blog stand by itself? Right or wrong it is a very controversial viewpoint. You show disrespect by pulling ourfinite world into it. Gail if I am off base just delete this post.
Thanks for that input.
There’s still time to catch the charter if you hurry….
https://airwaysmag.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Air-China-747-8.jpg
Z – I vote to allow you to post whatever you like…
@FE
Thanks mate.
There would be more discussion about oil and economics if there was honest reporting about it. I’ve often noted how difficult it is to find any in-depth reporting on economics or even science, in the past, in the comments section of this blog.
Everything related to economics and science is now extremely sensationalistic and political. Biased reporting leads to conspiracy theories.
OFW is by far the sanest place on the internet. It can be entertaining at times. Some other sites, which I don’t want to mention names have all the nice endings and everyone gets a oink teddy bear. Some sites are filled with trolls. Some are totalyl censored if you disagree with the blog owner.
Nice Endings – Tim
A s sh—ole Owner – Wolf
That is because all of the REAL Statistics are totally obfuscated. The books are being cooked worldwide.
Dude,
That is not my site, I just happen to read that one along with others and try to take the information and synchronize within myself to see what actually makes sense given all of the insane stuff going on. I highly respect Gails work along with others, yet it is not capturing everything. Therefore, I thought I’d share with the readership here. I have no personal agenda in those sites whatsoever.
Fear (of death or social isolation, for example) fuels the mechanism of truth denial . And as truth is ultimately gruesome (everyone dies, and everyone do it alone) and homo sapiens can’t live without hope, since without hope there’s no drive to action, and with no action there’s no food nor fun, denial mechanism is almost unavoidable.
Then there are rare freaks of nature who seem to value truth more than peace of mind or well-being, and with these the denial mechanism has less chance to intervene, because most of the times it is crushed at birth. But denial is always lurking inside each one of us, always waiting for us to let our guard down and be carried away by our friend mr. wishful think. .But nobody ever said that nihilism was an easy job!
Great point.
We nihil-doomers observant of collapsing IC follies are very rare bunch indeed, rare salt and spice of Earth, exception to the rule. It’s both a blessing and uneasy dark mission through the current of life.
Gail, you should spice up your graphs with a little anthropomorphism.
https://twitter.com/kellyemitchell/status/1251195152598777856
Interesting, thanks. Similarly, some people for strange reason were loading up on coal paper like crazy in that 2016 low point, why, perhaps there will be yet another megaspike in the future, e.g. non deliverable natgas situation, nuclear closed, lets ramp up coal once more..
“..tooda doodadoo.. lovers at first sight.. exchanging glances .. tooda doodadoo..”
Richard D Hall has put up a three-part video. I’ve just started watching it.
The Corona Scam
https://www.richplanet.net/richp_genre.php?ref=282&part=1&gen=99
This has gone to absurd levels…..you know after the 9/11 fakery being exposed I figured more people would start questioning everything……but the brainwashing and government indoctrination camps (schools) have done tremendous damage to people. Some will never be able to see how much of a HOAX this is…..including extremely intelligent people…..it is insane.
Thank god more are seeing through this
Thanks for that JMS.
That’s a key find as it supports the CDT — faced with an imminent exploding global economy … the Leeders released a virus which ended riots … justified a final nuclear stimulus bomb… and got people under their beds cowering in fear … all that remains is the starvation phase.
And after the big culling they will jump from their bunkers to rule like… counts? How’s that possible? Are they so fuc*ing deluded? Poor bast*rds, and poor us who are manipulated like puppets. Anyway, for homo sapiens it is more than time to go, I think.
I would imagine some of might do that … but they would know about the fuel ponds and realize they must remain in their prison until the food runs out…
However I suspect that are more likely to choose to end themselves once they have done their best to put us down… a few tabs of chewable Fentanyl would be a pleasant way to go.
I would not be surprised if at some point they mass distribute that drug … it would be particularly handy for women (or men) who are suffering beatings from their spouses…
Nancy did a nice job on her banker hubbie… made him a tasty milkshake laced with sleeping pills… then smashed him to death with a golf club … fabulous stuff!
BTW – I knew a guy who interviewed with Kissel and he said the guy reminded him of American Psycho…. that would explain his success in the field of finance….
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Robert_Kissel
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/nRTjNEP6v2U/maxresdefault.jpg
How instant collapse do you expect?
With electricity use way down they should be able to turn of nuclear soon.
https://cdn.quotesgram.com/img/34/10/1866419266-truth-george-orwell-1984.jpg
https://nypost.com/2020/04/09/central-park-coronavirus-field-hospital-near-capacity/
https://cdn.quotesgram.com/img/22/90/576100680-Orwell_quote.jpg
https://cdn.quotesgram.com/img/88/8/1848887569-civility-censorship-cartoon.jpg
The time for civility is over, Fast!
https://twitter.com/i/status/1176151235319218177
This is from September 2019. Now demonstrations are for other things, such as unreasonable lockdown requirements.
Ironically, their wish for reduced emissions was granted rather quickly. Maybe they’re harboring a genie.
That fella better watch out … there are red necks with high calibre automatic weapons in the area…. they are usually not the most tolerant of people
Celebrating the empty skies i guess huh…
These people have negative IQs….
https://www.flightradar24.com/
btw – whenever i check on Venezuela there are never any flights headed in or out – not even cargo …. wonder what’s playing out in that country…
https://www.flightradar24.com/AZU8706/245fca2f
I suspect outbound cargo has no tracking device.
Cargo flights are indicated
Orwell is one of the most lovable figures in literature, comparable IMO only to Chekhov and just few others. There’s a mixture of wisdom and courage (honesty) in him that is very noble and rare, and all the more valuable for that. Hommage to Catalonia” was one of the most important books of my young days, Not the least because he freed me early from any temptation to dance with communism and vaccinated me for life against any taste for authoritarianism, censorship, etc.. Unfortunately, his style and technique as a fiction writer is not top-notch, so I like him more as a journalist, memorialist or essays writer than as a fictin writer. I had the honour and pleasure of translating a big selection of his essays some years ago, and have know the thrilling responsability of translating his two most famous fiction books. So it would be awfully convenient for me that the world didn’t end before september, please so i could finish the job!
As a writer on Spain, Orwell far out-classes that posturing, pseudo-macho fraud,Hemingway.
Unfortunate that he had such a lamentable sex-life, he deserved better – his life seems notably to have lacked any fun for the most part. And then a slow death from TB: such bad luck!
I would guess the sex-life of most people in those post-victorian days sucked anyway, and so George was not an exception. Remember Philip Larkin’s lament:
Annus Mirabilis
Sexual intercourse began
In nineteen sixty-three
(which was rather late for me) –
Between the end of the “Chatterley” ban
And the Beatles’ first LP.
Up to then there’d only been
A sort of bargaining,
A wrangle for the ring,
A shame that started at sixteen
And spread to everything.
Then all at once the quarrel sank:
Everyone felt the same,
And every life became
A brilliant breaking of the bank,
A quite unlosable game.
So life was never better than
In nineteen sixty-three
(Though just too late for me) –
Between the end of the “Chatterley” ban
And the Beatles’ first LP.
Oops… here’s the plane … Mike .. Norm… you guys board through the first class entrance….
https://4brf13430svm3bnu053zbxvg-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Air-China-Plane.jpg
Fight Against Freedom — Fight for Censorship — Stand with CCP! — Kill the Cockroaches!
https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/styles/1200×800/public/d8/images/methode/2019/09/20/8b488148-dab5-11e9-80eb-3aa57b6d2433_image_hires_084737.JPG
How did it come to this?
Well… it started with us asking for Censorship on OFW….
Oh, was someone making racist comments or inciting violence?
No, not really, we just didn’t like that this one dude who admittedly is a super genius … was making too many comments that we didn’t agree with… he kept putting logical arguments on the site and that made us want him kicked off…
Then what happened?
That guy chartered a flight to Utopia – mainland China…. and we were so happy about that…
And then?
When we got there we couldn’t use youtube or surf p or n or access any websites except pro China sites — and our leaders Norm and Mike petitione Xi …
And where are Mike and Norm now?
Well we are not sure — but we got this postcard the other day that was signed by them
http://www.photosensibility.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/20090323-175-092.jpg
The problem with the shut down apart from the economic problems is that you can’t have masses of people doing nothing and getting bored silly…
Right. With little income, they often take out their problems on their wife and children. Domestic violence soars.
“Right. With little income, they often take out their problems on their wife and children. Domestic violence soars.”
That seems a weird presumption. How does that follow? “I’m sick of Scrabble and Monoply. I think I’ll bash the wife and kids.”
Where does this come from? Do you know many people like that? I know lots of people with little money. They don’t attack or terrorize their families. They love them.
Really, when people think that an outrageous casual slander like this can qualify as a normal characterization of men and family life – and no one objects – we know that feminism has been entirely successful in its vile aims of destroying public trust in family life and relations between men and women.
I agree. Many people seem to using the time to connect. walk with the dog and kids. Get that jump rope out. read that book. tea on the porch. How beautiful is the world? Very.
I know a bit about domestic violence. There are true victims. There are also those that play. IMO thats the epitomy of dysfunctional relationship. Its violent before any physical attack. The physical attack is just the manifestation of the dysfunction. If being in a close quarters with a significant other causes that degree of dysfunction it is a sad commentat on that relationship.
The tool of last resort to control oneself and to deescalate is to leave. Its the tool of last resort but that does not reduce its importance. When you are getting close to that edge you leave. In a perfect world we would have perfect control. If you are committed to appropriate behavior you commit to leaving rather than engaging in inappropriate behavior.
Nothing has changed. You leave rather than hit. No exceptions.
So you don’t believe that a stressful situation as the loss of job and income can lead to an increase of frustration and violence? Isn’t that obvious?
Kim, thank you. My thoughts exactly. Some 40% of the victims of spousal abuse are men, but they don’t count. We all know the script: if a man hits a woman he is a monster; if a woman hits a man he must have provoked her. Sick, sick, sick. And over in the UK people are surprised that the marriage rate is now the lowest on record.
Nothing is more offensive than a woman smacking a man…. because a man cannot smack back.
Yes, it’s something of a Feminist meme these days: ‘bored men are abusers’.
No, a very tiny minority of sadistic and cruel men are absusers – , and all the time, they need no pretext for it.
Anyway, judging by the sounds emanating from neighbouring houses, it’s the women who are doing the shouting and hitting – poor kids!
And now we have that imbecilic and mendacious Ethiopian, Tedros, claiming that Western males need to be kept away from alcohol in lock-down or they will all act like savages – yet more gratuitous anti-white prejudice shoved down out throats.
What about all the drug taking in Muslim countries like Iran, Tedros, ever thought how that contributes to general crime and violence, and high levels of drug taking in general throughout the 3rd World?
Xabier, the #1 source of “domestic violence” is mothers abusing children. That has been repeatedly documented, and repeatedly ignored. The #2 source, by the way, is mother’s boyfriend. But modern liberal society hates traditional marriage, and is doing its best to destroy it. If you want to know how to rescue our civilisation, look at Hungary.
a uk health visitor once told me that a ‘new boyfriend’ was always carefully if surreptitiously, watched by her, and put on the ‘usual suspects’ list until he could , over time, prove himself to be above suspicion in that respect.
and if you had to choose between the wrath of god, and said health visitor, the choice was an obvious one
Can someone tell Tedros (aka The Crook) that if it were a cultural norm in the west to dress women in bed sheets, not let them go out of the house and get them to buy into obeying when we said ‘heel’ —- we’d not have to beat them….
And then there are these kind and gentle arabs …. imagine what they’d do if they were to get juiced up on a bit of hard stuff?
https://www.hrw.org/reports/2004/saudi0704/7.htm
and watch out if your wife takes up gardening:
https://ifunny.co/picture/Vos3XdoX7
Only worrying if she also decides to keep a pig: excellent way of disposing of corpses, I believe. ……
Yep — I am pretty… pretty … pretty pretty bored….
But the dog is not bored… she can run along the same ravine trails with me a thousand times and she just can’t get enough of it. She does not like it when I mountain bike though as it exhausts her trying to keep up….
Or bored smarter?
Watching the NZ lockdown announcement at 4pm…. my first click will be to the barber online booking app if they allow them to open…. I will buy up all the slots and then scalp the appointments on Trademe.
It’s time for Cooking with Fast Eddy…. (as we try to drive this sucker to 10,000 comments)
It does get a bit old beating up on oil for 10 years… let’s beat some eggs instead!!!
Today’s recipe we will make Whisky Eggs…
You will need two farm fresh eggs (preferably free range organic)…. some broccoli … and whisky.
Chop the broccoli into small bits then add a little water and steam it in a pan for about a minute until it’s bright green and al dente…. crack the eggs into a bowl, add whisky to taste … then beat as if you were beating a DelusiSTANI to death….. mix in the brocolli …
Add a small amount of oil to the pan then add your mixture cooking on low heat until done.
Put in a bowl — add another splash of whisky… and there you have it Whisky Eggs a FE.
https://www.pbfingers.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/scrambled-eggs-024_thumb.jpg
Another kitchen story:
I don’t even have to hear Pelosi speak and I already despise her.
what kind of whisky? I suppose you are using Scotch, probably a single malt. could we use an American or Bourbon whisky? will strong coffee tend to titrate the meal?
oh wait, it’s probably Canadian whisky. Eastern or Western?
Japanese … but any whisky will do
OK Fast…how about these for sustainable living!?
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=38SIGVuQa30
Easy Least once you get past the taste
Boredom Overcome…
Given that the food supply is now under performing, people are going to struggle to maintain a reasonable state of health. That singing in the background that you may be able to hear is the real pandemic getting ready for centre stage…. perhaps this northern winter?
Then we will see a real flattening of the curve and everything else to boot!
That is a real concern.
It would be wonderful to be cape-verdian now, with all those islands and hills to hike and blue waters to dive till the fat lady sings (the lady in this case would be the great Cesária of course).
Unfortunately, i’m only portuguese (:
It is curious, and quite appropriate, that I am now beginning to translate Orwell’s “1984” for one of my employers. I hope this is not my last job!
“Thus, at one moment Winston’s hatred was not turned against Goldstein at all, but, on the
contrary, against Big Brother, the Party, and the Thought Police; and at such moments his heart
went out to the lonely, derided heretic on the screen, sole guardian of truth and sanity in a
world of lies.”
“Assim, em dado momento, o ódio de Winston não se virava contra Goldstein, mas, pelo contrário, contra o Grande Irmão, o Partido e a Polícia do Pensamento; e nesses instantes o seu coração estava com o herético e escarnecido solitário no ecrã, único guardião da verdade e da sanidade mental num mundo de mentiras.”
So what is your nationality, JMS? Given that there are a few Portuguese-speaking countries, e.g. Cabo Verde.
Oops again, put the answer in the wrong place. (sorry, Gail!)
It would be wonderful to be cape-verdian now, with all those islands and hills to hike and blue waters to dive till the fat lady sings (the lady in this case would be the great Cesária of course).
Unfortunately, i’m only portuguese (:
Portuguese is fine. Portugal is a long-standing ally of the UK, of course. I enjoy watching Portuguese documentaries (e.g. ‘The Truth of the Lie’) and Brazilian ones, so that I get to hear the way it is spoken. Dutch and Portuguese are my favourite languages to listen to.
Unbelievable coincidence, portuguese is also my favourite language to listen to! 🙂
Tee-hee!
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Oops, it was already posted by Yoshua minutes ago. Sorry.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/
Get this: China daily stats show 351 new infections & 1290 deaths today! Maybe they got tired of being called on the carpet for obviously phony stats. Keep going China, pile on those stats until we say, ok they look about right.
The notes say:
“China: Hubei Province issued today a “Notice on the Correction of the Number of New Coronary Pneumonia Cases Diagnosed and the Number of Diagnosed Deaths in Wuhan” in which it reported 1,290 additional deaths that had not been previously counted and reported, bringing the total number of deaths in Wuhan from 2,579 to 3,869, an increase of 50%, as the result of a revision by the Wuhan New Coronary Pneumonia Epidemic Prevention and Control. As part of this revision, 325 additional cases in Wuhan were also added. Separately, China’s National Health Commission (NHC) reported 26 new cases (and no deaths) in its daily report.”
Worldometers also gives three links to go with this.
According to Nobel prize winner in Medicine Sars-Cov-2 is man made in a lab and contains a hiv strain.
https://www.zerohedge.com/health/covid-19-man-made-virus-hiv-discoverer-says-could-only-have-been-created-lab
From that article:
“According to Professor Luc Montagnier, winner of the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 2008 for “discovering” HIV as the cause of the AIDS epidemic together with Françoise Barré-Sinoussi, the SARS-CoV-2 is a virus that was manipulated and accidentally released from a laboratory in Wuhan, China, in the last quarter of 2019. According to Professor Montagnier, this laboratory, known for its work on coronaviruses, tried to use one of these viruses as a vector for HIV in the search for an AIDS vaccine!”
Well, at least it they had good intentions – lol. I think China trying to claim the dreaded virus came from a seafood market that didn’t have bats needs to be nixed. This is just getting too obvious it came from that lab, presumably accidentally released.
China should just be thankful it was ‘accidentally’ released in China, because if it had been released in any other country, and proven to have come from a lab in Wuhan, then it would be considered an act of war.
Chinese officials are saying that CIA dropped the virus in Wuhan.
NSA spooks are saying that Zerohedge is a FSB front and take orders from Moscow. An article pointing out China would need Moscow’s approval.
The virus is spreading in Russia. The Kremlin has ordered 1.5 million Chinese to leave Russia.
China pre Chinese New Year was the perfect place to release this … millions were about to head overseas and across the country…
You forgot the er… hopeful side of professor Montagnier declaration:
“In any case, this thesis, defended by Professor Luc Montagnier, has a positive turn. According to him, the altered elements of this virus are eliminated as it spreads: “Nature does not accept any molecular tinkering, it will eliminate these unnatural changes and even if nothing is done, things will get better, but unfortunately after many deaths.”
I hadn’t noticed this. Interesting.
https://twitter.com/jenniferatntd/status/1245367173977190403?s=20
How come no one is blaming people who are encouraging people to stockpile food for 3-6 months for the food shortage?
Lots of people in China to be fed. This year’s harvest is a long ways off, and many people lack funds to buy food, even if it is available.
great famines have always been part of chinese history, there was little they could do except die
this time they know where food is, and they have to means to come looking for it. They think they’ve ‘bought farms’ in Africa, That’s going to come as a shock when they want to harvest the crops and take them back to china.
they will also turn their ‘factory workers’ out into the fields, reversing the trend of the last 50 years. Those tower blocks will never be occupied after all
that will cut off our supply of all those cheap chinese gizmos we love so much.
that will make everything we buy too expensive (or impossible to make anyway), so western industries will fold. (they are already)
So where do western workers go?
Back to the fields, whence they came, just like the chinese, to ‘work for food’ (just like in the 30s.)
Serfdom anyone? Anyone interested should read up on ‘hiring fairs’ in the middle ages.
It depends, the degree of foolishness will be revealed eventually.
It’s very doubtful they bought access to these African farms (production) without the proper link to local security and contract obligation enforcement aka having local politician or warlord on a financial (and security supplies) leash – and this would obviously continue to work even during milder stages of famine and general unrest. It won’t work for ever though without serious boots on the ground meaning front in your face colonialism.. Not sure which (intensity) stages revel itself in this context within few next years.
local warlords are the ultimate opportunists
they go where the right combination of money power and survival lie
‘contracts’ mean nothing come shtf time
You only repeated the end game of the last stage I described.
They would have switched sides already NOW..
We are not there YET. Watch that WHO apparatchik, still not demoted, if Chinese relative power drops lower, such examples would shine through.
Thanks for the alert, it surely must have more broad implications beyond that single prefecture..
MILWAUKEE – Soaring milk production and plummeting consumption have dealt a series of devastating blows to Wisconsin dairy farmers in recent years.
But the coronavirus pandemic has been a next-level gut shot. Shuttered schools and restaurants have cut off much of the demand for dairy, even as panicked shoppers bought out milk and other dairy products — and just about everything else in sight — as the quarantine began.
A heavily viewed Facebook video painted the scene this way:
“Although grocery store dairy shelves remain sparse … dairy farmers are being forced to dump thousands of pounds of milk down the drain,” says the two-minute clip from Courtenay DeHoff TV.
https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/04/10/fact-check-coronavirus-farmers-dump-milk-demand-shift-bottling-limits/5128191002/
Cutting off restaurant and other business use is big problem. It is hard to make the grocery store sector grow enough.
I’ve not had any problem getting milk and cheese at any place I’ve been to. 7-Eleven, CVS, Kroger, Walmart all have plenty of dairy since the start of the shutdown.
Good article, albeit the usual rainbow at the end. (hope it’s not to large to post here)
Worst Recession in 150 Years
“The stock market had another big day today, spurred by the Fed’s massive recent liquidity injections. But you really shouldn’t be terribly surprised by the rally. Even the worst bear markets see substantial bouncebacks. And you can expect the market to give back all of its recent gains in the months ahead as the economic fallout of the lockdowns becomes apparent.
This bear market has a long way to run. And we could actually be looking at the worst recession in 150 years if one economist is correct. Let’s unpack this…
My regular readers know I have a low opinion of most academic economists, the ones you find at the Fed, the IMF and in mainstream financial media. The problem is not that they’re uneducated; they have the Ph.D.s and high IQs to prove otherwise. I’ve met many of them and I can tell you they’re not idiots. The problem is that they’re miseducated. They learn a lot of theories and models that do not correspond to the reality of how economies and capital markets actually work.
Worse yet, they keep coming up with new ones that muddy the waters even further. For example, concepts such as the Phillips curve (an inverse relationship between inflation and unemployment) are empirically false. Other ideas such as “comparative advantage” have appeal in the faculty lounge but don’t work in the real world for many reasons, including the fact that nations create comparative advantage out of thin air with government subsidies and mercantilist demands.
Not the Early 19th Century Anymore
It’s not the early 19th century anymore, when the theory first developed. For example, at that time, a nation that specialized in wool products like sweaters (England) might not make the best leather products like shoes (Italy). If you let England produce sweaters and Italy make shoes, everybody was better off at the end of the day. It’s a simple example, but you get the point.
But in today’s highly integrated and globalized world, where you can simply relocate a factory from one country to the next, comparative advantage has much less meaning. You can produce both sweaters and shoes in China as easily as you can produce them in England and Italy (and much more cheaply besides). There are many other examples of lazy, dogmatic analysis among mainstream economists, too many to list. Yet there are some exceptions to the rule. A few economists have developed theories that are supported by hard evidence and do a great job of explaining real-world behavior. One of those economists is Ken Rogoff of Harvard.
The Worst Recession in 150 Years
With his collaborator, Carmen Reinhart and others, he has shown that debt-to-GDP ratios greater than 90% negate the Keynesian multiplier through behavioral response functions. At low debt ratios, a dollar borrowed and a dollar spent can produce $1.20 of GDP. But at high ratios, a dollar borrowed and a dollar spent will produce only $0.90 of GDP. This is the reality behind the phrase “You can’t borrow your way out of a debt crisis.” It’s true. Meanwhile, the U.S. debt-to-GDP ratio was about 105% even before the crisis. It’s only going higher. We’re just digging a deeper hole for ourselves. So when Ken Rogoff talks (or writes), I listen. In his latest article, Rogoff offers a dire forecast for the recovery from the New Depression resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic.
He writes, “The short-term collapse… now underway already seems likely to rival or exceed that of any recession in the last 150 years.” That obviously includes the Great Depression and many other economic crises. This is something you should really consider before you decide the coast is clear and it’s time to jump back into stocks.
Complex Systems Collide
Zooming out a bit, and as I’ve argued before, the pandemic is a prime example of complex systems colliding into one another… Investors and everyday citizens are focused on how the COVID-19 pandemic (one complex dynamic system) is crashing into the economy (another complex dynamic system) and influencing the political process and the upcoming U.S. presidential election (still another complex dynamic system). Analyzing the operations of one complex dynamic system is difficult enough; most analysts can’t do it because they’re using the wrong paradigms.
Analysis becomes far more challenging when multiple complex systems interact with each other and produce feedback loops. That’s where the real so-called “Black Swans” reside.
And this crisis is the blackest swan most people alive today have ever seen, especially if Rogoff’s insight is correct — 150 years is a very long time. That’s not to minimize in any way recent events like 9/11 or the 2008 financial crisis. Both were devastating. But neither led to a virtual lockdown of the entire economy like we’re seeing now. The current crisis simply has no precedent.
What we’re seeing is a full-fledged global contagion.
Biological and Financial Contagions
Let’s discuss the word “contagion” for a minute because it applies to both human populations and financial markets — and in more ways than you may expect.
There’s a reason why financial experts and risk managers use the word “contagion” to describe a financial panic. Obviously, the word contagion refers to an epidemic or pandemic. In the public health field, a disease can be transmitted from human to human through coughing, shared needles, shared food or contact involving bodily fluids. An initial carrier of a disease (“patient zero”) may have many contacts before the disease even appears.
[…]
A similar dynamic applies in financial panics.
It can begin with one bank or broker going bankrupt as the result of a market collapse (a “financial patient zero”).
But the financial distress quickly spreads to banks that did business with the failed entity and then to stockholders and depositors of those other banks and so on until the entire world is in the grip of a financial panic as happened in 2008.
Still, the comparison between medical pandemics and financial panics is more than a metaphor.
Disease contagion and financial contagion both work the same way. The nonlinear mathematics and system dynamics are identical in the two cases even though the “virus” is financial distress rather than a biological virus. But what happens when these two dynamic functions interact? What happens when a biological virus turns into a financial virus? We’re seeing those effects now.
Get Ready for Social Disorder
Yet even this three-system analysis I just described (pandemic > economy > politics) does not go far enough. The next phase has been little noticed and less discussed.
It involves social disorder. An economic breakdown is more than just economic. It leads quickly to a social breakdown that involves looting, random violence, fraud and decadent behavior.
The Roaring ’20s in the U.S. (with Al Capone and Champagne baths) and Weimar Germany (with riots and cabaret) are good examples. Looting, burglary and violence in the midst of a state of emergency are the shape of things to come. The veneer of civilization is paper-thin and easily torn. Most people don’t realize how fragile it is. But they’re going to learn that lesson, I’m afraid.
Expect social disorder to get worse long before it gets better.
https://dailyreckoning.com/worst-recession-in-150-years/
” …nations create comparative advantage out of thin air with government subsidies and mercantilist demands.”
I gave up right there. Remember how Iceland used government subsidies and mercantilist demands to become a major exporter of olive oil? Thought not.
Quite so, that’s what that fatuous, but now fashionable, term ‘De’growth’ really means in practice: despair, violence and disorder.
Only last year it was reported that drug gangs in the UK were fighting bitter turf-wars, as they had to compensate for a decline in income by seizing territory from their rivals.
Next step is, logically, more crime by gangs against citizens who are not in the drug/prostitution sector or users as they seek money any old how.
And then, formerly honest and employed people joining in with violent crime and scams as they seek to stay afloat.
ten years ago i tried to think of an alternative scenario to that
i couldn’t
and here we are.
correction: formerly +[“seemingly”] honest people
True. Most people are only honest and decent in so far as they are absolutely certain of their next meal and safe place to sleep.
Kinda like The Road — except way way way WAY more violent.
https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19/86003
Critically Ill COVID-19 Patient Better After ECMO Treatment
https://clf1.medpagetoday.com/media/images/86xxx/86003.jpg
Works, but probably not very scalable. Too resource intensive.
Count me out. That contraption dont sit right with me.
That ECMO therapy success is interesting because there is some evidence that ventilators may do more harm than good is some cases where the lung damage is so severe that oxygen simply cannot be forced into to it in order to oxygenate the blood. As you say though, Gail, probably not very scalable.
(Non anglo-saxonic) music for the end of the world party.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=181&v=eDFe4mVR2cA&feature=emb_title
The lyrics of this recently released song is perfectly adjusted to the present times:
(google-translated)
Last night
The earth shook;
It wasn’t news,
No one else felt.
Shadows without owner
They swept the floor.
Doors creaked
Asking for attention.
Nobody wanted to hear.
………
They play in the parks.
Children with parents.
Gray-haired were born.
Nobody cares about the signs!
Nobody reads the signs!
…
I know it ‘s the end.
The beginning of the end.
I know it’s the end
It amazes me the eternal optimism of most people… the world is literally crashing down around us in slow motion … and most people think we’ll be back to normal in a month or two….
Fear (of death or social isolation, for example) fuels the mechanism of truth denial . And as truth is ultimately gruesome (everyone dies, and everyone do it alone) and homo sapiens can’t live without hope, since without hope there’s no drive to action, and with no action there’s no food nor fun, denial mechanism is almost unavoidable.
Then there are rare freaks of nature who seem to value truth more than peace of mind or well-being, and with these the denial mechanism has less chance to intervene, because most of the times it is crushed at birth. But denial is always lurking inside each one of us, always waiting for us to let our guard down and be carried away by our friend mr. wishful think. .But nobody ever said nihilism was an easy job!
Death doesn’t bother me because I’ve done pretty much everything worth doing.
Me too. Had a good life, made an easy and enjoyable (even if not much profitable) career, etc. I’m not worried about my death. What horrifies is the death of my (fortunetely few) loved ones. But i never think about next week, just about tomorrow afternoon. It’s the secret of my permanent good mood.
Lock-down Reality, UK-style.
A UK doctor who is working in both A&E and a COVID ward reports that self-injury incurred while undertaking DIY (mostly eye and face injuries) is hugely up, and also ‘many more people coming in with things in their bodies which ought not to be there’, declining to be more specific, but……
So, that’s a nice snapshot of how Brits cope with being banged up.
So proud. God, save the Queen!
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/61qxVL8j29L._SL1500_.jpg
Oil futures under 18 dollars a barrel. That can’t be good.
“China’s economy shrank for the first time since at least 1992 in the first quarter, as the coronavirus outbreak paralysed production and spending, raising pressure on authorities to do more to stop mounting job losses…
“Gross domestic product (GDP) fell 6.8% in January-March year-on-year…”
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-economy-gdp/china-posts-first-gdp-decline-on-record-as-coronavirus-cripples-economy-idUSKBN21Z08Q
“Even before this dismal [GDP] result, the International Monetary Fund predicted Asia would see zero growth this year.
“Even flatlining sounds optimistic when you consider the role China played nursing the region through the Asian financial crisis of 1997-1998 and the Great Recession a decade later.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2020-04-17/coronavirus-china-s-gdp-slump-won-t-bring-big-stimulus-this-time
“…after doling out nearly two-thirds of new lending in 2019, the private banks have been unable to escape the effects of India’s lockdown of its economy, which is expected to devastate many of their retail and corporate customers.
“If they now respond by curtailing new loans even to healthy borrowers, that will have serious consequences for the Indian economy and the pace at which it can emerge from the crisis.”
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/banking/finance/banking/banks-that-skirted-indias-bad-loans-cant-escape-lockdown/articleshow/75193266.cms
This is hard to believe: “Industrial output fell by a less-than-expected 1.1% in March from a year earlier.”
I notice, ““As long as there are strict social distancing measures, the recovery of activity will be very slow, and this will be reflected in consumption,” analysts at ING said in a note.”
Pingback: Tverberg: ¿Por qué las economías no podrán recuperarse después de las paradas? | Heaven32
http://peakoilbarrel.com/opec-march-2020-production-data/. How Iran can survive??
Like many oil-producing nations, Iran was in pretty dire straits pre-coronavirus but had the added pressure of US sanctions on top. It must feel like the end times there with another round of crazy spring-flooding, the pandemic, the tanking economy and the locust swarms.
To make things worse, the US is pressuring the IMF not to assist Iran:
“In recent days, Reuters has reported the IMF is still assessing Iran’s $5 billion request. Jihad Azour, director of the IMF’s Middle East and Central Asia department. told the news wire that “since we have had limited engagement with Iran in recent times, the process of obtaining the information we require to assess the request is taking time.”
“Officials in Tehran suspect another reason for the delay though. Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Ali Shamkhani has claimed the U.S. is trying to sabotage the Iranian request in what amounts to “crimes against humanity.””
https://www.forbes.com/sites/dominicdudley/2020/04/16/imf-battleground-for-us-and-iran/#58011f786898
I sometimes suspect it would take an Apocalypse to make Iranians despair: if I ask how things are they invariably reply that X.Y and Z are terrible, can’t afford this, can’t get that, paying bribes to get anything done, etc, ‘but that’s normal.’
Those who aren’t religious take refuge in home-made drink and of course lots of drugs, perhaps that is the answer?
Iran has been forced to be more self-reliant than a lot of other countries.
I notice that Iraq has been raising its production. Russia has generally been raising its production as well. A few countries account disproportionately for the decline.
“Middle East and North African economies have been hit by dual shocks during the past two months, notably the coronavirus pandemic and lower oil prices. For some, like Lebanon, it comes amid a financial crisis that was already underway.
“But as the global impact of the crises bites, so another financial shock is looming – a drop in remittances from overseas workers. And it is likely to hit the region’s most vulnerable economies, including Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon…”
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/coronavirus-egypt-lebanon-jordan-remittance-economy
“…the likes of Turkey, Russia, Brazil have become new hotspots of the coronavirus with their new cases’ curve still on a steepening trend. Prolonged outbreaks would put further strains on the developing countries’ already vulnerable financial situation.
“As we type, Mexico was just downgraded by Fitch to BBB- and this is just the tip of the iceberg in our opinion.”
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4338000-emb-emerging-market-junk-bonds-sow-seeds-of-next-financial-crisis
Lebanon riots have stopped
Another version of “clearly government services will have to fall.” Makes for an unhappy population, if they really need food subsidies to survive. Also subsidies that provide jobs.
“The global pandemic and accompanying economic crisis have knocked states and cities across the country back on their heels.
States are hemorrhaging money to stand up medical systems and field unemployment claims while watching their revenue plummet. People have been ordered to stay at home, meaning sales tax revenues are way down, and as layoffs take hold, revenue from income tax is falling as well.”
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/4/16/21223398/state-city-budgets-coronavirus-economic-crisis-ppp-cares-act
“Even before the arrival of the coronavirus outbreak, Los Angeles city leaders had been facing a budget crunch, in large part because of new pay raises and increased benefits for the city workforce.
“Now, the shutdowns triggered by a global health crisis have unleashed a new and potentially more dire financial threat, endangering the city’s ability to maintain existing public services.”
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-04-16/coronavirus-los-angeles-city-budget-problems
Clearly government services provided will need to fall.
European Car Sales Drop Most on Record With Showrooms Closed
Passenger vehicle registrations fell 52% year-on-year, the European Automobile Manufacturers Association said in a statement Friday. The total of 853,077 cars marks the lowest since at least 1990, when the industry body first started to compile data, and follow similar slumps in China and the U.S.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-17/european-car-sales-drop-most-on-record-with-showrooms-closed?srnd=premium-europe
Lie? How can the drop only be half? If they published the real drop then that would crush people
Those figures are for March. The first national lockdown in Europe began on 9th March. Here in the UK our lockdown began on 23rd March.
So, I can kind of see how 52% adds up, although I’m surprised that people and corporations were still buying them at a relatively normal rate, given what was obviously coming down the pipe.
I noticed that Fiat dropped most and Volvo least. I associate Fiat with inexpensive cars and Volvo with expensive cars. Maybe rich people continued to purchase vehicles more than poorer people.
Volvo sales are so little that it is a rounding error
The car industry went through several waves of consolidation already.
Fiat brands also include Alfa-Romeo, Jeep, .. Lower cost econobox models have been partially outsourced to factories in Turkey, the pseudo posh production (spec up models) remains in N. Italy and the US. While good bailout strategy for gaining additional breathing space after last GFC with their model portfolio they are toast for the next (this) one. People simply moved onto better quality + features for the same money by Koreans or don’t have any reason to abandon the German variety..
While Volvo is strictly upper upper middle to lower luxurious segment (lowish volume production) brand only, different story. Btw. miss the SAABs..
Tesla sells must be collapsing to near zero given their share price is up 40% recently.
Watch for Tesla to pop to $5000 per share if they go out of business and transform into a virtual auto business.
What’s that game where you use real money to buy virtual cows and farm machinery … ah yes… Farmville…
Fast Eddy sees major revenue streams for selling virtual trips to Mars, Youran-us and even to the sun…..
This is where Tesla is headed therefore FE is putting a buy recommendation on this company.
https://www.wired.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/water-engine1.gif
“…the question being asked is whether the US banking sector can readily absorb the shock that is about to hit the US economy from the economic shutdown, caused by the spread of the coronavirus pandemic… a pyroclastic flow of loan defaults in the coming weeks and months.
“There does appear to be some concern amongst some Fed members about the capacity of US banks to absorb what might be coming their way…”
https://www.cmcmarkets.com/en-gb/news-and-analysis/us-banks-gearing-up-for-a-consumer-debt-tsunami
“As unemployment rises, lenders like JPMorgan JPM and Bank of America are setting aside record amounts to cover coming losses from Americans unable to pay their credit cards, auto loans and home mortgages.
“But according to data provided by New York City fintech Dv01, loan delinquencies are already a serious matter for online lenders.”
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffkauflin/2020/04/16/exclusive-early-data-shows-12-of-online-loans-in-trouble-double-just-weeks-ago/#32b1836218c1
“It looks as if the US economy was heading for a recession in 2020, even without the breakdown connected with the pandemic.
“…this conclusion raises a major question: If the economy was already heading for a recession, will that make a recession connected with the coronavirus even that much worse?”
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4338137-industrial-production-u-s-economy-was-already-heading-for-recession
The March data the seeking alpha author writes about already had a substantial amount of COVID-19 slowdown in it, so I am not too impressed by his findings.
Thank you for these articles on the fragile banking system that will collapse without strict Capital Controls and restructuring…the FDIC insurance is a fraud and window dressing.
Way back in the Saving and Loan Crisis, had an account at a failed bank and was issued a cheque by them to reimburse me for my monies in it. Won’t happen this time around😭.
Stagflation is the new normal like the 70s…..the Fed has no choice but to inflate itself out of this mess it painted itself into with the Politicians. Wasn’t it not too long ago the DON was clammering the FED for interest rate cuts!? Well, he got them and now what are we going to do!?
OK, Fast Eddie, no one is going to escape this hurt, except some lucky people in doomsday bunkers that is….just kudding
The hyper inflation already happened:
debasement of currencies and pensions, lowered quality standards of both public and private services and products (e.g. shrinkage of package-content weight), fine arts, properties, stock manias of 20-30baggers flowing to hands of any halfwit watching the circus. off balance sheet debts, ..
Now, we are only waiting for the last finale, when the fat lady is wheeled in front of the (burning) theater scene and starts sing about the [day to day] hyperinflation in food and other basic necessities.
That’s what is unusual nowadays because previously the time separation to the grand finale (quick burnout) was not that prolonged as in this installment..
No kidding!