The COVID-19 story keeps developing. At first, everyone listened to epidemiologists telling us that a great deal of social distancing, and even the closing down of economies, would be helpful. After trying these things, we ended up with a huge number of people out of work and protests everywhere. We discovered the models that were provided were not very predictive. We are also finding that a V-shaped recovery is not possible.
Now, we need to figure out what actions to take next. How vigorously should we be fighting COVID-19? The story is more complex than most people understand. These are some of the issues I see:
[1] The share of COVID-19 cases that can be expected to end in death seems to be much lower than most people expect.
Most people assume that the ratios of deaths to cases by age group, computed using reported cases, such as those included in the Johns Hopkins Database, give a good indication of the chance of death a person faces if a person catches COVID-19. In fact, the cases reported to this database are far from representative of all cases; they tend to be the more severe cases. Cases with no symptoms, or only very slight symptoms, tend to be missed. The result is that ratios calculated directly from this database make people think their risk of death is far higher than it really is.
The US Center for Disease Control has published Planning Scenarios, based on information available on April 29, 2020.* Using this information, the CDC’s best estimate of the number of future deaths per 1000 cases with symptoms is as follows:
Ages 0 – 49 0.5 deaths per 1000 cases with symptoms
Ages 50-64 2.0 deaths per 1000 cases with symptoms
Ages 65+ 13.0 deaths per 1000 cases with symptoms
The CDC’s best estimate is that 35% of cases have no symptoms at all. Thus, if we were to include these cases without symptoms in the chart above, the chart would become:
Ages 0-49 0.5 deaths per 1,538 cases (including those without symptoms), or 0.3 deaths per 1000 cases with or without symptoms
Ages 50-64 1.3 deaths per 1000 cases with or without symptoms
Ages 65+ 8.5 deaths per 1000 cases with or without symptoms
A recent study of blood samples from 23 different parts of the world came to a similarly low estimate of the number of deaths per 1000 COVID-19 infections. It reported that among people who are less than 70 years old, the number of deaths per 1000 ranged from 0.0 to 2.3 per 1000, with a median of 0.4 deaths per 1000.
The same paper remarks,
COVID-19 seems to affect predominantly the frail, the disadvantaged, and the marginalized – as shown by high rates of infectious burden in nursing homes, homeless shelters, prisons, meat processing plants, and the strong racial/ethnic inequalities against minorities in terms of the cumulative death risk.
[2] There seem to be things we can do ourselves to reduce our personal chance of serious illness or death.
General good health is protective against getting a bad case of COVID-19. Thus, anything that we can do in terms of a good diet and exercise is likely helpful. Staying inside for weeks on end in the hope of preventing exposure to COVID-19 is probably not helpful.
Continued exposure to huge amounts of disinfectants and hand sanitizers is likely not to be helpful either. Our bodies depend on healthy microbiomes, and products such as these adversely affect our microbiomes. They kill good and bad bacteria alike and may leave harmful residues. It is easy to scale back our personal use of these products.
There are recent indications that vitamin D is likely to be protective in reducing both the incidence of COVID-19 and the disease’s severity. Web MD reports:
Several groups of researchers from different countries have found that the sickest patients often have the lowest levels of vitamin D, and that countries with higher death rates had larger numbers of people with vitamin D deficiency than countries with lower death rates.
Experts say healthy blood levels of vitamin D may give people with COVID-19 a survival advantage by helping them avoid cytokine storm, when the immune system overreacts and attacks your body’s own cells and tissues.
While we don’t know for certain that vitamin D is helpful, there is certainly enough circumstantial evidence to suggest that it would likely be worthwhile to raise vitamin D levels to the amount recommended by the National Institute of Health (30 nmol/L or higher). People with dark skin living in areas away from the equator might especially be helped by this strategy, since dark skin reduces vitamin D production.
Masks seem to be helpful in preventing the spread of infection. A person’s own immune system can handle some level of germs. If two people meeting together both wear masks, the combination of masks can perhaps reduce the level of germs to within the amount the immune system can handle. Our immune systems are built to handle a barrage of small attacks by viruses and bacteria. Continued “practice” with relatively low combinations of good and bad bacteria (as occur with masks) will tend to build up our bodies’ natural defenses.
We see dentists and dental hygienists wearing face shields. These shields are readily available over the internet and can be worn with a mask or by themselves. We don’t yet know precisely how much protection they provide, but early models suggest that they can be helpful in two directions: (a) preventing the wearer’s droplets from harming others and (b) reducing the droplet exposure from others. Thus, they may be a worthwhile way to reduce exposure to the virus causing COVID-19, even when others are not wearing masks.
[3] The medical community’s ability to treat COVID-19 cases keeps improving.
There seem to be many small changes that are improving treatment of COVID-19. If patients are having trouble getting enough oxygen, having them lie on their stomachs seems to increase their blood oxygen levels. The cost of this change is pretty much zero, but it keeps people out of the ICU longer.
Originally, planners thought that ventilators would be needed for patients with COVID-19, since ventilators are often used on pneumonia patients. Experience has shown, however, that oxygen plus something like a CPAP machine often works better and is less expensive.**
The simple change of not sending recuperating patients to nursing home-type facilities for the last stages of care has proven helpful, as well. Many of these patients can still infect others, leading to infections in long-term care facilities. Tests to tell whether patients are truly over the disease do not seem to be very accurate.
Last week, it was announced that treatment with an inexpensive common steroid could reduce deaths of people on ventilators by one-third. It could also reduce deaths of those requiring only oxygen treatment by 20%. Using this treatment should significantly reduce deaths, at little cost.
We can expect improvements in treatments to continue as doctors experiment with existing treatments, and as drug companies work on new solutions. Looking at cumulative historical mortality rates tends to overlook the huge learning curve that is taking place, allowing mortality rates to be lower.
[4] More doubts are being raised about quickly finding a vaccine that prevents COVID-19.
The public would like to think that a vaccine solution is right around the corner. Vaccine promoters such as Anthony Fauci and Bill Gates would like to encourage this belief. Unfortunately, there are quite a few obstacles to getting a vaccine that actually works for any length of time:
(a) Antibodies for coronaviruses tend not to stay around for very long. A recent study suggests that even as soon as eight weeks, a significant share of COVID-19 patients (40% of those without symptoms; 12.9% of those with symptoms) had lost all immunity. A vaccine will likely face this same challenge.
(b) Vaccines may not work against mutations. Beijing is now fighting a new version of COVID-19 that seems to have been imported from Europe in food. Early indications are that people who caught the original Wuhan version of the COVID-19 virus will not be immune to the mutated version imported from Europe.
Vaccines that are currently under development use the Wuhan version of the virus. The catch is that the version of COVID-19 now circulating in the United States, Europe and perhaps elsewhere is mostly not the Wuhan type.
(c) There is a real concern that a vaccine against one version of COVID-19 will make a person’s response to a mutation of COVID-19 worse, rather than better. It has been known for many years that Dengue Fever has this characteristic; it is one of the reasons that there is no vaccine for Dengue Fever. The earlier SARS virus (which is closely related to the COVID-19 virus) has this same issue. Preliminary analysis suggests that the virus causing COVID-19 seems to have this characteristic, as well.
In sum, getting a vaccine that actually works against COVID-19 is likely to be a huge challenge. Instead of expecting a silver bullet in the form of a COVID-19 vaccine, we probably need to be looking for a lot of silver bee-bees that will hold down the impact of the illness. Hopefully, COVID-19 will someday disappear on its own, but we have no assurance of this outcome.
[5] The basic underlying issue that the world economy faces is overshoot, caused by too high a population relative to underlying resources.
When an economy is in overshoot, the big danger is collapse. The characteristics of overshoot leading to collapse include the following:
- Very great wage disparity; too many people are very poor
- Declining health, often due to poor nutrition, making people vulnerable to epidemics
- Increasing use of debt, to make up for inadequate wages and profits
- Falling commodity prices because too few people can afford these commodities and goods made from these commodities
- Gluts of commodities, causing farmers to plow under crops and oil to be put into storage
Thus, pandemics are very much to be expected when an economy is in overshoot.
One example of collapse is that following the Black Death (1348-1350) epidemic in Europe. The collapse killed 60% of Europe’s population and dropped Britain’s population from close to 5 million to about 2 million.
Figure 1. Britain’s population, 1200 to 1700. Chart by Bloomberg using Federal Reserve of St. Louis data.
We might say that there was a U-shaped population recovery, which took about 300 years.
A later example that almost led to collapse was the period between 1914 and 1945. This was a period of shrinking international trade, indicating that something was truly wrong. On Figure 2 below, the WSJ calls its measure of international trade the “Trade Openness Index.” The period 1914-1945 is highlighted as being somewhat like today.
Figure 2. The Trade Openness Index is an index based on the average of world imports and exports, divided by world GDP. Chart by Wall Street Journal.
Many of the issues in the 1914-1945 timeframe were coal related. World War I took place when coal depletion became a problem in Britain. The issue at that time was wages that were too low for coal miners because the price of coal would not rise very high. Higher coal prices were needed to offset the impact of depletion, but high coal prices were not affordable by citizens.
The Pandemic of 1918-1919 killed far more people than either World War I or COVID-19.
World War II came about at the time coal depletion became a problem in Germany.
Figure 3. Figure by author describing peak coal timing compared to World War I and World War II.
The problem of inadequate energy resources finally ended when World War II ramped up demand through more debt and through more women entering the labor force for the first time. In response, the US began pumping oil out of the ground at a faster rate. Instead of depending on coal alone, the world began depending on a combination of oil and coal as energy resources. The ratio of population to energy resources was suddenly brought back into balance again, and collapse was averted!
[6] We are now in another period of overshoot of population relative to resources. The critical resource this time is oil. The alternatives we have aren’t suited to fulfilling our most basic need: the growing and transportation of food. They act as add-ons that are lost if oil is lost.
If we look back at Figure 2 above, it shows that since 2008, the world has again fallen into a period of shrinking imports and exports, which is a sign of “not enough energy resources to go around.” We are also experiencing many of the other characteristics of an overshoot economy that I mentioned in Section 5 above.
Figure 4 shows world energy consumption by type of energy through 2019, using recently published data by BP. The “Other” combination in Figure 4 includes nuclear, hydroelectric, wind, solar, and other smaller categories such as geothermal energy, wood pellets, and sawdust burned for fuel.
Figure 4. World energy consumption by fuel, based on BP’s 2020 Statistical Review of World Energy.
Oil has been rising at a steady pace; coal consumption has been close to level since about 2012. Natural gas and “Other” seem to be rising a little faster in the most recent few years.
If we divide by world population, the trend in world energy consumption per capita by type is as follows:
Figure 5. World Per Capita Energy Consumption based on BP’s 2020 Statistical Review of World Energy
Many people would like to think that the various energy sources are substitutable, but this is not really the case, as we approach limits of a finite world.
One catch is that there are very few stand-alone energy resources. Most energy resources only work within a framework provided by other energy sources. Wood that is picked up from the forest floor can work as a stand-alone energy source. Wind can almost be used as a stand-alone energy source, if it is used to power a simple sail boat or a wooden windmill. Water can almost be used as a stand-alone energy source, if it can be made to turn a wooden water wheel.
Coal, when its use was ramped up, enabled the production of both concrete and steel. It allowed modern hydroelectric dams to be built. It allowed steam engines to operate. It truly could be used as a stand-alone energy source. The main obstacle to the extraction of coal was keeping the cost of extraction low enough, so that, even with transportation, buyers could afford to purchase the coal.
Oil, similarly, can be a stand-alone energy solution because it is very flexible, dense, and easily transported. Or it can be paired with other types of less-expensive energy, to make it go further. We can see our dependence on oil by how level energy consumption per capita is in Figure 5 since the early 1980s. Growth in population seems to depend upon the amount of oil available.
As I have mentioned in previous posts, the economy is a self-organizing system. If there isn’t enough of the energy products upon which the economy primarily depends, the system tends to change in very strange ways. Countries become more quarrelsome. People decide to have fewer children or they become more susceptible to pandemics, bringing population more in line with energy resources.
The problem with natural gas and with the electricity products that I have lumped together as “Other” is that they are not really stand-alone products. They cannot grow food or build roads. They cannot power international jets. They cannot build wind turbines or solar panels. They cannot put natural gas pipelines in place. They can only exist in a complex environment which includes oil and perhaps coal (or other cheaper energy products).
We are kidding ourselves if we think we can transition to modern fuels that are low in carbon emissions. Without high prices, oil and coal that are in the ground will tend to stay in the ground permanently. This is the serious obstacle that we are up against. Without oil and coal, natural gas and electricity products will quickly become unusable.
[7] A major problem with COVID-19 related shutdowns is the fact that they lead to very low commodity prices, including oil prices.
Figure 6. Inflation-adjusted monthly average oil prices through May 2020. Amounts are Brent Spot Oil Prices, as published by the EIA. Inflation adjustment is made using the CPI-Urban Index.
Oil is the primary type of energy used in growing and transporting food. It is used in many essential processes, including in the production of electricity. If its production is to continue, its price must be both high enough for oil producers and low enough for consumers.
The problem that we have been encountering since 2008 (the start of the latest cutback in trade in Figure 2) is that oil prices have been falling too low for producers. Now, in 2020, oil production is beginning to fall. This is happening because producing companies cannot afford to extract oil at current prices; governments of oil exporting countries cannot collect enough taxes at current prices. They hope that by reducing oil supply, prices will rise again.
If extraordinarily low oil prices persist, a calamity similar to the one that “Peak Oilers” have worried about will certainly occur: Oil supply will begin dropping. In fact, the drop will likely be much more rapid than most Peak Oilers have imagined, because the drop will be caused by low prices, rather than the high prices that they imagined would occur.
Amounts which are today shown as “proven reserves” can be expected to disappear because they will not be economic to extract. Governments of oil exporting countries seem likely to be overthrown because tax revenue from oil is their major source of revenue for programs such as food subsidies and jobs programs. When this disappears, governments of oil exporters are forced to cut back, lowering the standard of living of their citizens.
[8] What our strategy should be from now on is not entirely clear.
Of course, one path is straight into collapse, as happened after the Black Death of 1348-1352 (Figure 1). In fact, the carrying capacity of Britain might still be about 2 million. Its current population is about 68 million, so this would represent a population reduction of about 97%.
Other countries would experience substantial population reductions as well. The population decline would reflect many causes of death besides direct deaths from COVID-19; they would reflect the impacts of collapsing governments, inadequate food supply, polluted water supplies, and untreated diseases of many kinds.
If a large share of the population stays hidden in their homes trying to avoid COVID, it seems to me that we are most certainly heading straight into collapse. Supply lines for many kinds of goods and services will be broken. Oil prices and food prices will stay very low. Farmers will plow under crops, trying to raise prices. Gluts of oil will continue to be a problem.
If we try to transition to renewables, this leads directly to collapse as well, as far as I can see. They are not robust enough to stand on their own. Prices of oil and other commodities will fall too low and gluts will occur. Renewables will only last as long as (a) the overall systems can be kept in good repair and (b) governments can support continued subsidies.
The only approach that seems to keep the system going a little longer would seem to be to try to muddle along, despite COVID-19. Open up economies, even if the number of COVID-19 cases is higher and keeps rising. Tell people about the approaches they can use to limit their exposure to the virus, and how they can make their immune systems stronger. Get people started raising their vitamin D levels, so that they perhaps have a better chance of fighting the disease if they get COVID-19.
With this approach, we keep as many people working for as long as possible. Life will go on as close to normal, for as long as it can. We can perhaps put off collapse for a bit longer. We don’t have a lot of options open to us, but this one seems to be the best of a lot of poor options.
Notes:
*The CDC estimates are estimates of future deaths per 1000 cases. Thus, they probably reflect the learning curve that has already taken place. It is unlikely that they reflect the benefit of the new steroid treatment mentioned in Section 3, because this finding occurred after April 29.
**I have been told that disease spread can be a problem when using CPAP machines, however. Using ventilators at very low pressure settings seems also to be a solution.
“Asia’s economy is expected to shrink this year “for the first time in living memory,” the International Monetary Fund said, warning that the region could take several years to recover.”
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/01/imf-asias-economy-will-shrink-first-time-in-living-memory-due-to-coronavirus.html
“While the Army or the government from either side [India and China] has not disclosed what transpired during the talks, there were no hints of any consensus reached by the two countries to resolve the border dispute in Ladakh.
“Moreover, there are reports citing Army sources that the standoff may even continue well into the winters.”
https://english.jagran.com/india/indiachina-ladakh-standoff-no-hint-of-deescalation-from-third-round-of-talks-10013407
“Protests have broken out in Hong Kong during its first day under controversial national security laws imposed by Beijing, and after China confirmed that some suspects could be extradited to the mainland under the new rules.”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jul/01/hong-kong-activists-call-for-protests-over-security-law-as-city-marks-handover-anniversary
“…the production of wheat and rice in Asia would be heavily impacted if lockdowns to curb the pandemic and virus restrictions continue to be enforced.”
https://theaseanpost.com/article/cambodias-food-crisis-pandemic
Can’t leaders of these countries figure out the problems that will occur, if lockdowns are enforced?
Of course they can figure it out. So why are they doing it?
It’s interesting that 2.9 million Hong kongers plus dependents will be granted U.K. citizenship. Pity for those who voted brexit to stop immigration.
I am happy to welcome these British citizens to the UK.
Did you vote for brexit?
John, I also would be very happy to welcome three million civilised, hard working, and law abiding Hong Kong Chinese. I would be twice as happy if they replaced three million of the other kind of immigrant, of whom we have far too many.
Citizens are not exactly happy, I expect!
As a precedent has already been established, let’s provide the respective premiers of India and China with clubs, and watch them slog away on some mountain ridge, winner takes all.
Hundreds of millions of disgruntled citizens would probably be only too delighted to witness such a spectacle.
In the UK, Boris Johnson could be made to host young ravers in his garden and practice the welcoming attitude he preaches so glibly to inhabitants of seaside towns who have been overwhelmed by drunken, drugged and defecating revellers recently.
He wants ‘bustle and activity’, let’s give it to him.
Xabier, I believe two Indian princes mobilised for a war to resolve a territorial dispute. They then decided to play a game of chess instead. That, in my view, is true nobility.
“During the past week, three institutions well respected for their economic research – the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) and the United States Federal Reserve – have released reports about how the economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic will play out.
“Overall, it’s a grim prognosis and full of uncertainties, which pose daunting challenges for policymakers.”
https://www.straitstimes.com/opinion/economic-carnage-from-covid-19-laid-bare
“How do you make a balance sheet look pristine in a fractional reserve system that is inherently unstable? That’s easy. Just put everything you don’t want to show in something called a “variable interest entity,” stuff it with a bunch of credit card and mortgage debt and call it all “off-balance sheet.”
“The dominoes are all lined up for another financial collapse.”
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4356385-mainstream-wakes-up-to-prospect-of-banking-collapse
This Seeking Alpha article is disturbing. Banks have too much hidden bad debt.
According to the BIS:
This sounds like a horrible disaster!
Prospects are appalling.
Cut off all revenues for several months, and then expect those companies to thrive in a disrupted, depressed and impoverished society – what could go wrong?
2020
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Eb1NiQYWoAA_YzY?format=jpg&name=large
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/us-buys-debt-hollywood-giants-as-pandemic-credit-facility-ramps-up-1300880
The Federal Reserve purchased more than $16 million in debt from WarnerMedia owner AT&T, more than $13 million in debt issued by NBCUniversal owner Comcast and $4.5 million in debt issued by Fox Corp., among others.
The U.S. government has purchased millions of dollars in corporate bonds issued by entertainment giants like Fox Corp., Comcast, AT&T and others as part of a debt liquidity program spurred on by the novel coronavirus pandemic.
Because this is why the Federal Reserve was established. And why the big media will always so bravely hold its activities up to the light of scrutiny.
Unfortunately, AT&T and Comcast are big internet suppliers as well.
If they cut off internet service, a lot of websites will go down.
“The coronavirus pandemic is dealing a serious blow to investments aimed at cutting shipping emissions.
“The European Community Shipowners’ Associations, an umbrella trade body of vessel owners that control nearly half of the global commercial oceangoing fleet, says an industry survey in May found that three-quarters of its members would either halt or reduce investments in cleaner ships.”
https://www.wsj.com/articles/coronavirus-puts-the-brakes-on-the-clean-ship-movement-11593536612
“The coronavirus pandemic is dealing a serious blow to investments aimed at cutting shipping emissions.”
Hahaha. This pesky hurricane is really playing havoc with my hairdo!
“Hedge fund launches in the first quarter slumped to their lowest level since the 2008 financial crisis while fund liquidations surged by over 50% from the previous quarter, illustrating the stark challenges the industry faces this year.”
https://www.fnlondon.com/articles/hedge-fund-launches-fall-and-liqudiations-soar-in-q1-2020-20200630
“Coronavirus brought an end to one of the longest waves in mergers and acquisitions history as global dealmaking dropped to its lowest levels in more than a decade during the second quarter of 2020.
“Companies have struck just $485bn worth of deals since the beginning of April, down more than 50 per cent from the same period last year…”
https://www.ft.com/content/92c13865-6c67-4f48-b96b-3429194c2ea2
It is hard to see good opportunities for investment in this climate.
“The COVID-19 crisis has grounded airlines and halted air travel all over the world, with economic consequences that are rippling far beyond the sector. Here are four charts that show the main challenges faced by airlines right now – and the dramatic changes we could see in this vital industry.”
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/06/4-charts-airline-crisis-covid-way-ahead/
“Airbus (AIR.PA) on Tuesday announced plans to cut 15,000 jobs from its global workforce, citing the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the aviation industry.
“The French plane maker said the job cuts, which affect around 11% of staff, were “necessary” for “safeguarding the company’s future” in light of the COVID-19 pandemic.”
https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/coronavirus-pandemic-airbus-job-cuts-from-global-workforce-aviation-174939522.html
Thanks for the link….Also, Europe banning USA travel this Summer is going to be devastating to revenue in all related businesses. American Airlines is getting some bad press to allow middle seats to be filled on planes and this with the respike of the Kung flu.
On TV yesterday…folks won’t fly now
Loss of demand by airlines is part of what is depressing oil prices. It also cuts off a lot of imported goods that normally travel under planes full of passengers.
https://www.breakingisraelnews.com/153802/chinas-three-gorges-dam-largest-in-world-in-danger-of-collapse-after-worst-floods-in-70-years/
Weeks of heavy rain have put the Three Gorges Dam, the largest hydropower project in the world, in danger of collapse putting 400 million people at risk. The flooding has been described as the worst since 1949 with natural disasters being declared in 24 provinces and municipalities in the southwest and central China, especially in areas near the upper reaches of the Yangtze River and the Three Gorges Dam, causing the reservoir’s water level to exceed the flood control line.
The water level in China’s massive Three Gorges Reservoir reached 147 meters on Saturday, two meters above the flood warning line. Meanwhile, the inflow increased to 26,500 cubic meters per second from 20,500 cubic meters per second on the previous day.
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
This would really stimulate global demand if it collapsed.
That really sounds serious and I hope the Dam doesn’t fail.
It would surprise me if the dam was to break. It’s a gravity dam, which can usually withstand water level higher than the crest without too much damage. They can also open spillway and bottom outlets, potentially flooding area downstream but without as much impact as if it was to break. Big dams like that are dimensioned in order to resist to floods with return periods of more than 1000 years.
The dam has some major construction deficiencies, namely, it was never anchored to the bedrock. Google Earth pictures show the dam is shifting. It’s kind of like the world debt fiat crisis. As long as the banking system (the dam) holds, there will only be manageable consequences like some intermittent top over/ overflow floods, but if all the sequestered fiat behind the debt instrument dam is suddenly released, the results downstream for millions of people will be catastrophic. In the meantime, they are releasing a lot of water, unannounced, I suspect to try to decompress the dam and prevent catastrophic failure. Just like the FED is secretly releasing money into the system- as reserves. As long as they are contained, we’re ok, but if ever released, we will have a flood of inflation.
Sorry about the analogy. I cruised the Yangtze in 1994 when I was in China. I just have a fond memory of it. Glad I got to see it then.
Oh, dear! Building a dam like this so that it would be strong enough to never fail would be an impossible task.
Unfortunately, I can believe this. I walked on top of the Three Gorges Dam when I visited China in 2011. They said that there were small earthquakes in the area, related to the pressure the water was exerting.
One of the people who gave a lecture on the area said that many farmers had been displaced by the dam. They attempted to carry baskets of fertile soil from the valley up to the places on the hills where they would now live. A lot of people would need to move to cities. Some who stayed would work in the tourism industry, related to boats floating down the Yangtze River. A lot of shipping is done on the river as well.
EROEI calculations can be misleading. They don’t tell you about all of the displaced people. They don’t tell you about the chance of failure. They are based on the best possible case.
On June 29, an article was published called Flooding Worsens in China as Discharged Waters From Three Gorges Dam Inundate Cities.
“Alex” is funny today (and most days):
https://www.alexcartoon.com/index.cfm?cartoon_num=7709
“Japan’s industrial output fell for a fourth straight month in May to the lowest level since the global financial crisis and the jobless rate hit a three-year high, underscoring the broad economic pain caused by the coronavirus.
“Japan, the world’s third-largest economy is bracing for its worst postwar recession…”
https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-japan-economy-output/japan-factory-output-slumps-as-economy-sinks-deeper-in-recession-idUKKBN24105K
“Confidence among major Japanese manufacturers has plunged to its worst level since the global financial crisis, a key survey showed Wednesday, as the coronavirus dries up global demand.”
https://www.bangkokpost.com/world/1944036/japan-business-confidence-worst-since-2009-crisis
“Japanese auto supplier Sanden Holdings (6444.T) on Tuesday said it had filed for debt restructuring with its creditors as falling sales due to the coronavirus pandemic had made it difficult for the company to pursue its restructuring plans.”
https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-sanden-hldg-adr/pressured-by-coronavirus-japan-auto-supplier-sanden-holdings-files-for-debt-relief-idUKKBN2411J6
It is the failure of the weakest link that causes the problem. If there are not other suppliers for the air conditioners that Sanden Holdings supplies, it would seem like some cars could not be shipped.
Most interesting essay.
Considering masks- It may be helpful if you read up on Prof Denis Rancourt Mask don’t work. It has been censored and therefore opposes the consensus Covid19 narrative. So, I an sceptical, why censor a paper backed up with science from a reputable scientist? Here is a link to his paper. https://vixra.org/abs/2006.0044
The testing issue is still very questionable. The PCR test that is being used is not a diagnostic tool. In fact, the inventor specifically said it should not be used as a diagnostic tool It cannot determine a specific virus. https://off-guardian.org/2020/06/09/scientists-have-utterly-failed-to-prove-that-the-coronavirus-fulfills-kochs-postulates/ Some further reading on the issue https://digwithin.net/2020/04/08/covid-19-testing/. Further, the PCR test for coronavirus can return false positives in up to 80% of cases, so it’s entirely possible the majority of these deaths never even had the virus.- https://off-guardian.org/2020/06/09/report-over-95-of-uk-covid19-deaths-had-pre-existing-condition/. So, if the tests are neither accurate or diagnostics are wrong then purported deaths really for an unidentified and unproven to exist disease called covid19 and this has also affected treatment protocol too.
This must affect the numbers reported too. Governments are trying to cover their butts. No government wants to lose power because they did nothing so they have reacted to pressure and precaution not science and fact. Now the numbers are used to justify political policy. It has proved hard to differentiate between the causes of death. “she/he died after testing positive for coronavirus”. Or “died with covid” or “died of covid”, “as a result of” or “because of”, but “after testing positive”. You die of an infection not with an infection
On the treatment. My conjecture. The reason for the massive differences in results of studies concerning the treatment of Covid19 is that because the disease has been falsely tested by PCR test. Could it be misdiagnosis and a resulting defective treatment protocols caused specifically by the fear and panic created by the WHO saying it was a new virus? The treatments or treatment protocols being given to treating doctors may be be the wrong treatment for incorrect diagnosis. That is why there is so many different conclusions being drawn on the different treatments. We see this in the issue of ventilation used and in variations of treatments and the results are so different. Vitamin C Vitamin D, Hydroxychloroquine, with Zink , without , with antibiotics etc. Then suddenly a new treatment emerges, then Remdesivir and now dexamethasone, all appear to seem to have varied successes. The treatments remain symptomatic do they not?
I would agree with you that the outcome of testing is not as accurate as we would like. It seems to give both false positives and false negatives. The test results tend to come back days later. They also seem to cost a lot, relative to any insight they provide for treatment. As you say, most treatment is based on symptoms. They don’t even tell when a person is not infectious very well. Results on the same person seem to flip back and forth.
At this point, we seem to be stuck with what we have, unfortunately.
The whole story is very politicized. Too many people want to sell media stories that are as frightening as possible. Politicians want to solve many problems at once. If they have a problem with closed factories, they want to hide it with a necessary closure due to COVID-19.
Yes! Very politicized.
Agree with this, the Sars cov2 reaction has become a politicized mantra. Insuring better air quality in urban environments, and reducing domestic smoke, especially in large cities and during winter ( possibility keeping away from shared air conditioning too,) would do more for human health than ineffective tests. Personal/ family health enhancement and exercise is the best focus, pulse diet, fennel tea, Vitamin C and Vitamin/Hormone D3 lol.
odd why Chinese would stop meat imports unless they know something we don’t
https://www.bloombergquint.com/politics/china-halts-meat-imports-from-more-plants-amid-virus-confusion
When I searched on Google, the stoppage of the meat exports is a problem that has been going on to some extent since April. It may partly reflect the fact that with layoffs, the Chinese people can no longer afford as much imported meat.
There may also be a concern that the virus that causes COVID-19 can spread in refrigerated meat. They seem to believe that the last round of COVID-19 cases came in refrigerated salmon cases. One article I found (dated June 21) says, China Stops Tyson Imports Over Covid-19 Concerns
let me tell you what will happen humans are so good at ruining everything so that’s what we’ll do we will ruin everything once everything is ruined and a M.A.D. (mutually assured destruction ) through the use of planet ending nuclear weapons or the spent fuel pools going off, the proverbial cavalry will come in to save us they will not be what you .
Yes we’ll give the scientists of the world the task of fixing the spent fuel problem that will be their life’s mission .
With all the emphasis on solar, I don’t see why they can’t set up a solar system for the nuke pond cooling pumps. At least it would delay the problem for a while.
I wonder whether a solar system could even be made to work for this purpose. Pumps used for this purpose require “good quality” electricity of the right kind. They can’t be off for two weeks when the sun is behind a cloud. The solar panels have to be dusted off and otherwise maintained. I wonder whether even with a substantial set of backup batteries such a system could be made to work.
There would also be the issue of adding more water, as it evaporates, I expect.
Gail a 5kw system would pump Venice dry. Thats about $6000 or the cost of a screwdriver in the nuclear industry.
Nice 5 kw inverter $2000
Batteries $2000
Panels $1000
Charge controller $300
The nuclear industry assumes a 2 week period to be max for grid down and maintains diesel generator capacity for that time period
Batteries for how long? Long enough to last during a very long cloudy spell?
The thinking behind doing “more with less”
This analysis implies that, even if the Paris Accord target of a 1.5 °C to 2.0 °C rise in temperature is met, we cannot exclude the risk that a cascade of feedbacks could push the Earth System irreversibly onto a “Hothouse Earth” pathway. The challenge that humanity faces is to create a “Stabilized Earth” pathway that steers the Earth System away from its current trajectory toward the threshold beyond which is Hothouse Earth (Fig. 2). The human-created Stabilized Earth pathway leads to a basin of attraction that is not likely to exist in the Earth System’s stability landscape without human stewardship to create and maintain it. Creating such a pathway and basin of attraction requires a fundamental change in the role of humans on the planet. This stewardship role requires deliberate and sustained action to become an integral, adaptive part of Earth System dynamics, creating feedbacks that keep the system on a Stabilized Earth pathway (Alternative Stabilized Earth Pathway).
This can’t happen, I am afraid. People in academia seem to write wishful thinking articles.
I believe that the lockdowns related to the virus fear mongering which is happening now is part of the plan to go down the path of Stabilised Earth Pathway so expect more lockdowns
It is a bit of a stretch to think that academics would have devised a plan to mitigate the problem of diminishing returns from non-renewable resources but I believe a plan B was devised many years ago involving a move into renewable resources but as you say their wishful thinking is purely that a fantasy that they wholly believe in unfortunately they will take us all with them as they carry on with this “delusistani” plan of theirs.
Right, without the covid-hysteria we could maybe kick the can for some more years, but isn’t true we were doomed already in December 19? What happens when something cannot go on?
This masterplan was conceived in Delusistan, i agree. But could i advance a better one? Not really. Could you?
yes i believe i could come up with a better plan that will not result in a planet ending resuit after the earth is devastated by future wars and the spent fuel pools going off ,we need a simpler system bring back morse code communication ,eliminate the stock market,eliminate politics,eliminate all practices that do not contribute to the common good we would be returning to a simpler way of life a spartan existence if you cant grow food or provide for yourself then you’ll simply starve
Yes, good plan. But it is feasable? I don’t see how. I believe the train to Stable Ecosystem Land passed long time ago. Maybe in the 70’s we could have catched it yet, although i doubt it. Now it’s seems too late for any kind of managed degrowth. It is being implemented, but it will not get us too far i think.
I’ve long believed that, in many disciplines, it’s often not the best and brightest who stay in academia after graduating, merely those who can play the politics well and like the lifestyle – as it used to be that is, things are not so good for lecturers these days.
Add to that the requirement to publish frequently in fashionable fields, and universities end up emitting an awful lot of rather absurd and quite useless tripe.
Fair enough. Professors in some fields can make more money outside academia; in others, not so much. Tenure (not having to worry about being fired) has historically been a key benefit, though this would not apply to lecturers (who are often overworked and underpaid in the USA), and these days you have to worry about running afoul of moral codes (e.g. being accused of sexual harassment or something).
Publishing these days is often evaluated according to citation indices, which reward you if you get written about by other people (positively or negatively). The process favors larger fields over well-established but small niches, and English over other languages.
Of course, colleges and universities vary a lot–the Ivies are very different from the big state schools, military academies, Bible colleges (including BYU), HBCUs, liberal arts colleges, junior colleges, for-profits, etc., and schools overseas are different from US ones. Virtual instruction has been a big shift, of course. I expect a big wave of college bankruptcies to be the next big thing–we’re talking hundreds of US schools over the next few years. It could conceivably be worse.
Following this modus, you can bet academia will strive for BAU to recommence ASAP. With joblessness becoming a feature of the new normal, government and uncertainties will drive demand as a stop gap to keep young folk occupied, under control, out of the workforce and mostly mindless.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=E0J2LObdT-g
What if we’re heading into a grand solar minimum though? Some outlier farmers, researchers, and various folk have spoken of the weather turning colder….some say we’re leaving the warm period and heading into a 50-70 year minimum of sun activity after solar cycle 25 (just starting now), which would greatly affect crop yields.
To add to all this we are poisoning our food supply and killing topsoil right before this big shift….the world needs a lot more small farmers regardless. All hands on deck!
@War
We have to apply antidote to our food supply and restore the soil. This is the only way to survive.
Why do you say “What of…” or “Some say…”
We are going into a cooling period….it is getting colder….the ice pack is growing in Greenland….our spring and fall are much colder, much more moisture affecting planting and harvests.
It getting warmer here on Earth.
What planet are you on?
It was warmer during the Eemian, Duncan.
And during the Holocene Optimum.
And during the Minoan, Roman and Medieval Warming Periods.
And during the 1930s.
Do we have to go through this pointless charade of a cli-mate debate, yet again?
The Paris Accord is a joke and always was one. For one thing, if you remove the global dimming caused by pollution, we are already over the 1.5C limit. Which gives us almost half the effect of the Mediaeval Warm Period, which did not create a hothouse Earth. For another, the European countries promised to reduce emissions (a promise many of them broke), but other countries were not required to promise anything, merely to provide “estimates” a couple of decades in the future. And finally, Europe as a whole managed to reduce coal consumption by moving that consumption, and the industries it enabled, to mainland China. Big deal.
Finally, I note that Forbes has censored the public apology of a certain former climate change academic. If Forbes is that anxious to maintain the green movement, then it is not about climate, it is about money. Which was obvious to many of us a decade ago.
Oh, yes, there are electricity shortages in south Sweden due to shutting down nukes now forces the oil burners into commission. Hooray for the “environmentalist” mercenaries causing fuels better suited for transportation and manufacturing being burned for electricity.
Mayor of Miami suggests he’s willing to shut the city back down if he’s unable to contain the coronavirus surge with a mask mandate and new penalties
From Business Insider
Mayor of Miami suggests he’s willing to shut the city back down if he’s unable to contain the coronavirus surge with a mask mandate and new penalties
Eliza Relman 2 hours ago
People wait in a queue to enter Island H2O Live! water park in the Orlando area over Memorial Day weekend.
People wait in a queue to enter Island H2O Live! water park in the Orlando area over Memorial Day weekend. Paul Hennessy/Getty Images
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Trump-aligned Republican, was slow to shut his state down to contain the coronavirus and quick to reopen it.
Florida’s coronavirus cases are now skyrocketing and the state is a new national epicenter of the pandemic.
Miami Mayor Francis Suarez told Business Insider that he hopes the governor follows his lead in implementing a mandate to wear masks in public places.
And he warned that he’s prepared to shut his city down again if hospitals reach a critical state.
The mayor said the rapidly rising rate of infection among young people is in part due to widespread noncompliance with social distancing orders.
He said Trump’s refusal to wear a mask has “without a doubt” undermined his efforts.
And Parents are upset
MIAMI (CBSMiami) – A group of Broward parents arguing their children should be given the option to go back to school five days a week come August held a rally outside the Broward School Board Building on Tuesday morning.
They chanted and carried signs. Dozens of public school parents just want their voices to be heard.
“We have to get back to education, not two days a week,“ says parent Anna Warburton.
“They are creating an achievement gap. Parents who can afford it send their kids to private school,” said demonstrator Tracy Christiansen.
The School Board met to discuss the reopening of schools in August.
these stories combine to give the typical scenario going forward.
politicians, not being systems thinkers, might feel compelled to do more lockdowns, while most of the citizens will be “upset” by the whims of their politicians.
I saw a story that the governor of PA has had a 40% drop in his approval rating.
politicians thought and maybe still think that they know best for their citizens, and many citizens are saying no.
do masks, don’t do lockdowns.
There are indications that sunlight on the skin, not vitamin D gives the needed Covid-19 protection. Vitamin d is just a marker. Taking vitamin d supplements does not help. Sunlight has other benefits too. Too much can trigger skin cancer. Fortunately, light-skinned people only need a few minutes on a small patch of skin, dark-skinned more.
https://www.drmirkin.com/health/morehealth/sunlight-more-than-vitamin-d.html
The virus is spiking in the US “Sun Belt,” though.
They are all indoors with aircon.
Have you spent time in the South?
Not the healthiest of Americans, who are a health challenged group to begin with.
Duncan, I have spent time in the US south. Never again if I can help it. The people seem to live in a wholly artificial environment, driving in air conditioned cars from one air conditioned building to another. They are mostly obese, because they never get healthy outdoor exercise. They mostly have infectious diseases, because a large air conditioned building or shopping mall is almost an ideal plague factory.
And it is all unnecessary. I grew up in Africa with no air conditioning, but in buildings designed for the climate: deep eaves, verandas and balconies, breezeways. And I lived in Singapore for 20 years without ever turning on the air conditioning in the apartments I rented. Of course, I selected only apartments with windows that opened and had at least some shade above them. After all, we evolved in the tropics, and the idea we cannot live in them today without a fake climate is absurd.
Yea, I lived in Micronesia for a year, without electricity or running water.
Every time I’m in Atlanta, I think this city would go back to a population of 25,000 when aircon goes,
Duncan, that must be an interesting story, when you have the time. We also had no electricity for the first couple of years. Food was cooked on a wood burning stove in a kitchen about 5 metres from the house along a breezeway, to reduce the pollution. Lighting was by oil lamps. I remember my mother insisted on dining in good light, with a lamp in the middle of the table. A moth falling on her dinner plate, and bigger than the dinner plate, convinced her otherwise. Lamps belong in corners, and since nature thoughtfully fitted our eyes with an iris that worked pretty well.
Running water, happily, was available. Cold showers in the tropics work quite well.
I lived in a Japanese country side house for a few months, the sliding doors opened the house up like a origami letting the cool breeze from the mountain pass straight through the house (with swallows nesting in the “Genkan”). It was quite picturesque and comfortable, even for a whitety dude conditioned to a climate above the arctic circle. However, in Tokyo during the same time of year the heat was awful.
dozens will die, perhaps hundreds.
Deaths aren’t up in the South. In fact, there does seem to be an increase in total US deaths today, but it is a spike in New York reported deaths. I would imagine it is another reclassification of “old” NY deaths as COVID-19 deaths. Outside of the NY-NJ-CN region, deaths are staying down, even though reported illnesses are up. The big concentration of public transit and high rise buildings is in the NY-NJ-CN area.
https://gailtheactuary.files.wordpress.com/2020/04/us-south-and-us-ex-ny-nj-ct-new-deaths-june-30.png
https://gailtheactuary.files.wordpress.com/2020/04/us-south-vs-us-excuding-ny-nj-ct-new-cases.png
Cases are rising in Alabama but hospitalizations are falling.
Lots of obesity here in AL. Most people dying from Covid are walking heart attacks.
It seems like I ran across this issue before. It would be very nice if Vitamin D pills were sufficient. Then we might be able to solve quite a few of our medical problems (including COVID-19) with Vitamin D pills.
I have been outside walking quite a bit, but I tend to stay in the shade quite a bit of the time because it is more comfortable, especially when the weather is already warm. Maybe sunshine is the reason why walking is so helpful to health.
I just sunbathed for 20 minutes at 1pm with the sun close to the zenith, naked but for my 98% UV-cut sunglasses, and now I feel able to leap tall buildings at a single bound.
I have one strong disagreement with interrguru’s statement. Taking vitamin D supplements DOES help, especially if you can’t get enough sunshine.
Come on everyone, get that blood vitamin D level up and say goodbye to a host of medical issues. It might even save your life and allow you to survive long enough to make a profit on all those pension and social security premiums the government has been syphoning out of your pay packets all these decades.
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/61B7RA57u0L._AC_SY741_.jpg
Walking must also be good for brain function, as one has to observe carefully so as to avoid collisions and difficulties: very different to the mental and physical laziness of being a passenger or on a motorway in the simplified environment which lanes, signs and barriers creates. Also, one has never heard of ‘walking rage’, unlike driving…..
Just getting brief exposure to a small area of the skin is not enough except that it can help to avoid the worst of D-deficiency diseases. But it is not sufficent for optimal health. Vitamin D3 is not in fact a vitamin but is a pro-hormone that is involved in thousands of hormonal processes in the body. Of course, to get the D3 that you need, there is no need to bake in the sun until you look like beef jerky, but at the same time, sticking your elbow out of the car windown while you drive will be unlikely to get you what you need.
I have seen recommendations of 40 minutes a day of whole body exposure to sunlight as being optimal for building up your D3 levels. That kind of exposure is hard to get for most people but it is a good target.
Note that there is zero chance that this kind of exposure will give anyone cancer. Perhaps if you are exposed and repeatedly BADLY SUNBURN certain areas of your skin, then skin cancer may result decades in the future. But it also may not.
The Slip, Slap, Slop anti-sun (supposedly anti-skin-cancer) campaign that the Australian government ran for so many years was a public health disaster as instead of saying “don’t lay for four hours a day in the hellish radiation of the midday Australian sun while smearing bronzer on yourself like you are basting a turkey” they said “Run for the hills!” “The sun will burn us all to a crisp! You will all get cancers if you go out into the sun!” “Cower in the shadows until dusk!” “Beware the solar Morlocks!”
People at bus stops would edge away to find shade twenty meters away and run out waving when they saw teh approach of teh bus because they feared five miniuts of exposure would become a potentially deadly threat decades hence. Lunacy. Parents would request that their children be removed from sitting near windows in the classroom because who knows, some rays of sunlight might fall on them.
It is always the same with these government and agency people. Their PERSONAL IMPORTANCE AND EVER LARGER BUDGETS depend on everyday people jumping at shadows and panicking at the slightest rustle in the grass “It’s a monster come to get us! Ruuun!”
For decades otherwise sensible people in Australia strived to avoid exposure to something that is essential to human health and that has an important role in human hormonal regulation.
Because idiots and schemers told them to.
Remind you of anything?
Normies, go figure ’em.
They remind me of the braindead Eloi in H.G. Wells’s The Time Machine who would walk into the shelters the Morlocks had prepared for them at the hoot of a siren.
one of my dermatologists informed me once that there is no such thing as a “healthy tan”, only sun-damaged skin.
for light-skinned folks, he advised avoiding the sun between 9 AM and 4 PM. when outside, wear long-sleeved shirts and pants, a broad-brimmed hat, good sunglasses (UVA and UVB polarizing) and apply plenty of SBF 50+ to any exposed skin.
i usually observe the 15 minute rule these days, after that it’s head for the shade. i live in Hawaii, so the sun exposure is brutal.
at 40, i had cataracts in both eyes. i’ve lost count of the number of skin cancer operations. i see a dermatologist every 3 months. they usually meet me with liquid nitrogen canister in hand, ready to burn precancers.
I wonder why you are burning so easily? Were you getting tremendous amounts of sun? Did you have a high-carb diet? When I ate high carb, 30 minutes in the high sun would turn me beet-red and cover me in sun blisters.
Since I have been low-carb (ten years) I have been able to stay in the sun for 30-45 minutes and get a faint red. No painful burning or blistering. I am very pale. I do not tan – I just go a kind of beige.
The advice of your dermatologist would leave you very D3-depleted. As for the eyes, it is hard to argue with sunglasses.
My American neighbor, who is 80 years old, also has to have the liquid nitrogen canister treatment every three months, and he’s had his corneas replaced. He spent many years as a young man sailing around the Pacific and being serially over-exposed to the sun. I hope for both of your sakes that BAU continues to sail on unabated.
On the upside, he reports that since the cataract surgery he’s been literally staggered by how bright the world is. It certainly puts Goethe’s reported last words “More light!” in a brand new light.
For myself, a reasonably light-skinned bloke of 60, I wear a broad-brimmed straw hat and good sunglasses when out in the sun. But a lot depends on where one is and on the time of year. The sunlight is stronger at sea or on the coast than inland, stronger in the country than the city, stronger at higher elevations, and stronger the higher the sun is in the sky. The eyes need protection all year round in most places as the UV will progressively damage the corneas, let alone the retinas.
For the skin, I don’t mind up to 20 minutes of sunbathing even at midday in summer because I think the health-enhancing-in-small-doses UV is stronger then. By contrast, when the sun is lower in the sky, the nice UV doesn’t reach the ground but the nasty skin-aging-and-cancer-inducing UV penetrates quite nicely.
I’ve noticed that many Japanese people my age exhibit signs of aging skin including wrinkles, moles and things only your dermatologist could describe. Commonly they have not taken any precautions and taken too much sun over too many years. The are also a minority, invariably female, who avoid sunlight like vampires, wearing big hats, visors and long gloves plus a parasol, and these ladies tend to have whitish or translucent skin. In their natural environment, East Asians tend to be olive skinned and require about four times as much sun exposure than northern Europeans to synthesize Vitamin D. So white-skinned ones are going to be Vitamin D deficient unless they are taking supplements or eating huge amounts of shitake mushrooms.
Charles Hugh Smith gets parts of the story right:
Forget the V, W or L Recovery: Focus on N-P-B
I don’t agree with this part, however:
His solution seems to deny the laws of physics. I am afraid it won’t work.
He along with Chris Martenson likes to sell “Hopium”. In fact Martenson has CHS as a semi-regular guest.
Agreed. Society, and those left over, will have to do more with less in the future. But I doubt it will be a positive experience.
https://www.dailydot.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/How_It_Ends_Netflix_movie_review-e1531616564682-1024×512.jpg
https://dailydosewithdrshermaine.files.wordpress.com/2018/08/dose31.jpg?w=700
CHS realy has nothing useful to say about the future, however good his analysis of the financial disaster we are in.
The whole ‘More attention to need, less greed, more meaningful and richer life’ theme is utter, utter tripe.
Appealing, but rubbish none the less.
‘A fuller, richer life with less’ rolls nicely off the tongue, but is as absurd as promises of Heavenly rewards or the Communist Utopian, and so on.
Hard, cruel and bitter times clearly await us – those who survive the repeated shocks which are coming that is – and to face them we will need great spiritual as well as physical strength.
There is a reason that the Bible is so full of great and inspiring poetry – it is because the times were so brutal and called on every resource of our humanity.
1 To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
2 A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
3 A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
4 A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
5 A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
6 A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
7 A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
8 A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.
(Ecclesiastes iii:1-8)
“His solution seems to deny the laws of physics. I am afraid it won’t work.”
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=pWdd6_ZxX8c
I don’t really agree.
Comments like this, and some of the others below, seem to boil our future down to a binary pair of absolutes – either BAU will continue, or things will go to absolute hell (subtly suggesting mass human species die-off or possibly near-human extinction).
While CHS doesn’t usually discuss the darker side of collapse (perhaps he feels there’s enough focus by others on our approaching dystopian future?), I don’t think he’s naive to the fact that much of the lifestyle we’re accustom to will disappear for most, if not all, people who survive through collapse. What I believe he is eluding to is an idea that constantly seems to be avoided / disparaged here at OFW: that our current industrialized civilization (BAU, if you will) is, in many ways, a gilded cage that is oppressive, pathological, and unnecessarily exploitative.
These living conditions – which some here would drag out as long as possible for reasons I can’t completely grasp (other than to maintain their current living standard and/or self-preservation), cost to future generations be damned – make use insane, lonely, isolated, oppressed, and spiritually devoid.
Collapse can be viewed in a positive light in that it may free us from (at least some of) these constraints. If you don’t care about, or don’t want to look yourself in the mirror and recognize you suffer from these intangible issues (thus viewing the quality of your existence solely on your employment, your standard of living, your access to energy and food, other tangible things, etc.), then I suppose that makes sense. But personally, I think anyone who doesn’t recognize that our “gilded cage” reality comes to us at a cost in other forms is rather naive (a more eloquent writer than I might argue that, while we certainly lead longer and more content lives right now, we don’t actually live those lives in any meaningful way).
Generations who came before us had to learn to be less wasteful and do more with less. I don’t see why it violates the laws of physics to suggest we will have to re-learn the ways of the past.
Painful and difficult, yes. But impossible? Never say never… 🙂
Cheers,
-GBV
Generations before us had a much lower total population and less depleted resources. What they could do, we cannot do.
@Gail Tverberg
The Black Death carried of 1/3 of Europe. I will not rule out the massive capability of Pestillence to whittle down the population over time.
Collapse brought the decline in population of Europe from 1/3 to 60%. Black Death was just the part of the collapse scenario at that time.
Now, the economy is balanced in such a way that even a small disturbance to the economy will bring the population down by a much larger percentage.
Thinking my point has once again been missed.
I’m arguing that the quality of one’s life is based on more than just the tangibles (population density, total energy, total resources, etc.). I’m arguing that the outcome of our journey – what we can or cannot achieve – is less important than the journey itself. And I’m arguing that perhaps conflict / suffering / loss are necessary to our existence, freeing us from our complacency to allow us to lead a meaningful life.
Don’t want to put words into the mouth of CHS, but I think he’d argue something similar.
Cheers,
-GBV
GBV,
Like you, i always thought that average homo colossus way of living is a sad sight and a stupid way of squander finite and valuable resources. And i always shuned the kind of life that corporate world demands from his servants. Never work more than 4 hours a day. was my vow, thinking better to be poor than to be a wage-slave. .
But you can’t don’t forget this:
With no fossil fuels (~1780) 1 billion people in this planet,
With some fossil fuels (~1920) 2 billion people.
With all the fossil fuels-and-the-kitchen-sink ( today) 7.8 billion.
It seems some sort of die-off is simply inevitable.I don’t see how to deny that.
Cheers!
Well, I’m not denying it really – deaths are inevitable. But I’m suggesting a good death (or perhaps even a rotten one) may be better than some of the lives being led today.
Also, I don’t really claim to understand nature or physics as well as some people here, but I do sometimes wonder if the combined constraints on energy and the difficulty of overcoming the natural world in the past limited human growth more so than we recognize.
Having trouble to put words to exactly what I’m trying to get at, so an example might be more helpful: perhaps in the 1780s when large swathes of forest and wilderness stood in our way, further human expansion (both in terms of population growth and in an actual geographic sense) wasn’t really possible without an energy-intensive reformation / re-purposing (“geoforming”?) of the land.
Fossil fuels provided us with the high energy sources we required to open up the land and make it more habitable / productive for mankind. As a result, it makes me wonder if the people of post-collapse will have more ability / opportunity to thrive than the people of 1780 who were so energy / geographically constrained.
Of course, there’s the issue that Gail raised about our resources being depleted today compared to the past (no gold boulders just laying around in Alaska waiting to be found, or overwhelming amounts of seafood to be harvested without IC technology, just as two examples), and we’ve also sunk a lot of that energy into creating man-made geography that will be just as challenging (or more so) for people to overcome / re-pupose (e.g. our cities) to something of use, so perhaps those issues outweigh any gains we’ve created through our use of fossil fuels… hard to say.
Cheers,
-GBV
JMS, I think you are too optimistic. The soil in 1790 was still healthy, undamaged by artificial fertiliser, not poisoned by artificial pesticides and herbicides, annually renewed with human and animal output. Today, at least in the “rich” countries, the soil is dead, and will take centuries to recover. Left to itself, the famous US bread basket could probably support fewer people than it did in 1491.
“What nobody dares even ask is: what businesses and industries will still be financially viable running at 50% capacity? How many cafes, restaurants, resorts, airlines, etc. will turn a profit operating at 50% capacity? How many can not just survive half of the seats being empty, but turn a profit?”
these are misleading questions.
he proposes a reduction of half of all customers, but misses the obvious possibility of a reorganizing of the economy.
in a city or town with only half the 2019 amount of customers, it seems that about half of the cafes and restaurants can operate near full capacity IF the other half of the cafes and restaurants go out of business. (required social distancing may impact this negatively.)
with 50% less customers, perhaps half of all businesses could run at a profit IF half of their competitors go out of business.
that’s a simplistic model of the near future.
a lot of patience will be needed as many of these outcomes will happen later in 2020 and into 2021.
No, the social distancing is going to be required, for the foreseeable future, unless we just let COVID-19 go around and around, reducing the population on each round (or we find a solution – cheap cure or cheap vaccine that really works. It is the social distancing that leads to the need for 50% capacity. Even if half the cafes go out of business, the remaining restaurants will not be able to make a profit. Too much rent per customer, for example.
maybe.
the ones who own their buildings are more adapted to be in the survivor group.
half the customers could eat in, and the half who can’t get seats might have to settle for take-out.
profits will be lower, even with higher meal prices.
you are right about the self-organizing aspect of the economy. it will continue to self-organize.
Is a vaccine the answer? It was never effective for a coronavirus in any event. Why not let it die off naturally like it does every year. The numbers of death appear quite normal for an annual flu. When has it ever been sound medical governmental policy to sacrifice – and destroy – the economic, mental, and physical well-being of the 99 percent to protect and save the one percent…or less?
Hey, we got a volunteer for the “herd”. Now you go work with the covid-19 stricken and take care of the near and dear.
And covid19 exists does it, Why because you were told it does by the UN cult. Where is the vaccine for HIV? I never got a vaccine for mumps or for Chieken pox or measles and I am immune against that without a vaccine. Here open your eyes. Here is the evidence it does not. https://off-guardian.org/2020/06/27/covid19-pcr-tests-are-scientifically-meaningless/
The survivors would have to be allowed to run at 100% seating capacity, no masks or distancing.
Those over 65-70 yrs old should then avoid eating out – now, what % are they of the pre-COVID customer base I wonder?
Quite a large percentage, I expect. They are often the more well off financially. They have plenty of time as well.
One of my older sisters, around 75 yrs of age and technically obese, is a liberal and was arguing with me that the lockdowns must continue to “protect” everyone…meaning her. While I talked with her she was picking up take out from some restaurant. On the one hand our economy must stop for the safety of people like her but on the other hand she is risking her health getting food prepared by someone that might be a carrier of Covid! Go Figure….
Yes..you just have to shake your head.
Meanwhile in Norway:
Cries for hydrogen ferries *now*, minister says we’re not quite there but almost.
Jarle, the hydrogen will be produced from the excess hydroelectric Norway has? How much excess hydroelectric does Norway have?
None. Hydropower provides (as of Jan 2020) just 60% of Norway’s demand for electricity. But they are still building, though not as fast as demand is growing. And before fainting in coils about hydrogen, remember that 80% by weight of the output from water electrolysis is oxygen, which in concentration is a serious pollutant.
There is also the issue of energy. One may perhaps devise a thought experiment whereby, with the energy inputted to break the oxygen-hydrogen bonds being equal to the energy outputted when those bonds are reformed, hydrogen is an energy carrier, not an energy source.
In the real world, however, when factoring in the energy to build and operate all relevant infrastructure and allowing for the energy lost through the hydrogen escaping, hydrogen produced by electrolysis of water is a net energy sink.
If the idea is to use hydrogen to replace fossil fuels and we stop using fossil fuels, then where do we get the energy from to make up for the energy lost through our use of hydrogen as an energy source when it is actually an energy sink? How many trees will we be chopping down and burning in our failed attempt at solving the problem we created with our transition to the hydrogen economy?
Not that anybody cares about such matters, of course. Hydrogen is clean and green. Hydrogen is an environmentally friendly, renewable, and limitless source of energy. The world is saved!
According to 2018 numbers from the norwegian statistical bureau, hydropower production was 139,7 TWh and gross electricity consumption 136,9 TWh.
https://www.ssb.no/en/energi-og-industri/statistikker/elektrisitet/aar
Norway is a big exporter of electricity.
BP doesn’t show exported electricity separately from other electricity, but it is clear from its data that Norway’s hydroelectric is quite variable from year to year (making it hard to rely on). It is not trending up quickly, either, even as other countries need more balancing power.
Recent terawatt hours of generation are given as follows by BP:
2008 139.0
2009 125.3
2010 116.8
2011 120.3
2012 141.7
2013 128.2
2014 135.4
2015 137.3
2016 142.2
2017 142.0
2018 139.0
2019 125.3
I’d imagine frozen rivers have a limited value.
@Robert Firth
I hope we aren’t losing water from this.
Poor Nigeria being hit from all sides:
“Nigerian cocoa farmers and exporters are facing a serious economic crisis caused by the global coronavirus lockdown. Huge losses are being recorded daily as cocoa stays in the country’s warehouses because of restrictions at destination ports, meaning the longer it sits the more it decreases in weight, reducing its value.
“The country’s farmers are also suffering from a lack of pesticides needed to grow the next crop.”
https://www.confectionerynews.com/Article/2020/06/29/Nigerian-cocoa-faces-serious-economic-crisis-due-to-coronavirus-outbreak
“Zimbabwe has blocked the majority of mobile money transactions and suspended the country’s stock exchange as it seeks to stabilise its currency.
“The move prompted outcry, with merchants unable to honour any transactions…”
https://www.developingtelecoms.com/telecom-technology/mobile-financial-services/9705-zimbabwe-suspends-mobile-money-services-amid-economic-crisis.html
This should solve the problem, after all it’s an Election year!
House passes new coronavirus relief bill for renters and homeowners, as Democrats urge Republicans to negotiate further aid
rperper@businessinsider.com (Rosie Perper)
June 30, 2020, 3:20 AM EDT
Richard Tsong-Taatarii/Star Tribune via Getty Images
The House of Representatives on Monday passed legislation in order to protect Americans impacted by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic from evictions and foreclosures.
The bill, sponsored by Rep. Maxine Waters of California, passed by a vote of 232-180 split down party lines. Only one Democrat, Rep. Kurt Schrader of Oregon, voted against the measure.
Waters said the Emergency Housing Protections and Relief Act of 2020 contains several provisions that were included in the HEROES Act, a $3 trillion stimulus bill that passed the House in May.
The bill allocates $100 billion towards emergency rental assistance, establishes a $75 billion fund for homeowners, and extends an eviction and foreclosure moratorium. It now heads to the Senate for further action.
….America was facing an affordable housing crisis before this pandemic hit,” Waters added. “With so many families struggling as a result of the pandemic, we are now on the precipice of an eviction and homelessness crisis like we’ve never seen in our lifetimes
……..The legislation now heads to the Senate for further action.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer called on Senate Republicans to start negotiations on a new coronavirus relief bill, though they have signaled that they would not support the Democrat-led measure.
Read the original article on Business Insider
Well I just got off the phone with local (county) tax appraisal office. They have increased my property taxes by 10% from last year (based on their appraised value).
Of course I asked and wanted to know how they figured my property went up 10% in value from last year.They said it was across the board for everybody and for me to go pound sand. I live in Texas.
Looks like I’m going to be putting my house up for sale and I’m going to leave it up for sale until I get an offer of what they have appraised it for and if I don’t and they come looking for more next year I’ll tell them they can pound sand.
F’ing ridiculous.
My sympathies. 10% is brutal but I suppose the school needs a new football stadium, and they surely had to provide after-school dinners for children whose parent(s) live in food deserts and don’t have the privilege of being able to fry an egg, boil a vegetable, or prepare a tuna salad sandwich. And then of course, that 10% of extra funding is going to require more administrators to manage it, including the HR department’s new BLM liaison officer…
I remember my daughter’s primary school received some funds and had a vote of parents whether to hire a music teacher or an aboriginal liaison officer. Guess what they got? A school painted all over with grotesque yellow black and red “rainbow serpents” and another all-day huddle around the cardboard wine cask in the staff room refridgerator (I assure you that wine in the staff room fridge is 100% normal in Australian schools).
So get out of the way, because if you are at the shooting range and you’re the only person not pulling on a trigger, it may just be that you are the target.
Ah, Kim, what memories that brings. Yes, public sector bureaucracies are expert at wasting money. When funding increases, they need more administrators to manage it. When funding decreases, they need more administrators to help them make the tough choices. And luxuries such as football stadiums, olympic sized swimming pools, and repulsive modern art are of course crucial to morale.
By the way, “A Gurls Wurld” episode 13 revolves around a most elegant example of Aboriginal dot painting. You might want to check it out.
Dr Fauci waits for the cameras to stop rolling and then straightaway removes his mask. LOL!
It’s a reeaally deadly virus everyone! Be very, very scared! Boo!
https://www.citizenfreepress.com/breaking/fauci-removes-the-mask-when-the-cameras-disappear/
Interesting…..To be honest it is difficult at times to breathe freely with it on and my aged parent is always trying to remove it to breathe, even in well ventilated, air conditioner doctors offices. Obviously, it’s a poly to pretend that they will curtail the spread.
Never mind the psychological effect on the public of control and being watched.
Severe fines for not abiding by the rules.
Except those that are powerful enough to flaunt the rules
If the authorities would allow face shields instead, this might work as well or better and be more acceptable to older people. These are the clear shields that a person sees doctors and dental assistants wearing. Even without a mask underneath, they seem to provide significant protection. Models seem to suggest that they are helpful, but I haven’t seen any real-life tests.
They are also useful against acid attacks, for those who live in London.
Do as I say, not as I do.
Dr Fauci is deservedly the world expert on Covid. After all, he helped the Chinese create it. But whether he tells the truth about his creation, that is a horse of a very different colour.
Fauci is a poker face of epic proportions. Whats not to like about this guy?
“The International Air Transport Association (IATA) released data for global air freight markets in May showing a slight improvement in the air cargo market.
“But capacity remains unable to meet demand as a result of the loss of belly cargo operations on passenger aircraft that have been parked.”
https://www.miragenews.com/may-air-cargo-shows-slight-pickup-amid-continuing-capacity-crunch/
“Global capacity, measured in available cargo tonne-kilometers (ACTKs), shrank by 34.7% in May (-32.2% for international operations) compared to the previous year, a slight deceleration from the 41.6% year-on-year drop in April.”
No wonder capacity remains unable to meet demand!
This is why tourism (hiss, boo! ‘Only 10% of the economy’, etc. ) is so important – those cargo holds in the jets.
Sort of like internet gaming holding down the costs of the internet, so that businesses can afford to use it for their purposes. We don’t understand all of the dependencies.
Even the brightest people can’t entirely grasp these issues and all the ramifications of inter-dependency: like Tim Morgan, who thinks we can happily let tourist jets go away.
And as CTG pointed out recently, the local effects of an ‘inessential’ restaurant closing can be significant. Or even a nail parlour.
Nothing that exists now is truly ‘ inessential’ and a mere luxury: all part of the debt-complex.
Hay is, anyone at OFW playing Metro exodus to keep the world economy ticking over lol
“OPEC further restricted its oil production in June compared to May as it aims to withhold a record volume of supply from the market together with its non-OPEC allies led by Russia, according to tanker-tracking company Petro-Logistics.
“However, the cartel still produced more than its collective quota.”
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/OPEC-Is-Still-Producing-Too-Much-Oil.html
“Oil giant Royal Dutch Shell said on Tuesday it will write down the value of its assets by up to $22 billion in the second quarter, after revising down its long-term outlook for oil and gas prices.”
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/30/shell-to-write-down-assets-worth-up-to-22-billion-in-q2.html
Write down assets = devalue oil in the ground
In my opinion, there is a double problem:
(1) Less oil is profitable to extract, and
(2) The oil that is extracted will sell for less.
This is the big reserve write-down problem oil companies face. Peak oilers have counted on this oil being available.
Thank you, Gail, an excellent summary. Yes, oil companies counted oil in the ground as an “asset”, and valued it at current prices. But that oil was of lower quality, harder to extract, and more expensive to refine. It was worth a lot less than the supposed book value. And now the chickens (or Chinese bats?) are coming home to roost.
Exactly!
I wonder if collapsing demand for oil will somewhat counterbalance the reduction of (profitable) reserves that can be extracted?
A lot of the peak oil themed videos I’ve watched over the years always mention that energy companies / analysts claim we have X number of years left of energy source Y at current levels of consumption, at which point the video asks the (fair) question, “but what if demand / consumption continues to increase? Not many (save for Gail and a few other voices in the wilderness) saw the possibility of both extractable reserves and demand falling at the same time…
Hopefully everything we’ve witnessed as of late will encourage people to rethink their assumptions about economics, energy, human behaviour and the future… though I guess I would be wise not to hold my breath 😐
Cheers,
-GBV
Collapsing demand will lead to huge debt defaults and a collapsing economy. Indeed, oil demand may head to zero; this is equivalent to no one being able to afford food. It would also be possible to get to collapsing oil demand through broken supply lines. For example, truck drivers might stop driving their trucks because with partially empty trucks, they are not making enough money to cover their cost of operating the vehicles, including debt repayment, insurance, maintenance, and fuel costs. The food is being grown; it doesn’t get to its required destination.
I don’t think I would celebrate a change such as this. You don’t want falling demand.
“this is equivalent to no one being able to afford food.”
What I think you meant to say is, “this is equivalent to no one being able to afford industrial civilization-produced food.” Not all food / energy is produced courtesy of fossil fuels, JIT supply chains, chemical fertilizers, etc. (though, I suspect you’d be right if you said the vast majority of it is).
But, no, wasn’t exactly suggesting we celebrate the situation (though I’m still of the mind that there might be something positive on the other side of collapse that perhaps a few of us may even get to witness) – just pointing out that so few saw it playing out this way, and that despite everything that has happened, so many more still cling to the hopium of an eleventh-hour deus ex machina saviour to propel us into a techno-utopic future.
Cheers,
-GBV
The world’s current population certainly could not live on foods that are produced and transported through today’s industrial civilization, unfortunately.
Again, I recommend Paul Hanley’s book “Eleven” (referring to the projected human population circa 2100): https://www.amazon.com/Eleven-Paul-Hanley/dp/146025046X
Hanley writes on agriculture and food from a Baha’i perspective. Baha’is foresee a period of calamity and adjustment before the rise of a truly global civilization, without extremes of wealth or poverty.
(sigh) I meant to write that the projected human population for 2100 is 11 billion, not 11, period! Nobody is *that* much a doomster!
I see that Hanley is offering a virtual course through the Wilmette Institute. I’ve taken their courses before, and recommend them (even though I’m not a Baha’i). It’s 50 bucks US, but if you write and plead poverty they’ll probably let you in under the ropes::
https://wilmetteinstitute.org/courses/sustaining-11-billion-people-challenges-for-an-ever-advancing-civilization-2020-2/
The people of OFW plead for poverty, oh please. 😉
This is the report by the group that counts the ships carrying oil away from the gulf. The OPEC report on oil production will not be out until July 14.
“The UK economy shrank more than first thought between January and March, contracting 2.2% in the joint largest fall since 1979, official figures show… There was a significant economic impact in March, as the coronavirus pandemic began to have an effect.”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-53231851
“Weekly spend in UK food service in April 2020 was just over £200 million, compared to April 2019’s weekly spend level of around £1 billion. The report from NPD Group found that although lockdown officially started on 23 March, many people were already avoiding eating out.”
https://www.scotsman.com/business/consumer/decline-restaurant-spend-three-times-deeper-last-financial-crisis-2898059
“Burger chain Byron is scrambling to find a buyer who can stave off impending financial collapse, save 1,200 jobs, and reopen its 52 restaurants in the UK by mid-next month. The company has filed a notice of intention to appoint administrators…”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-53222949
“More than 300,000 planned new homes [UK] may remain on the drawing board over the next five years, deepening the UK’s housing crisis…
“Construction of the cheapest social housing could fall to a “catastrophic” low of 4,300 units annually – the smallest number since the second world war. Shelter said this would not even be enough to clear the waiting list for a social home in Wakefield, never mind the rest of the country.”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/30/coronavirus-slump-could-delay-building-of-300000-homes
“Social housing”, by the way, is British socialist speech for “housing you pay for and they live in”. “They” being people who vote socialist.
A lot of poverty in the UK today, maybe most of it, is within families where one or both adults / parents work (20% of UK couples have no children) but they get paid so little they cannot afford very many luxuries in life, like owning their own home, holidays, and in some cases, enough food. That is why the UK govt, a couple of weeks ago, was forced to bring back free school meals for those that qualified. For a lot of children it is the only decent meal they get on a regular basis. And the size of the pie is rapidly shrinking.
And with so many people who were formerly in decently paid jobs now or soon-to-be unemployed, I should expect the housing market will be flooded with properties for sale. Now seems to be a dodgy time to build new houses on a large scale. But I stand to be persuaded otherwise.
Seems to be like the US in terms of many families with one or both parent working being in poverty.
In the US, the vast majority of these people would be currently renting the housing (often an apartment) that they live in. The big problem would be missed rent payments. Some would move back in with relatively.
In the US, there has recently been a big difference between demand for housing to purchase (high) vs. housing for sale (low). The new demand for housing for purchase arises from changes in family status: need space for a home office, mother is moving back in from assisted living center, adult child is moving back in. Or families wanting to move out of metropolitan city centers, if the breadwinner can work from home. There have been relatively few homes for sale, because people don’t want unknown people walking through their homes, probably leaving germs of various kinds.
It isn’t called that to differentiate it from anti-social housing?
Another meaning of social housing, in the UK, is:
‘Subsidised housing let to immigrant tenants who then sub-let ( and over-fill it ) to illegal immigrants and pocket the cash.
Could the UK buy previously built apartment homes that are no longer needed, as more people move out of their apartments, into social housing? Is there any point in building more? Is UK’s population really increasing today, with fewer immigrants?
The University of Cambridge has been building no less than 3,000 apartments, just on my door-step, mostly for Chinese graduate students, part of their expansion programme, competing in the global education market.
Unfortunately, the tenants one can get for ‘social housing’ are not at all desirable and would likely trash the place – those sort of people have so many drug and behavioural issues, etc.
Oddly enough, someone said to me last year that the new development would be the ‘slum of the future’. They may well be right.
The UK population was until the start of this year still rising, and forecast to keep rising, entirely due to net immigration. I don’t know what has been happening this year but with flights almost non-existent, population might end up falling slightly.
There is no shortage of apartments for sale, certainly not here in Aberdeen and I suspect outside of London / the SE of England. As for social housing, its heydays were the 1940s-1970s. Then Thatcher became PM and there has been a perpetual shortage ever since.
The HK:ers are ready to fill those vacant houses. The poor rabble will be thrown into the streets.
The always-intriguing deagel.com predicts the current UK population of 66 million to drop to 15 million by 2025.
That would be interesting to watch…from afar. But it might solve the housing problem.
Based on what, a (big) wave of suicides from “sheltering at home”?
Do you have a link? With that many dead I doubt many of them could be buried / cremated without the use of giant pits, and disease for the survivors would be rampant, presumably.
Here is a link to the forecasts. http://www.deagel.com/country/forecast.aspx
I bring it up only for a morbid laugh. It is a strange site but it has been around forever – it has some connection to the Mil-Ind complex – and provides no rationales for its predictions.
The intriguing factor is in predictions such as that China’s population will remain basically unchanged into 2025 but that of the USA will drop from 326 million to 99 million. Okay, I can foresee the USA drop – absolutely possible if the lockdowns continue – but why does China, or for that matter Russia, Brazil, India or Indonesia get a pass on whatever affects the USA?
I want to see these numbers explained, but alas, no explanation is available.
This is just a scenario. It isn’t something I could prove beyond reasonable doubt.
Apart from things that happen spontaneously such as earthquakes, many of our most important news events are scripted well in advance. So anyone who has access to the script and knows how to read it can forecast the future.
Hence the long list of things that happened first in the Simpsons and later in real life. Hence the so-called Illuminati card game released by Steve Jackson in 1982.
If this is the case, then the Deagel people could have looked at the script and seen that the Elders were planning to crash the West and take living standards in the industrialized world down to “sustainable” Third World levels.
Incidentally, this is what the Globalists have been signaling that they want to do for almost forty years now.
https://youtu.be/SKm0SwdKuuY
Cases in Italy were clearly on their way up by March 1. Iran’s cases are up by then as well. The US started shutdown on March 13. I can see why many UK citizens might have stopped eating out by March 1.
Eating out in the UK, at anything above the ‘Subway’ level – I still don’t know how people, other than drunk students, can possibly stomach their crap, but they are always full! – is just such fantastically poor value for money at the mass -market, mid-price range.
Given the gathering recession of 2019, the UK restaurant trade was going to hit the buffers, with or without COVID.
I ate 2 feet of meatball sandwich once, in my student days. (Subway was having a two-for-one sale.)
Yes, eating out and already-cooked food in general is tremendously poor value for money.
Xabier, that is why when I lived in the UK I ate out very little. If you were lucky enough to find a Sichuan restaurant, you had a fair chance of getting an edible meal, but otherwise… The one gem that saved us was a family run takeout in Highworth. British husband who made the fish and chips (with quality fresh oil) and Chinese wife who cooked traditional cuisine for the ang moh. Enjoy at home over an episode of Doctor Who. As a bonus, the newspapers that wrapped the fish were an excellent barometer of current political trends.
This morning’s newspaper told me that the number of deaths worldwide attributed to COVID-19 has risen to 500,000.
Whether this is an underestimate or an overestimate is debatable. But it’s as close to an official figure as we have at present.
How does this pandemic compare with some of the flu ones of the last century? I looked at Encyclopedia Britannica and it told me:
“The 1968 flu pandemic, also called Hong Kong flu pandemic of 1968 or Hong Kong flu of 1968, global outbreak of influenza that originated in China in July 1968 and lasted until 1969–70. The outbreak was the third influenza pandemic to occur in the 20th century; it followed the 1957 flu pandemic and the influenza pandemic of 1918–19. The 1968 flu pandemic resulted in an estimated one million to four million deaths, far fewer than the 1918–19 pandemic, which caused between 25 million and 50 million deaths.”
So up to the present, COVID-19 has caused around an eighth to a half as many fatalities as the 1968 Hong Kong flu pandemic, when the world population was about half of its current size, and about a hundredth as many fatalities as the 1918/19 flue pandemic, when the world population was about a quarter of its current size.
Britannica also told me:
“The 1968 flu pandemic caused illness of varying degrees of severity in different populations. For example, whereas illness was diffuse and affected only small numbers of people in Japan, it was widespread and deadly in the United States. Infection caused upper respiratory symptoms typical of influenza and produced symptoms of chills, fever, and muscle pain and weakness. These symptoms usually persisted for between four and six days. The highest levels of mortality were associated with the most susceptible groups, namely infants and the elderly.”
Lastly, the CDC Website told me:
“The 1968 pandemic was caused by an influenza A (H3N2) virus comprised of two genes from an avian influenza A virus, including a new H3 hemagglutinin, but also contained the N2 neuraminidase from the 1957 H2N2 virus. It was first noted in the United States in September 1968. The estimated number of deaths was 1 million worldwide and about 100,000 in the United States. Most excess deaths were in people 65 years and older. ”
On that basis, COVID-19 in the US is up there with the 1968 flu and likely to greatly outperform it as a culler of the herd in time.
I find it interesting that both the 1968 flu and the 2020 COVID-19 pandemics struck much more harshly in the US than in Japan—these two baseball-crazy nations separated by a an ocean of differences in culture, customs, habits, mores and styles of behavior. I’m not sure why this should have been the case as the urban Japanese are crowded together in tight quarters and breathing each other’s air to a greater extent than the Americans are. At a guess, I would put it down to all the raw fish they consume and the significantly lower BMI of the Japanese then and now.
Perhaps the people of 1918 and 1968 were more intelligent and less cowardly?
But, to be fair, they probably didn’t live in the world of the Internet, science as a dogma / religion (instead of, well, science), and the 24-7 fear-mongering news cycle…
Cheers,
-GBV
You had to be there in 1968.
Tet offensive, King and Kennedy assassinated, Chicago Democratic Convention, Student protests, etc.
I was 18- and the most drafted class of the VN War.
And in The Bay.
In 1968, people had experienced the stress of WW2, so a little flu was not going to upset them too much: and they were also more used to deaths in the mid-60’s, rather than 70-80’s as we tend to expect as a ‘timely’ end. Also, as many point out, a much more sensible media environment.
Yes, there is a huge difference in the likelihood of this pandemic leading to death, compared to earlier ones. The big difference this time seems to be that world leaders somehow believe that we have the ability to stop the pandemic. Unfortunately, we don’t. All we can do is disrupt our current economy.
Mind-blowing question of the day:
Is it that world leaders believe they can stop the pandemic, or that they only believe they can get re-elected by us simple-minded proletariat morons if they say (and act) like they can stop the pandemic?
https://media.tenor.com/images/b3acd7deebbd51e294dce80a3932a1d5/tenor.gif
Cheers,
-GBV
Let them peddle hope while the seneca inches forward and shatters every dream of a better tomorrow with large nation states and crowded metropolitan areas.
If SARS-CoV-2 isnt up for the job, perhaps there are some more effective strains ready to be circulated.
Witness the end of an era (of consumerism).
You mean precariat morons too, right?
I think you should correct your comparison for the population growth.
What was the relative bodycount (deaths per million) in 1918 and 1968?
“Concerns about the financial repercussions of the coronavirus crisis have largely faded since the first few hectic weeks. That’s a problem, because authorities should be doing much more to prepare for what could be a destabilizing wave of losses…
“At some point… the question will be not whether borrowers can keep borrowing, but whether they can afford the obligations they’ve taken on.”
https://www.bloombergquint.com/gadfly/the-coronavirus-pandemic-could-become-a-financial-crisis-too
“The world is likely to feel the impacts of the unprecedented post-lockdown recession for years to come, according to a senior investment analyst.
“As the US – the world’s largest economy by nominal GDP – continues to grapple with its outbreak of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, flailing international economies will struggle to recover, says Milford Asset Management senior analyst Frances Sweetman.”
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/money/2020/06/coronavirus-global-recession-will-last-for-years-as-no-end-in-sight-for-covid-19-senior-analyst.html
“Nouriel Roubini: “‘My prediction for a Great Depression is not about 2020, but the decade of the 2020s.””
Video:
https://finance.yahoo.com/video/nouriel-roubini-prediction-great-depression-201457486.html
“The worst could be still to come in the Covid-19 pandemic, the World Health Organization (WHO) has warned, six months on from when the outbreak began.”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-53227219
“A new strain of swine flu which has the potential to spread to humans and cause another pandemic has been identified by researchers in China.
“Named G4 EA H1N1, the virus is similar to the swine flu that caused a pandemic in 2009 and possesses “all the essential hallmarks of a candidate pandemic virus”, according to the authors of the study.”
https://news.sky.com/story/new-swine-flu-found-in-pigs-in-china-with-human-pandemic-potential-12017782
“One in 10 pig farm workers tested also showed elevated levels of the virus in their blood, particularly those aged 18 to 35 years old.”
But so far, the virus does not adversely affect humans. The concern is that it could mutate and do so.
All of the previous efforts didn’t really fix anything.
Roubini sees the recession/depression taking various forms. The third quarter (for the US, at least) may look somewhat better, but that will not hold. It will go up and down for a while, until it resolves to an L shape non-recovery, probably in the middle of the decade.
I didn’t listen to the end of the video, but I presume he believes that even with the deglobalization and negative supply shocks, there will be no major reductions in world population. Or, maybe he just doesn’t want to “go there.”
An article today in the WSJ said that banks are cutting back on new credit card solicitations and on auto loans because of concern that people cannot repay the new debt they are taking on. The information in databases does not consistently tell whether people have stopped making their debt payments, where they have been temporarily suspended, for example. This cutback on new debt could have an adverse impact on things like car sales.
Not ready for Peak Oil…hmmm…will we ever be ready!?😎
The World Isn’t Ready for Peak Oil
The coronavirus crisis is revealing the instability a sudden move away from petroleum would bring—but also giving us the chance to help countries make the necessary transition.
AMOS HOCHSTEIN the Atlantic
JUNE 28, 2020
The resulting instability, from the Middle East to Africa to the Americas, raises a flurry of immediate national-security concerns. But the current crisis also offers a stark preview of the challenges the world will face if it negotiates a climate accord without also moving to stabilize the more than a dozen countries that depend on oil exports as their primary source for generating government revenue.
In Iraq, for example, oil revenues account for 90 percent of the government’s budgetary income and two-thirds of its economy. This year’s falling oil prices have already reduced the country’s revenues by half.
Before the outbreak, Iraq’s unemployment rate hovered around 50 percent, and Baghdad faced a wave of youth-led protests that ultimately led to the ouster of Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi. But with dwindling revenues, the new government will be hamstrung in its efforts to improve economic conditions. To make matters worse, among Iraqis who are employed, 30 percent work in some capacity for the government. The World Bank estimates that Iraq will need oil prices to return to $58 a barrel just to meet its wage and pension obligations.
……..Some version of this story is playing out across multiple continents. According to the International Monetary Fund, Algeria, which depends on oil revenue for about 40 percent of its budget, will need oil prices to reach $109 a barrel in order to break even. In Libya, where the petroleum sector accounts for 60 percent of GDP, the break-even price is $100. Meanwhile, in our own neighborhood, oil accounts for a third of Mexico’s tax revenue and a quarter of Ecuador’s. If prices settle in the $30 to $40 range, the consequences could easily cascade, creating new regional instability in many parts of the world.
Doubt we as civilized societies can hold it all🤑 together
And if prices “settle” at $20 per barrel…?
😐
Cheers,
-GBV
The World Isn’t Ready for Peak Oil
We are not at peak oil globally.
That happened in November of 2018.
It is disappearing in the rear view mirror.
Of course, this is only the oil exporter part of the problem. The rest of the world can say goodbye to pretty much all aspects of its economy today. No food becomes a problem, quickly. We certainly do not have an electric work-around for the food problem.
“Let them eat tungsten-filled gold bars”
Or was it “cake”?
One of the two anyway…
I certainly had a food problem today. Went to the local grocery store to buy a *new flavour* of ice cream (Ontario Peach… yum!), but they were out of stock. Damn store wouldn’t even give me a rain cheque because… covid-19.
Ladies and gentlemen, I’ve been to Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq, and I can say, without hyperbole, that this was a million times worse than all of them put together 😐
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=m66rkK1aK6g
Cheers,
-GBV
Ah yes the famous ‘Let them eat cake’ In fact the then queen of France at the time didn’t say those words, but the statement was contrived and used to destroy her. This shows you the power and control of media narrative today. Deadly Magic.
The people of Easter Island found an effective low tech work around for their food problem.
Building large stone figurines? No?
“If the US Federal Reserve Board does what markets are expecting, indeed demanding, and implements yield curve control, it will create something quite unprecedented: The world’s most powerful central bank will control not just the volume of money in the world’s largest economy, but also its price.”
https://www.smh.com.au/business/markets/is-the-fed-about-to-nationalise-financial-markets-20200630-p557kd.html
“The US Federal Reserve is prepared to spend at least $24bn to purchase corporate bonds issued by oil and gas companies as part of a broader effort to support US corporations’ access to financial markets amid a severe recession.”
https://www.argusmedia.com/en/news/2118740-oil-companies-benefit-from-fed-bond-purchases
“Major sovereign bond yields, which have been low for years, are expected to be close to current levels for the next 12 months, as the global economy struggles to recover from the impact of COVID-19, a Reuters poll found.
“With expectations for weak economic growth intensifying, major central banks are likely to expand their bloated balance sheets, increasing their sway over bond markets.”
https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-markets-bonds-poll/central-banks-heavy-hand-to-keep-sovereign-bond-yields-low-reuters-poll-idUKKBN24101M
It seems like there are a lot of implicit expectations to this. Basically, every part of the system will continue to work as it does today. Even if Italy’s debt gets downgraded to “junk,” it won’t really matter. The EU will continue to operate as it does today (will have enough funding, for example).
“amid a severe recession.”
You gotta love BS. The media keeps pumping out the word recession. The global eCONomy is collapsing and it’s being labeled as a “recession” and that’s after 3 months and just one lockdown. Let’s see what the July numbers show because commonsense tells me this isn’t a “Recession” and the BLS is lying about their unemployment numbers because they ain’t 13.5% but really more like 34% unemployment in the US.
Of course, these economic journalists are idiots, but it’s also rather like family doctors in pre-antibiotic times:
‘Just rest up a bit old chap, maybe go somewhere nice for change of air, have plenty of eggs and cream, some steak, have a glass of port every evening, and you’ll be fine.’
What else is there to say when the case is terminal? It does no good to state the truth.
However, it’s known that those who are soon to die realise their case, whatever they are told. Many can feel what is in the air, whatever the media tell them.
The eggs, cream and steak would have ben excellent advice. Low fat / high carb diets destroy humn health.
What is the point of buying bonds from companies that will probably never make a profit again? I suppose, to continue the illusion of prosperity a little longer.
Totem Pole Economics: ritual activities without any sense that maintain the illusion of effective individual and social agency?
Whatever it takes, it sounds like!
Magic!
“The Wirecard scandal is the most serious indictment of European finance since the global banking crisis. In terms of frauds, the collapse of the German payments business is one of the most damaging ever for the reputation of the European financial system.
“It has revealed a pattern of negligence (or worse) among leading banks, auditors, rating agencies, investors and regulators that is simply breathtaking…
“Another remarkable aspect of the Wirecard story is how many separate red flags it raised. One of the simplest was that the company didn’t generate cash. The income claimed was not reflected in its cashflow, a classic symptom common to most frauds, including Enron.”
https://www.fnlondon.com/articles/wirecards-collapse-does-not-indict-one-company-but-a-whole-system-20200629
“Wirecard’s UK subsidiary, Wirecard Card Solutions (WCS), said it was “working hard” to restore operations after the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) on Friday ordered the firm to freeze regulated activities.”
https://www.cityam.com/wirecards-uk-subsidiary-scrambles-to-avoid-collapse/
“Is fraud the new bankruptcy? Shares in fallen German fintech giant Wirecard jumped 138% during Monday trade, in what appears to be the latest irrational market pump for stock that could soon be worthless.”
https://thenextweb.com/hardfork/2020/06/29/wirecard-stock-140-percent-still-down-96-billion-fraud-fintech/
So now we have two major companies in Germany with huge frauds. First Volkswagen, with their claim of cars with better fuel economy than was actually the case, and then Wirecard, with its deception.
Maybe Germany is trying to do things that can’t be done. Clearly, the company that is providing the services that Wirecard has been providing needs to receive a higher stream of revenue than it has been getting. How is this going to be fixed? It is a little like mandating fuel economy that can’t really happen.
“French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire proposed splitting off the debt piled up as a result of emergency spending to tackle the coronavirus and spreading out repayments over years.”
https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/france-mulls-splitting-off-coronavirus-153458876.html
“Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena said late on 29 June that it has approved a plan to transfer non-performing exposures, deferred tax assets, other assets, financial debt, other liabilities and net equity to Asset Management Company, an Italian state-owned manager of bad loans.”
https://www.fnlondon.com/articles/money-market-shifts-are-proving-bad-news-for-profit-starved-global-banks-20200629
It sounds like a new “bad bank,” to try to bail out Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena in Italy.
Perhaps spread out the payments over the next thousand years.
In all, the Fed on Sunday identified 794 companies whose bonds it will be buying directly to support the market for investment-grade corporate debt. Automakers, Technology Firms Are Largest Components of Fed’s Corporate-Bond Purchases – WSJ
They are buying everything. No other choice.
I got this 2nd hand, so no link, but the source given was Wall Street Journal, so a quick search would likely find it.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/debt-from-att-and-other-corporate-giants-saw-biggest-purchases-from-the-fed-2020-06-28
the Fed owns the bonds, the corporations get the cash.
I don’t like this save-everyone approach.
“Automakers, Technology Firms Are Largest Components…”
I think the economy needs to discard a major automaker and a major airline, for starters.
this approach would give the survivors a bigger slice of the economic pie, which is a smaller pie as the economy is resetting at a lower level.
so allowing the economy to self-organize at a lower level of activity.
While that might seem logical, the end of civilization -which is what we face now – is not a logical process, any more than the growth phase was.
The usual pattern is to endeavour to keep it all up and running, refusing to face reality.
The rulers do not anticipate wisely; they only react – desperately.
Everyone just hopes that things will go back to the way they were, and that all the troubles would dissolve. instead of -as they must -accumulating and growing ever deeper.
Few will be capable of comprehending fully what is happening; and those few will be unable to act on what they know, due to the inertia and complexity of the system, and the wishful -thinking and delusion of the mass of people, both elite and non-elite.
“…and those few will be unable to act on what they know, … due to … the wishful -thinking and delusion of the mass of people, both elite and non-elite.”
Thus why Ugo Bardi calls his blog Cassandra’s Legacy.
Cassandra, Princess of Troy, was the daughter of Priam and Hecuba, and a priestess of Apollo. The god admired her, and gave her the gift of prophecy in exchange for her promise of a gift of herself. But she then reneged on the deal (some things never change) so Apollo added a small codicil to his gift: that nobody would believe her. And ever since, prophets without honour have used the pen name “Cassandra”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLwi5Q-eiEg
But Cassandra had problems
She denied a god love
And he ruined her gift of prophecy
She could see it all
But no one believed her
No one believed her when she said
We are all victims of the dance
Maybe ‘Green Clean’ energy is our Trojan Horse – a gift we should be wiser to reject?
Good point!
It seems like some of these companies are the same ones who were some of the same ones being recommended in a recent video by an analysts saying what terrible shape the world economy is in. I suppose a company that just got a big bailout would be expected to do well.
It is disturbing that AT&T and Comcast, both of whom are big sellers of internet services, are on the list. Without internet services, none of us will have internet connections. Maybe they really need to charge more for their services.
Note to aggressive in-yer-face protestors:
In encounters with other road vehicles, pedestrians invariably come of worse.
https://twitter.com/atensnut/status/1277598473819492352?s=20
like during a bullfight, gotta root for the bull over the matador.
More on Covid-19, it changed between the beginning and now, tough to make a vaccine seems to be part of the conclusion of this article.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/not-just-accidental-how-one-coronavirus-mutation-helped-virus-conquer-globe
It appears this will be a challenge to all of us.
Dennis L.
This is a link to a version of the article the Zerohedge report is based on. https://www.lmtonline.com/news/article/Coronavirus-mutation-has-taken-over-the-world-15373472.php
It is really a Washington Post story, although the Zerohedge reports calls it a Bloomberg article.
There’s a very simple solution to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Trump announces he will postpone the 2020 Presidential election until we have a cure, and just like that, Covid-19 disappears overnight!
Haha!
I looked at the academic article preprint. https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.06.12.148726v1.full.pdf
It is by the Scripps Research Institute authors who were cited in earlier comments.
Okay, here is one in memory of FE posts on the subject, something about climate delta:
Apparently, the world is not going to end for a bit, read and enjoy or become angry depending on point of view. I know nothing about the subject, so I let a smile be my umbrella and go on my way.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/forbes-censors-award-winning-environmentalists-apology-over-three-decade-climate-scare-so
Dennis L.
Excerpt
it seems the repentant environmentalist believes that being human ingenuity as infinite as energy resources, everything is possible for us in this wonderful planet! A poor fool in my opinion.
Perhaps he listens to the politicians.
Sounds like he’s drunk the proverbial…
https://www.koolaidmystery.com/public/COMPILED/images/flavoured-expired.59f1971ecf5595f8cdd37fc1636fca06.png
Sorry, not credible, follow the money (aka lobby money)………………
“Nuclear power lobbyist Michael Shellenberger learns to love the bomb. Shellenberger has done a 180-degree backflip on the power-weapons connections. Shellenberger’s argument is “almost Trumpian in its incoherence”.
Source?
Or just an opinion?
Cheers,
-GBV
Incoherent drivel, Mental problems caused by the inability to face a too-horrible reality?
Haha, someone needs to forward that article to Guy McPherson aka “The Nutty Professor”.
Hi Gail,
Can I just say I enjoyed reading this article.
I discovered your blog in the early 2010’s and I have been reading regularly ever since.
All of your posts have a such a high degree of credibility, Your reasoning seems sound, though I hope you are wrong for the sake of humanity.
Best wishes
Thanks for your vote of confidence.
I hope I am wrong, too. I always seem to be wrong on timing, if nothing else.
To be fair, unless I missed something, I don’t think anyone else has got the timing right on the complete collapse of modern industrial civilization yet either 😀
Cheers,
-GBV
“A secret question hovers over us, a sense of disappointment, a broken promise we were given as children about what our adult world was supposed to be like. I am referring not to the standard false promises that children are always given (about how the world is fair, or how those who work hard shall be rewarded), but to a particular generational promise—given to those who were children in the fifties, sixties, seventies, or eighties—one that was never quite articulated as a promise but rather as a set of assumptions about what our adult world would be like. And since it was never quite promised, now that it has failed to come true, we’re left confused: indignant, but at the same time, embarrassed at our own indignation, ashamed we were ever so silly to believe our elders to begin with.
Where, in short, are the flying cars? Where are the force fields, tractor beams, teleportation pods, antigravity sleds, tricorders, immortality drugs, colonies on Mars, and all the other technological wonders any child growing up in the mid-to-late twentieth century assumed would exist by now? Even those inventions that seemed ready to emerge—like cloning or cryogenics—ended up betraying their lofty promises. What happened to them?”
As usual, Greta said it best.
https://www.cryptogeography.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/how-dare-you-greta-thunberg-meme-hoverboard.jpg
Scientists have been tracking temperature at the Amundsen-Scott south pole Station, Earth’s southernmost weather observatory, since 1957. It is one of the longest-running complete temperature records on the Antarctic continent.
Our analysis of weather station data from the south pole shows it has warmed by 1.8℃ between 1989 and 2018, changing more rapidly since the start of the 2000s. Over the same period, the warming in West Antarctica suddenly stopped and the Antarctic Peninsula began cooling.
One of the reasons for the south pole warming was stronger low-pressure systems and stormier weather east of the Antarctic Peninsula in the Weddell Sea. With clockwise flow around the low-pressure systems, this has been transporting warm, moist air on to the Antarctic plateau.
…..The temperature variability at the south pole is so extreme it currently masks human-caused effects. The Antarctic interior is one of the few places left on Earth where human-caused warming cannot be precisely determined, which means it is a challenge to say whether, or for how long, the warming will continue.
But our study reveals extreme and abrupt climate shifts are part of the climate of Antarctica’s interior. These will likely continue into the future, working to either hide human-induced warming or intensify it when natural warming processes and the human greenhouse effect work in tandem.
Kyle Clem is a research fellow in climate science, Te Herenga Waka, Victoria University of Wellington
https://amp.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jun/30/south-pole-warming-three-times-faster-than-rest-of-the-world-our-research-shows
We did get astonishing leaps forward in phone technology, like this one I’m using now. In 2001, a space odyssey, he had to go to the phone booth to call home.
In Alien, interstellar transportation, AI, androids, but so awful 80s style low def computer screens. Funny. (but, hey, great movie).
i remember reading the British Interplanetary Society’s proposal for a manned expedition to Mars for the opposition of 1956. (Yes, back then we were still a first world country) It nearly broke my heart, because I would be far too young to join. And here I am now, far too old. Whither is fled the visionary gleam?
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=K3X2Fv-c3Fc
“Interesting” chart:
https://srsroccoreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Total-US-Debt-To-GDP-Forecast-Q2-2020-768×471.png
For those of us brought up to neither a borrower nor a lender be, this graph is a bit of a shocker.
Eyeballing this, the two lines began to diverge during the seventies and the debt one has rocketed up, doubling the GDP one by the mid-eighties and tripling it by the end of the century. Now it’s reached over four times higher, and one wonders how much higher it can go.
Divergence really began in 1944 with the Bretton Woods agreement and the end of the gold standard. It accelerated after 1971 when Nixon closed the gold window that had allowed countries to exchange the $ for US held gold.
The world economy began growing more rapidly quite quickly after WWII. It also used a lot of debt to enable the growth. The combination would seem to be the reason that the gold standard could no longer be made to work, especially after the US hit its early peak oil in 1970.
Oh no, not again….
Pandemic threat
A bad new strain of influenza is among the top disease threats that experts are watching for, even as the world attempts to bring to an end the current coronavirus pandemic.
The last pandemic flu the world encountered – the swine flu outbreak of 2009 that began in Mexico – was less deadly than initially feared, largely because many older people had some immunity to it, probably because of its similarity to other flu viruses that had circulated years before.
Coronavirus: This is not the last pandemic
That virus, called A/H1N1pdm09, is now covered by the annual flu vaccine to make sure people are protected.
The new flu strain that has been identified in China is similar to 2009 swine flu, but with some new changes.
So far, it hasn’t posed a big threat, but Prof Kin-Chow Chang and colleagues who have been studying it, say it is one to keep an eye on.
The virus, which the researchers call G4 EA H1N1, can grow and multiply in the cells that line the human airways.
They found evidence of recent infection starting in people who worked in abattoirs and the swine industry in China.
Current flu vaccines do not appear to protect against it, although they could be adapted to do so if needed.
https://www.bbc.com/news/amp/health-53218704
Funny that they call it “G4”. ZeroHedge just posted an article about coronavirus that discusses the “G” strain / mutation, which apparently is more infectious to humans than the strain that came out of Wuhan:
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/not-just-accidental-how-one-coronavirus-mutation-helped-virus-conquer-globe
All these “G-viruses” remind me of a classic zombie apocalypse game, Resident Evil 2…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dzr1hmWIWaw
Life imitating art?
Cheers,
-GBV
Yawn. Humanity has encounter maaany maaan maaany viruses and we’re still here …
Bwaaa-haaa-haa… 😀
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/83-tons-fake-gold-bars-gold-market-rocked-massive-china-counterfeiting-scandal
The old saying must be true… “not everything that glitters is gold”
https://zh-prod-1cc738ca-7d3b-4a72-b792-20bd8d8fa069.storage.googleapis.com/s3fs-public/styles/inline_image_desktop/public/inline-images/fake%20gold%203.jpg?itok=Iw4MmcmJ
I suspect this kind of fraud (which actually may have already been committed en masse, with who knows how many goldbugs sitting on their stacks of gold-plated tungsten) will continue to pop up on our radar…
Cheers,
-GBV
you need an x-ray scanner, but you can probably tell if the bars have been tampered with by tungsten replacement. also, a precise weight/volume measurement might give it away.
A “precise weight volume measurement” was exactly how Archimedes proved Hiero II’s gold crown was partly fake. Plus ca change…
eureka!
Yep, very true..helps to purchase from a major reputable seller and not from a fly by night seller listed on Fleabag. Also, on YouTube has video posts on how to detect takes and good guidance/advice on what to look for in coins and bars.
With gold trading near record highs, these forgery products will undoubtedly be placed on the market. Buyer beware….
Nice video on bar
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KH7oOH04f-8
Another on common bullion British sovereign
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2UdUDrRBL4k
I once had a bag full of gold coins.
it turned out to be chocolate inside.
perhaps that explains a lot.
at least you can get some nourishment from the chocolate.
Yep. From the Miami Herald.. December 2018
Venezuelans sell gold and silver chains, bracelets, earrings — including pieces that have belonged to their families for decades or generations — so they can walk out the door of the pawnshop with enough money simply to eat, at least for a while.
Some get rid of their family jewels to pay for other necessities like school registration for their children, oil changes for the car, dental procedures or healthcare.
Torres found a temporary solution by trading her most precious possession, but she still struggles to buy groceries. Money is so tight that she’s tempted to sell the only piece of jewelry remaining: a silver ring her godmother gave her before she died.
the word “they” is not part of the excerpt here is the link to the original document it will take a long time to read
https://www.pnas.org/content/115/33/8252
Sorry Adonis, this is very old news. Science and scientists have no power in this society. Those warnings were ignored for decades before it was too late to do anything. Now that it is way too late they will definitely be ignored again.
Your money is safe from “them”.
Here is an excerpt from a document i read if you read “between the lines” you realise that that what has happened in the first six months of 2020 is summarised in that excerpt here it is .
“they”The Stabilized Earth trajectory requires deliberate management of humanity’s relationship with the rest of the Earth System if the world is to avoid crossing a planetary threshold. We suggest that a deep transformation based on a fundamental reorientation of human values, equity, behavior, institutions, economies, and technologies is required. Even so, the pathway toward Stabilized Earth will involve considerable changes to the structure and functioning of the Earth System”
I am skeptical that there is anything that we humans could choose to do that would change the trajectory. Probably the biggest thing we could do is try to close down the economy in response to COVID-19. This would change energy consumption use and tend to collapse the economy. Perhaps this would fix the problem they are concerned about. Of course, there may not be humans to observe this result.
“The Stabilized Earth trajectory requires deliberate management of humanity’s relationship with the rest of the Earth System if the world is to avoid crossing a planetary threshold.”
Management by whom? Plato’s Guardians? That didn’t work too well, if memory serves. Might I suggest that the Earth System managed itself pretty well over four billion years, and will likely continue to do so. With us or without us.
Agreed!
attention all finite worlders this is a very important message from adonis the virus is not being used by the powers that be to de-populate us it is being used to try to do wealth distribution from developed countries to poor developing countries if you wish to survive what’s coming invest in precious metals while you still can i do not know how this will play out but hyper-inflation looks extremely possible there will also be a world-wide bail-in so all fiat currency in bank accounts including super-annuation will be confiscated by banks either invest in precious metals or long life food this could all go down in 2020 so time is short.
Inflation, let alone hyperinflation, is nowhere in sight. Deflation is the big specter.
https://dailycandidnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/EWLSY3vXsAIHjcx.jpg
“The Global Financial Crisis of 2007-2008 has some similarities to current events – it was slow. It took more than a year from the gating of Bear Stearns structured credit funds, through the collapse of commercial paper markets, the run on Northern Rock, till we got to the collapse of Lehman in September 2008. As banks were bailed out and rescued, there were around three months in 2008 when it felt like financial markets were irreparably broken. Of course, they weren’t – governments and central banks nursed them through. Stock markets were extremely volatile – but were equally swift to arbitrage that support – triggering a rally that lasted 12 years! (Largely on the back of markets being distorted by ultra-low rates and QE.)
This time it feels different. The crisis started off with a meteor strike – the virus. We’ve never seen anything impact the real economy so dramatically. Normally – it happens the other way around: financial crashes impact the markets and only then does the pain trickle down into the real world. This time it’s real jobs and production that got hit first. That’s fundamentally different.”
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/time-it-feels-different-what-if-its-just-begun
Kind of silly to title this article “This Time It Feels Different”, only to then say it sort of feels like the GFC of 2007-2008… but I like the angle he takes – i.e. the real economy (which has arguably been hurting for a decade or more) taking the hit prior to the financial sector crashing, which the financial sector seems to be ignoring at this point (to their own peril?).
Cheers,
-GBV
The markets are clearly expecting way too much. Our problems aren’t over; they are just beginning.
Nice read for those with interest in Gold..
Yahoo NewsYahoo
FX Empire
Gold Market Manipulation And The Federal Reserve
Kelsey Williams
June 29, 2020, 1:16 AM EDT
Assertions are made that the manipulation takes place in a shroud of secrecy; and the unexpected lower prices for gold, or prices that don’t meet wildly bullish expectations, are cited as evidence of conspiratorial activity.
The claim is made that the price of gold would be much higher if this manipulative trading activity were exposed, acknowledged, and prohibited. But…
ALL MARKETS ARE MANIPULATED
I don’t disagree that there are forces at work in the gold market that can be disruptive; and may even be described as manipulative. However, the same is true of all financial markets – stocks, bonds, commodities, etc.
It is worth pointing out that gold and silver bulls are one-sided in their arguments against manipulation and its presumed effect on prices.
When prices don’t meet expectations on the high side, or an ‘unexpected’ drop in price occurs, finger-pointing at shadow figures is heightened.
Long-side investors in all assets, including precious metals, ‘benefited’ from the manipulative efforts of the Federal Reserve twelve years ago and again just recently.
The recent recovery in prices for stocks, bonds, oil, gold, and silver has been almost unbelievable. It is literally jaw-dropping, but nobody is complaining. Nobody cries foul when markets are manipulated for the purpose of driving prices higher.
Only a couple of years ago, JP Morgan Chase’s accumulation of silver was assumed to be bullish for silver prices. On the other hand, they have also been subject to scrutiny about price manipulation. Would silver bulls care about price manipulation if prices went up?
ALL HAIL THE FED
When prices of most assets dropped sharply in 2008, the Federal Reserve stepped in with both guns blazing and pledged incalculable amounts of money and credit creation. Their efforts led eventually to significant increases in previously beaten down stocks and bonds. The benefits to gold were more immediate and more spectacular. Nobody complained
The condition referred to as runaway inflation is a reflection of an accelerated drop in the purchasing power of the currency in use bordering on repudiation. In this case, negative sentiment for the US dollar increased and its weakness was reflected in higher prices f
Gold had already increased four-fold between 2001 and 2008 when the credit collapse threatened the integrity of our financial system. Prices of financial assets, including gold, fell sharply.
During a period of approximately six months from spring to fall in 2008, the price of gold declined by more than thirty percent. After that, it was off to the races again…..
Of course, after the gold price declined, claims about manipulation and price suppression began anew; and continue.
The recent year-long bounce in the gold price has again sparked dreams of wealth coming from expected higher gold prices. If someone accepts price suppression of gold as factual and evidential, then they must also recognize that no institution has done more to pave the road to higher gold prices than the Federal Reserve.
GOLD PRICE VS VALUE
However, the previous statement is by no means laudatory of the Fed.
The Federal Reserve has destroyed the US dollar over the past century by continually expanding the supply of money and credit. That debasement of the US dollar has led to a decline of more than ninety-eight percent in its purchasing power; and that decline in purchasing power is the reason for gold’s higher price over time from $20 per ounce to $1700 per ounce.
Some gold investors are way too price-conscious; nay, price-dependent is a more accurately descriptive term. They seem to be constantly in need of higher prices to justify their predictions for gold.
The purpose of the article is to point out how each time higher price expectations aren’t met, the price predictors trot out the price suppression argument. If they understood and accepted the argument for everything it implies, then they would already own physical gold and they wouldn’t have to defend their errant price predictions.
The case for gold is not about price. It is about value. Gold’s value is in its use as money and its value is constant and stable.
Gold is the original measure of value for all other goods and services. Gold’s price tells us nothing about gold. It tells us what has happened to the US dollar; nothing else.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/gold-market-manipulation-federal-051600422.html
Imagine at this stage if gold price wasn’t manipulated. The risk would be gold price skyrocketing with US dollar value dropping precipitously. Then all hell breaks loose. I’m not trying to justify the manipulation, but you’re right, the markets are also being manipulated. It’s likely the only thing holding the edifice of financial holdings together. A lot of huge ongoing financial band-aids until (hopefully) a viable vaccine to quell fear and things building back up organically, provided that’s still viable, and then easing back on the manipulation. I’m sure that’s the hope juice discussed at the FED.
value only exist if there are goods and services.
Ahh, imagine that….there is always a catch….DANG…
MarketWatch
Coronavirus vaccine still might not lead to herd immunity in U.S., Fauci warns
Published: June 28, 2020 at 11:50 p.m. ET
By Mike Murphy
Partially effective vaccine may not stop spread if not enough people get vaccinated
Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, speaks in April. BLOOMBERG NEWS
The U.S. is “unlikely” to develop herd immunity to COVID-19, Dr. Anthony Fauci said Sunday, due to the likely combination of only a partially effective vaccine and the large number of people who refuse to take it.
Speaking Sunday night to CNN’s Elizabeth Cohen as part of the Aspen Ideas Festival, Fauci said he would “settle” for a coronavirus vaccine that is 70% to 75% effective. By comparison, a measles vaccine is 97% to 98% effective.
“That would be wonderful if we get there,” Fauci, the government’s top infectious disease expert, said. “I don’t think we will. I would settle for a 70, 75% effective vaccine.”
Oh, my bad, the vaccination program is all smoke and mirrors… SURPRISE 😂🤣
Maybe Fauci read my article.
😘👍🤣.
This is more about $$$, the biggest bailout in HiStOrY😂👍.
GAO Can’t Solve the $2.7 Trillion Mystery of Covid-19 Aid
https://www.yahoo.com/news/gao-t-solve-2-7-103042904.html
Bloomberg
GAO Can’t Solve the $2.7 Trillion Mystery of Covid-19 Aid
Timothy L. O’Brien and Nir Kaissar
June 29, 2020, 6:30 AM EDT
23
(Bloomberg Opinion) — Last week, the Government Accountability Office issued the first comprehensive analysis of how trillions of dollars of taxpayer money is being spent to protect Americans, the economy and public services from the ravages of Covid-19. Its broad conclusions aren’t reassuring.
The report paints a picture of a federal government that is managing a gargantuan effort, at best, haphazardly. The government is either unable or reluctant to provide enough data and financial information to put clothing on what this $2.7 trillion effort truly looks like — and whether the funds are being deployed in a broadly successful way.
We’re fortunate to have the GAO at this moment because other watchdog groups meant to keep an eye on the biggest bailout in U.S. history — particularly an inspector general appointed by the president and a special bipartisan committee set up by Congress — haven’t produced any robust public assessments. That leaves the door open to possible abuses. For example, as the Washington Post reported on Friday, the White House has made it easier for government insiders to obtain bailout loans from the Small Business Administration, creating a raft of conflicts of interest.
While most Americans are aware that the federal government has undertaken this rescue, few know where the money is landing and what impact it’s having because details have been scarce.
Gone, baby, gone😘…
The Casino knows this is the end game and grabbing every nickel that it can get…
Swamp People…got to love them!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=40WBimeQZ7Y
Going in for the catch with the bait…works every time
TSA Checkpoint Travel Numbers
28th June 2020 – 633,810
28th June 2019 – 2,632,030
% drop – 76%
Mid of April – % drop is around 95%
A drop of 95% improve to a drop of 76% does not constitute an improvement in the grand scheme of things. With meetings, conventions, tourism, corporate air travel done to basically nothing, there is no way that a recovery will be coming soon.
The longer this drags on, the worse it gets. The companies that shutdown in March/April/May are those who cannot sustain at all. Those who can sustain hoped that when the society reopens, they can make it through. However, it looks like that is not possible. The next wave of closures will be just around the corner. Currently, the entire optimistic economist are are banking on “hope”
Q2 drop in trade is expected to around 18%. Remember that a contracted is not permitted in our debt-based economy and a -18% is beyond disastrous. Will it magically go back up to 0%. Not a chance unless it is fake data.
Tourism and food services (restaurants, etc) are the two sectors that many people are not forgiving. They will say that tourists sucks and restaurants should be closed because odf bad and expensive food. In a pure capitalistic way, yes, a bad business should close down. Right now, both the good and the bad are closed down.
All this while, I never believe in the GDP data and I felt that both are totally under-represented (food services and tourism). Both of them play critical roles in the economy because of “interconnectedness”. Like brick and mortar malls compared to e-commerce, the physical malls has many dependencies from janitors to interior designers, electricians, construction workers, the restaurants that feed the workers, electricians, the accounting software that the janitorial company is using and the computers that the interior designers are using. It is a big chain.
This applies to the tourism industry and the food services as well. The massive hotels, airlines, coaches, printers (tickets, etc), tables, chairs, coffer maker, lighting, etc. You can count multiple layers from the janitorial company, software company, point of sale, the uniform of the workers to the supplier of the cotton that makes the uniform. It is a long long chain of supply and all these are disrupted. If you include the farmers who supplied to the restaurants (be it for tourists or locals), the amount of dependency is enormous. It can rival the supply chain of the tech companies or factories.
You may not like the restaurant but it has paid salaries to the workers there. It has also paid the salary of the table and chair makers, the point of sale programmers, the electrician and so one. Their salary are used to buy the Nike Sport Shoes that you worked as a product manager.
Many people just cannot visualize how big a mess we are in when we locked down. As stated earlier in one of my posts, there is a lag in what we do. From taking bad food to vomiting out, it will take 3-4 hours before it happened. You can even die from it. However, there is no sign that you will die from the food poisoning 30-60 mins after you have taken the bad food.
We have not seen the worst of the lag. There are still people arguing about V-Shaped recovery. Hopium is great
there definitely will be a lag in the general public perception of how big the economic damage has been.
here, the “school year” begins around the beginning of September, and I think that will be about when most people begin to realize that the economy is in a depression and a quick recovery is doubtful.
there could be a lag or a second wave of economic damage also.
it seemed to me that Q2 would be the bottom and Q3 forward would have small partial recovery, but if the programs/policies to prop up Q2 are not renewed, and that is very possible, then who knows, Q4 could be a disaster.
banking/debt could implode later this year also, so the worst may be yet to come.
The V-Shape people will attend to a meeting in Minsk!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5ObycvN3DA
Saludos
el mar
The music is from Prokofiev’s “Lieutenant Kije”.
Businesses cannot be profitable if they have to run at less than their normal capacity, which is likely close to 100. If they also have to have workers doing disinfection, this adds to the overhead. Businesses of many kinds will discover that they have a problem. Part of it comes from the loss of tourism and restaurant services. Part of it comes from women having to leave the workforce because they no longer have adequate childcare for their children, with schools not providing “free childcare” for five days a week, plus after-school programs until mothers pick them up. Public transportation for workers is increasingly a problem as well, with reports showing that public transport is a source of COVID-19 transmission.
It is the lack of profitability that will pull the current system down. Lack of profitability will truly bite in the last part of the year. There will be little new investment either, given the poor business climate.
I see that the GDP NowCast of the Atlanta Federal Reserve now shows a -39.5% GDP decrease for the US for the second quarter. According to the report:
Planning to make the most of summer holidays this year, lockdown permitting. Looking like Christmas won’t be much fun, not for a lot of people.
“Businesses cannot be profitable if they have to run at less than their normal capacity, which is likely close to 100 … It is the lack of profitability that will pull the current system down.”
Even more worrisome when you consider that the system wasn’t really all that profitable prior to all the predicaments that cropped up in 2020. They likely only appeared profitable due to ultra-low interest rates and unsustainable debt levels (which in recent days have only gotten lower and larger, respectively).
One might say that Something’s Gotta Give…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zVzIaEuXS4
Yes, that’s has nothing to do with economic collapse… but who can say no to an early-2000’s, feel-good, PG-rated, Nicholson and Keaton rom-com? 🙂
Cheers,
-GBV
https://healthfeedback.org/claimreview/covid-19-is-among-the-leading-causes-of-death-worldwide-so-far-in-2020-but-beware-of-incomplete-graphs/
“A widely shared graph suggests that COVID-19 is a leading cause of death, responsible for approximately 345,000 deaths by 24 May 2020, ahead of well-known causes of death such as malaria (~256,000), malnutrition (~209,000), and homicides (~162,000).”
thanks.
below that (in)famous “incomplete graph” is a more complete graph.
COVID-19 is minuscule compared to heart disease and stroke.
but look!
the virus is closing in on “road injury”.
This is the chart shown:
https://healthfeedback.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/altogether-GBD-top-10-WHO2016-2048×915.png
But a 100% fatality rate for many businesses which contract Lock-down.
Good way of putting it!
“A disconnect is growing in emerging markets, which have rarely faced such dire economic conditions and yet whose assets are about to round out their best quarter in a decade…
“The yawning divide between market gains and economic gloom risks a snapback in the months ahead that would add to recovery headwinds.”
https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/reckoning-looms-emerging-markets-economic-210000269.html
“Rating agency Moody’s said late last week that South Africa’s goal to bring its surging debt load under control ‘will be very difficult to achieve’ and ‘unlikely’. That may seem like a statement of the obvious, but it is telling that it was made by Moody’s.”
https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2020-06-28-moodys-casts-doubts-on-south-africas-bid-to-stabilise-debt/#gsc.tab=0
“The fallout of the Covid-19 pandemic on Indian economy will be more disastrous than estimated earlier, according to international financial institutions and economists. The latest institution to sound the alarm bells for Asia’s third largest economy is the S & P Global Ratings that said on Friday that the Indian economy is in deep trouble…”
https://www.hellenicshippingnews.com/indias-economy-in-deep-trouble-sp/
“Thailand’s banking sector has been disrupted yet again, but this time it’s not a sophisticated new technology creating turbulence. Rather, it’s a microscopic virus that induces fear of immense collateral damage that could shake the country’s financial pillars to its core.”
https://www.bangkokpost.com/business/1942512/on-guard-against-contagion
Nevertheless,
““Asia-Pacific has shown some success in containing Covid-19 and, by and large, responded with effective macroeconomic policies,” said Shaun Roache, chief economist for Asia-Pacific at S & P Global Ratings.”
Even the projections that are given are pretty optimistic.
Some of the tidal wave of money from central banks is making it back as investments into emerging markets, making their results seem less gloomy than otherwise.
“As the recession that will surely explode by the autumn takes shape, [UK] food-bank providers report surges in demand of, in some places, around 300%.”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jun/28/pandemic-britain-hunger-boris-johnson
“The coronavirus crisis has led the Office for National Statistics to understate the speed prices are rising, according to a growing body of research during the pandemic…
“The Institute for Fiscal Studies has also found that the inflation rate in food experienced by households was higher in the first month of lockdown than usually experienced in a year.”
https://www.ft.com/content/f6b5ce2f-366f-4845-ac94-bb5448159d58
“Only 6% of the UK public want to return to the same type of economy as before the coronavirus pandemic, according to new polling, as trade unions, business groups and religious and civic leaders unite in calling for a fairer financial recovery.”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/28/just-6-of-uk-public-want-a-return-to-pre-pandemic-economy
“The UK will sell a record amount of government debt this year, testing the level of demand for gilts as Britain grapples with the economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic.”
https://www.cityam.com/uk-debt-office-plans-record-bond-sales-to-help-struggling-economy-recover/
They will damned lucky to have a functioning economy at all.
Xabier, they will. A socialist friend of mine is part of a movement pushing for a four-day week. I believe it was a potential policy of Corbyn’s but apparently this pandemic now offers the perfect opportunity to push for a re-shaping of our working habits.
Most people cant survive on six days a week working let alone four.
13 December 1973, Edward Heath introduced a three-day week to conserve coal stocks in response to the “oil crisis”.
So there’s form in Britain for this kind of nonsense.
The answer to shutdowns? More shutdowns!
I suppose it’s the rebirth of that old socialist warhorse, the “lump of work fallacy”…”the misconception that there is a fixed amount of work – a lump of labor – to be done within an economy which can be distributed to create more or fewer jobs” Wikipedia.
I don’t suppose I have heard that old chestnut for at least thirty years. Times must truly be dark to be dragging out that kind of stuff.
“Most people cant survive on six days a week working let alone four.”
Perhaps because many (most?) people have been convinced they are entitled to a luxurious lifestyle of houses (thanks to 30+ mortgages), new cars every 5 years, consumer goods (many of which are useless or redundant replacements for lower-priced consumer goods they already own) up the wazoo, trips around the world, and public services that practically do everything for them (at ridiculous public cost in the form of pensions and benefits that will likely never be paid out).
Personally, I’d love a four-day work week (or other job sharing initiatives that help spread out the work – and the incomes – across more individuals). It would be better than my zero-day work week of unemployment, and thanks to the fact I carry no debt and have learned to accept a very modest living standard, I’m pretty darn sure I could live off the proceeds.
Though I guess that’s just me; others may see it differently…
Cheers,
-GBV
Splendid idea and excellent reasoning: when it all teeters on the brink of collapse, it’s undoubtedly the perfect time to create the longed-for Utopia!
In reality, they will be on their knees, begging and imploring the gods to give them the pre-COVID way of life back, warts and all.
Or even dreaming of one of those awful UK govt. emergency food parcels…..