Los Angeles Closes Movie Theaters, Bars, Restaurants, Gyms, and Bowling Alleys
RSS
Search Text Case Sensitive Exact Words Include Comments
List of Bookmarks
These are the emergency steps we are taking to help prevent the spread of COVID-19 & protect people across LA, effective at midnight tonight. This isn’t easy & I don't make this decision lightly. We will do everything we can to help businesses & workers impacted during this time. pic.twitter.com/FAAOcRBDn7
— MayorOfLA (@MayorOfLA) March 16, 2020
For the mayor of Los Angeles to close movie theaters is a big deal, because it sends a message to the rest of the world: don’t go to the movies. (Granted, most of Hollywood’s revenue these days no doubt comes from entertainment delivered to homes, but still …)
Los Angeles is a high rent town. Economic question: How do lowered interest rates filter down to waitresses?
Rent in LA is expensive. How will waitresses pay their rent?
How will they pay for their treatment if they get corona?
I’m thinking lowered interest rates won’t help waitresses – they’ll be given helicopter money instead.
The rest of the world coudln’t care less fo LA movie theaters.
It looks, as if th had srious problems: Complete lock-down in Spain.
Kock-down and state of emergency called out in Bavaria.
Danemark lock-down
France: Closes – – -restaurants (and the borders)! – Begium – dito.
Switzerand and austria: Borders closed. No movies no nothing. Playgrounds closed!
GB – changes strategy – GB goes in the direction of – – – Sailer/Cochran style lock-down, that’s what they’re heading for right now. Maybe still without the masks, but that could follow fast.
If they can get any masks, that is.
I seriously wonder if one of the factors behind the UK's strange "let everyone but granny get it" strategy was simply that there weren't enough masks available, so they were incapable of trying the HK crush-the-curve strategy - I assume, like everything else, the masks are made in China and the Chinese needed them.
In the UK you can hardly find hand sanitiser, simple stuff to make. I think I'll knock some up myself next week, assuming I don't get gouged on the gelling stuff (polyacrylic acid).
…… they don’t.
How do lowered interest rates filter down to waitresses?
They would get bigger tips if they still had a job.
Thank god for this. Yoga’s covered, I assume. Los Angeles will be the top of the news in Japan. The Japanese prime minister today said in the diet in a response to a question that an announcement will be coming Thursday, after receiving emergency powers on Friday. This is nemawashi (consensus building) for some really tough measures, I think. But Thursday seems really far away.
‘…… Kock Down in Bavaria ……’.
So, *that’s* where Hillary Clinton ended up.
Screw that. I’m gonna go see “The Hunt” this week and they better not shut it down.
Liberals versus Deplorables. Come on. This is my movie!
This kind of thing drives me nuts:
California Legislature will consider a work hiatus due to coronavirus
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-03-15/california-legislature-will-consider-work-hiatus-due-to-coronavirus
State legislators “have been told” (by who? some staff lawyer?) that they cannot substitute a video feed (or else what? what is the sanction? a judge will issue an injunction? laws passed will not be enforced?).
This is a situation where you just do it. And if someone complains, you say, “Bless your heart!” and ignore him and continue doing your work.
Lowered interest rates will drop consumer borrowing rates (credit cards, mortgages, car loans). Depending on local supply/demand, it may result in lower rent.
This seems particularly shallow. What are they REALLY going to do?
my proposal (though there’s no legal out practical way to do it) is that if you really want to hit the pause button you could implement a suspension of
rent, mortgage, loan and interest payments for two months.
That would relieve major stress for pretty much everyone without too much distortion (except for the most responsible people who own and have no debt… they wouldn’t get anything out of the deal)
I'll tell you what I won't pay: Taxes. If that kind of shit goes down, the few thousand dollars that I just calculated I still owe, will be a LONG TIME coming.
Maybe they'll give them a pass on sleeping in the parks and shitting in public.
California Legislature will consider a work hiatus due to coronavirus
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-03-15/california-legislature-will-consider-work-hiatus-due-to-coronavirusState legislators "have been told" (by who? some staff lawyer?) that they cannot substitute a video feed (or else what? what is the sanction? a judge will issue an injunction? laws passed will not be enforced?).
This is a situation where you just do it. And if someone complains, you say, "Bless your heart!" and ignore him and continue doing your work.Replies: @Achmed E. Newman, @Anon, @Mr. Anon
When any legislature ANYWHERE shuts down, whether per normal schedule, or some virus, you count that as a blessing.
We will be doing some homeschooling tomorrow on fractions, as the school took a month with their concept lessons with the polygons that the kids would divide and color. They never got to a single actual written-out fraction. Peak Stupidity says “Hey, Ed-Schools, leave them teachers alone!” Tomorrow we will kick ass on this subject.
I think the Millennials will be hardest hit by this kind of shutdown. Not only do they work in the restaurants, bars, and coffee shops, they are the ones that seem to frequent them the most, especially the latter two. Will people put down their phones and talk to their families, or will that stuff get worse?
The interest rate business is a last-ditch effort, and the FED is out of ammo. That’s all they know how to do though, besides printing money. That they will do. Inflation is quite a bit higher than as advertised by the BLS and will go higher still.
If we're headed into a recession, stocks are a bad idea.
If inflation will be high, annuities and bonds are a bad idea.
Outside of highly desirable areas, real estate probably is a bad idea.
I'm thinking Gold.
Let's say you put your assets into a money market account. Then buy Call options on Gold. Then when Gold shoots the moon, you exercise your Call options. The spread between the Call value and actual value (which will have increased substantially during the coming panic) is your profit.
What do you think?Replies: @El Dato, @Jim Bob Lassiter, @Hypnotoad666
I used to be a Milton Friedman monetarist. But my empiricism dissuaded me from that perspective. I see no evidence of inflation, but I am open to more data.Replies: @Achmed E. Newman
my proposal (though there's no legal out practical way to do it) is that if you really want to hit the pause button you could implement a suspension of
rent, mortgage, loan and interest payments for two months.
That would relieve major stress for pretty much everyone without too much distortion (except for the most responsible people who own and have no debt... they wouldn't get anything out of the deal)Replies: @Achmed E. Newman, @Cloudbuster, @Twodees Partain
Right, like my family. My credit rating is dashes, as in “no data”. When responsibility is discouraged, the responsible will be discouraged.
I’ll tell you what I won’t pay: Taxes. If that kind of shit goes down, the few thousand dollars that I just calculated I still owe, will be a LONG TIME coming.
A wise decision: A good deal of the Corona Virus infections in Scandinavia, Germany and Austria (we are talking of a few hundred in the early stages of the epidemic) can be traced to the small ski resort town Ischgl in Tyrol: Despite early warnings from Iceland https://icelandmonitor.mbl.is/news/news/2020/03/05/ischgl_ski_resort_in_austria_is_risk_area/
political pressure from the tourism industry kept all the hotels, bars, restaurants open for tourists..
If such a small town can do such damage – imagine what can happen in LA..
who cares what happens in some city in a foreign country. California is not part of America. you want to talk about triage in the time of coronavirus? it’s time to let California go.
especially who cares about what happens to the movie industry. at least sports are real. even pro wrestling is more real than movies. movies are fake. nothing happening in a movie actually happened. actors are professional pretenders. even athletes are worth more than them. we’d be better off with sports returning after this hysteria, and movies being the thing that goes away forever.
9 million votes and 55 electoral ka-chings incoming for Mr “No deportations for ANY reason in the first 100 days” Joe Biden.
screw California. build the wall there. quarantine there. no more California transplants moving to other states and ruining them.
“Helicopter money” it’ll have to be, because lowered interest rates and even payroll-tax deductions only help incrementally, theoretically, and eventually (choose your favorite combination).
The many people in the margins of economic society, in the ‘gig economy’ or self-employed–not to mention unemployed–will still have to eat, much less pay rent. Are our fearless leaders up to the task of doing what has to be done? And will it even be enough?
Three guesses as to what comes next 😉
They don’t. Working-class people don’t need lower interest rates or support for asset prices.
They need cash to pay rent, eat, and take care of the bills. So the best way to help Joe/Jane Sixpack is to give them direct cash. Universal Basic Income (UBI), at least until this crisis subsides, is the answer. It’ll keep people and businesses afloat, as well as help mitigate any risk of a recession.
Over the last few days, we’ve given the major banks $2.2 trillion. Imagine if that had been given out to the general population. That’d be around $25,000 for an “average” 4 person family. Just think how much that’d help ordinary people, while making it financially easier for them to avoid going to work and spreading the virus.
It’s interesting that it’s “controversial” to give people UBI, but it’s “mainstream” to cut taxes, spend more on the military, and inject liquidity into the financial markets.
Life under the rule of oligarchs.
I don't see why having them pay part of the cost here, considering they have the money and have the most to lose, would be wrong.
It's time for them to start acting their age, for once in their lives.Replies: @Yak-15, @Reg Cæsar
We also have things like unemployment insurance that provide direct support to people who lose their jobs in a recession. Normally this only lasts a few months but if the recession is extended they can extend the period during which payments are made. We don't need "universal basic income" which will incentivize people to play video games instead of seeking work. Money does not magically appear from the sky - ultimately the money has to be supported by the production of actual goods and services and people need to work to produce those.
this is THE worst idea in the entire collection of ideas about how to respond.
'at least until the crisis subsides' is the key phrase.
once in place, it will NEVER end.
ok, well, it will end once the nation ceases to exist. so technically it will end. but not before then.
President Biden will keep the free money flowing as long as tax paying Republican voters are able to bear the weight of the third world America 2.0. which won't be long.Replies: @Screwtape
These are the kinds of measures necessary to get the curve down to where you want it. The question is, will they work? The answer is the same as that to another question, will zero interest rates work?
Similar problems, linked together. One gets the feeling we are pissing into the wind in both cases.
Prediction: No and no. The drastic closings will not push down R nought enough, and the damage they cause will not be assuaged by any economic measures possible in real math.
One hesitates to say it might have been better to do nothing, but… We have steered our full bus into an approaching truck to avoid a pedestrian — and we are going 60 mph.
Better to have pushed the fat man in front of the trolly, but now we are mixing metaphors. It’s late, but yeah, if you want your curve flattened, you are going to have to flatten your precious entertainment industry.
I think the Millennials will be hardest hit by this kind of shutdown. Not only do they work in the restaurants, bars, and coffee shops, they are the ones that seem to frequent them the most, especially the latter two. Will people put down their phones and talk to their families, or will that stuff get worse?
The interest rate business is a last-ditch effort, and the FED is out of ammo. That's all they know how to do though, besides printing money. That they will do. Inflation is quite a bit higher than as advertised by the BLS and will go higher still.Replies: @JohnnyWalker123, @anon, @Charles Erwin Wilson
So what are you doing with your money?
If we’re headed into a recession, stocks are a bad idea.
If inflation will be high, annuities and bonds are a bad idea.
Outside of highly desirable areas, real estate probably is a bad idea.
I’m thinking Gold.
Let’s say you put your assets into a money market account. Then buy Call options on Gold. Then when Gold shoots the moon, you exercise your Call options. The spread between the Call value and actual value (which will have increased substantially during the coming panic) is your profit.
What do you think?
A lot of people will be looking for liquidity on a short term and dump. So I dunno.
If you think people are under-reacting: buy ammunition and stored food.
Trying to take a cheap vacation may be out if you want the nightlife. Or just a restaurant to eat in. This may happen everywhere. But what about trips to see natural wonders? Will National Parks stay open?
Maybe one good thing will be continuing curfews for “challenged urban areas” even once this is over.
Le Challenge va en s’accroissant:
Coronavirus situation in France ‘extremely worrying’ & getting worse rapidly, top health official warns
This year is the bomb.
If have increased my stock of Italian coffee. Will it be enough? Fallout,jpg
If we're headed into a recession, stocks are a bad idea.
If inflation will be high, annuities and bonds are a bad idea.
Outside of highly desirable areas, real estate probably is a bad idea.
I'm thinking Gold.
Let's say you put your assets into a money market account. Then buy Call options on Gold. Then when Gold shoots the moon, you exercise your Call options. The spread between the Call value and actual value (which will have increased substantially during the coming panic) is your profit.
What do you think?Replies: @El Dato, @Jim Bob Lassiter, @Hypnotoad666
Possibly.
A lot of people will be looking for liquidity on a short term and dump. So I dunno.
How about measures that don’t give the entire US economy a heart attack?
Humidity is something everyone can do.
Number of US deaths from COVID-19 so far:
Just 69, or about 1/1000 of a bad flu season.
Year over Year GDP, annualized: -40%?
Deaths in tropical countries: almost none
Most of us will be able to control or at least affect the humidity within our own homes, but almost all contagion occurs outside the home. Obviously, if your household has people coming and going, that could be an entirely different story.
The best plan for everyone right now, irrespective of age, is to stay home and avoid like the plague all unnecessary social contact. Wash your hands, lower arms, and face with hot soapy water thoroughly when returning home from being outside. Do it without fail, and keep your hands away from your face at all times when outdoors or shopping.
Once you are ill, higher humidity in your personal space may play a decisive role in speeding your recovery. Steam inhalers are known to offer relief from flu and colds. Chicken Noodle soup has long been called Jewish Penicillin. I recommend standing over the chicken soup as it comes to a boil, and inhaling the vapors deeply. Green tea and other herbal teas also have beneficial properties to ease suffering from colds and the flu. A pot of water boiling on the stove can be used to humidify the air, and so can your shower. Circulate the humid air with a fan.
Salt water gargle also has recognized benefits, and some also recommend nasal irrigation with salt water.
If gas prices come down, one day drives to scenery sound pretty good. It’s finally raining again so the California poppies could show up in Antelope Valley.
The service industry is filled with people living from shift to shift, including a lot of illegals. How do you think this immediate freeze on these jobs with impact urban crime rates? I'm thinking muggings and robberies will spike.
They need cash to pay rent, eat, and take care of the bills. So the best way to help Joe/Jane Sixpack is to give them direct cash. Universal Basic Income (UBI), at least until this crisis subsides, is the answer. It'll keep people and businesses afloat, as well as help mitigate any risk of a recession.
Over the last few days, we've given the major banks $2.2 trillion. Imagine if that had been given out to the general population. That'd be around $25,000 for an "average" 4 person family. Just think how much that'd help ordinary people, while making it financially easier for them to avoid going to work and spreading the virus.
It's interesting that it's "controversial" to give people UBI, but it's "mainstream" to cut taxes, spend more on the military, and inject liquidity into the financial markets.
Life under the rule of oligarchs.Replies: @Bill P, @Neoconned, @Jack D, @prime noticer
Yeah, this is bullshit. I’m all for keeping my old parents alive, but yet another round of stealing from my generation to prop up their lifestyle is going too far.
I don’t see why having them pay part of the cost here, considering they have the money and have the most to lose, would be wrong.
It’s time for them to start acting their age, for once in their lives.
Things are not free - ultimately, people’s labor is what gives anything value. In essence, you’re taking the labor of others and giving it to people who are not laboring or are incapable of the quality of labor necessary to sustain a first world lifestyle over the long run. In substance, your pulling value away from those whose labor brings actual value and giving it to the valueless. At some point that shell game is ends.
Or children, for that matter.
Too Little Too Late.
Humidity is something everyone can do.
Number of US deaths from COVID-19 so far:
Just 69, or about 1/1000 of a bad flu season.
Year over Year GDP, annualized: -40%?
Deaths in tropical countries: almost noneReplies: @El Dato, @ic1000, @Sparkon
In spite of assurances by the PTBs, “the economy” (that nice network of aggressive who/whom exchanges, hoovering up resources, generating useful or useless structure as it goes, and leaving a trail of trash and waste heat in its wake) has had coronary heart disease for some time now. This slight exertion on the treadmill is an experiment.
my proposal (though there's no legal out practical way to do it) is that if you really want to hit the pause button you could implement a suspension of
rent, mortgage, loan and interest payments for two months.
That would relieve major stress for pretty much everyone without too much distortion (except for the most responsible people who own and have no debt... they wouldn't get anything out of the deal)Replies: @Achmed E. Newman, @Cloudbuster, @Twodees Partain
It wouldn’t lesson the stress on people who depend on rental income for their livelihood.
If they own the property free and clear then they're pretty much swimming in money anyway so missing a month or two of income isn't going to kill them.
Also landlords have to be able to deal with vacancy anyway so they can't run with zero cash/credit buffer anyway.Replies: @Anon
How will they pay for their treatment if they get corona?Replies: @danand, @Jim Bob Lassiter, @Hypnotoad666
I don't see why having them pay part of the cost here, considering they have the money and have the most to lose, would be wrong.
It's time for them to start acting their age, for once in their lives.Replies: @Yak-15, @Reg Cæsar
This is because you haven’t thought this through. They won’t tax wealth and even if they did, wealth is simply a place holder on the labor of other people.
Things are not free – ultimately, people’s labor is what gives anything value. In essence, you’re taking the labor of others and giving it to people who are not laboring or are incapable of the quality of labor necessary to sustain a first world lifestyle over the long run. In substance, your pulling value away from those whose labor brings actual value and giving it to the valueless. At some point that shell game is ends.
Humidity is something everyone can do.
Number of US deaths from COVID-19 so far:
Just 69, or about 1/1000 of a bad flu season.
Year over Year GDP, annualized: -40%?
Deaths in tropical countries: almost noneReplies: @El Dato, @ic1000, @Sparkon
@ Dan Hess — You have been the intraweb’s most forceful advocate of increasing indoor humidity. Because of the evidence you cite and the supporting peer-reviewed literature, I installed a central humidifier at home, yesterday. And I’ve been referring folks to your comments, IRL. So, thanks, I think.
I actually have a humidifier attached to my furnace but it stopped working a number of years ago and I never bothered to fix it. When it worked, it worked too well and my windows were fogging from the humidity. It was a maintenance headache because it operated with evaporative pads that would get crusted with minerals from the water. I know there are types now that use steam (basically a kettle that boils water) but when I looked at them I was very unimpressed by the quality of the construction - the boiling vessel looked like a plastic milk jug, the whole thing looked flimsy and not worth the price, especially not if you had to pay a HVAC contractor to install it.
In lieu of that, I have been using an ultrasonic humidifier in my bedroom. Somewhat of a pain in the butt to fill every night but not a lot of maintenance needed. Some white dust on the furniture from the minerals in the water. Inexpensive. Only serves one room.Replies: @ic1000, @AnotherDad
Given that that industry (and the power behind it) has pretty much flattened what used to be our precious country, it’ll be a small price to pay.
Trump: “I think that people in the markets should be very thrilled.”
The rest of us: “Who gives a sh*t”.
Nice to know our President has his priorities straight.
Regarding helicopter money, I am reminded of how Feinberg (The helicopter-money disburser) handled helicopter money after the Gulf oil spill. He decided not to require proof of loss of income. Later, he was shocked when people cheated, falsifying their claims. So we know people will cheat. We will need a lot of helicopter money, as Feinberg learned.
“How do lowered interest rates filter down to waitresses?”
If the fed buys up all the corporate debt and this Covid scare goes on long enough the underlying corporations will go bankrupt. Then the federal government will own everything.
As far as the waitresses I suggest activating unemployment insurance for all workers at fed gov expense.
I noticed school systems are being shut down but the staffs don’t seem to be furloughed, so they will continue getting their pay and benefits. Bowling ally workers will get UI for a time while the owner will lose his business as he probably is in debt.
“If inflation will be high, annuities and bonds are a bad idea.”
Individual bonds held to maturity won’t be directly affected by inflation. (As long as the payor remains solvent.)
The big factor will be if the resorts and campgrounds stay open. I don’t see any reason for the campgrounds to ever close, people can be there and still practice social distancing. Resorts should be able to clean rooms between each guest too. Checking the NPS website, it looks like the only places that have closed so far are the ones like Alcatraz in San Francisco.
Helicopter money aka a variation of UBI that Yang promotes? A tall orrder from this Congress and fron Trump….
They need cash to pay rent, eat, and take care of the bills. So the best way to help Joe/Jane Sixpack is to give them direct cash. Universal Basic Income (UBI), at least until this crisis subsides, is the answer. It'll keep people and businesses afloat, as well as help mitigate any risk of a recession.
Over the last few days, we've given the major banks $2.2 trillion. Imagine if that had been given out to the general population. That'd be around $25,000 for an "average" 4 person family. Just think how much that'd help ordinary people, while making it financially easier for them to avoid going to work and spreading the virus.
It's interesting that it's "controversial" to give people UBI, but it's "mainstream" to cut taxes, spend more on the military, and inject liquidity into the financial markets.
Life under the rule of oligarchs.Replies: @Bill P, @Neoconned, @Jack D, @prime noticer
“Rule by oligarches/plutocrats”…..just like the Antebellum South….how did that turn out?
How about homeless areas???
Arnold took too many drugs…sad.
A landlord’s single biggest expense is interest on the building mortgage. Lower interest rates allow him to refinance and reduce that expense. He can then afford to charge less rent to waitresses.
But, given no decrease in demand, why would he?
The interest rates are already low. Yet rents have been increasing some multiple of “inflation” for years now. Where are all those benevolent landlords looking to do a transaction to then pass the savings on to their customers?
Even assuming banks waived the various prepayment, lockout, and yield maintenance provisions built into commercial loans, a refinance takes a couple of months.
And then what? The LL cuts fixed expenses by 1%. Then he is going to turn around and lower contracted rent rates in his building with the savings?
It would make more sense, and even then not much sense, for the fedgov to just create a voucher program like section 8 in which rent is paid to LL directly based on a subsidy calc’d on lost employment days.
But thats too much paperwork. This is all too interconnected. A program can’t get going fast enough to filter through actual needs, abuses, manipulation, and efficiency. Nope. Helicopter money or bust.
People need relief today, not a structural capital deflation that carries no mandate to pass the savings to the consumer.
Just write a check to every legal resident. Its all funny money anyhow. The illegals can get a free bus ticket “home”. Maybe some sammich money too. Why not.
The Landlords and other asset owners are gonna do what they want anyhow.
Give the people a way to buy their junk for a month or two. If they squander it, so be it. At least the gubmint did something.
After all, who can show how the trillions of lube injected into “the market” and the banks hasn’t been squandered and or stolen?
My “wealth” is down 30%. My down payment for a house I was looking to buy has shrunk. My defensive gold positions are now jammed down by liquidity (or so ‘they’ say) desperados fleeing to cash as well. And my interest checking account makes an even smaller fraction of inflation.
Its great that I can get a 3% mortgage in a RE bubble. But just because that rate used to be 3.25% doesnt mean I am gonna pay more for the same house.
And now none of my clients are doing business so my already tenuous income as self-employed means I will have a hole in my income that those same banks will frown upon should the stars align and I apply for that mortgage.
Just give me some money already. I’m tired of the eggheads justifying the fleecing of treasure based on some economic theory that can never be proven and always seems to result in the same thing: More wealth at the top and an even more fragile system in its wake.
If the gov wants to play out this charade of saving our lives by cratering the economy for our own good, they need to just go all the way and hand out money. But no, we can have actual hyperinflation until the assets have been repriced and joe sixpack’s precious 401k is conpressed into a gubmint cheese panini.
Landlords lowering rent. Fukin hilarious.
And no one would ever lower rent unless the units were empty.
Also, commercial loans like this aren't nearly as easy to refi as home mortgages (which, unlike most forms of debt, are required to be prepayable without penalty). Refinancing can happen, but from what I've seen, it's generally going to require a complex renegotiation.
However, commercial real estate interest rates are often floating, in which case their interest expense drops without a refi.
Humidity is something everyone can do.
Number of US deaths from COVID-19 so far:
Just 69, or about 1/1000 of a bad flu season.
Year over Year GDP, annualized: -40%?
Deaths in tropical countries: almost noneReplies: @El Dato, @ic1000, @Sparkon
Indoors perhaps, but not outdoors or in public places.
Most of us will be able to control or at least affect the humidity within our own homes, but almost all contagion occurs outside the home. Obviously, if your household has people coming and going, that could be an entirely different story.
The best plan for everyone right now, irrespective of age, is to stay home and avoid like the plague all unnecessary social contact. Wash your hands, lower arms, and face with hot soapy water thoroughly when returning home from being outside. Do it without fail, and keep your hands away from your face at all times when outdoors or shopping.
Once you are ill, higher humidity in your personal space may play a decisive role in speeding your recovery. Steam inhalers are known to offer relief from flu and colds. Chicken Noodle soup has long been called Jewish Penicillin. I recommend standing over the chicken soup as it comes to a boil, and inhaling the vapors deeply. Green tea and other herbal teas also have beneficial properties to ease suffering from colds and the flu. A pot of water boiling on the stove can be used to humidify the air, and so can your shower. Circulate the humid air with a fan.
Salt water gargle also has recognized benefits, and some also recommend nasal irrigation with salt water.
They need cash to pay rent, eat, and take care of the bills. So the best way to help Joe/Jane Sixpack is to give them direct cash. Universal Basic Income (UBI), at least until this crisis subsides, is the answer. It'll keep people and businesses afloat, as well as help mitigate any risk of a recession.
Over the last few days, we've given the major banks $2.2 trillion. Imagine if that had been given out to the general population. That'd be around $25,000 for an "average" 4 person family. Just think how much that'd help ordinary people, while making it financially easier for them to avoid going to work and spreading the virus.
It's interesting that it's "controversial" to give people UBI, but it's "mainstream" to cut taxes, spend more on the military, and inject liquidity into the financial markets.
Life under the rule of oligarchs.Replies: @Bill P, @Neoconned, @Jack D, @prime noticer
When the banking system collapses, working-class people are the one who pay the highest price. From bitter past experience, the government has learned not to allow the banking system to collapse.
We also have things like unemployment insurance that provide direct support to people who lose their jobs in a recession. Normally this only lasts a few months but if the recession is extended they can extend the period during which payments are made. We don’t need “universal basic income” which will incentivize people to play video games instead of seeking work. Money does not magically appear from the sky – ultimately the money has to be supported by the production of actual goods and services and people need to work to produce those.
I think the Millennials will be hardest hit by this kind of shutdown. Not only do they work in the restaurants, bars, and coffee shops, they are the ones that seem to frequent them the most, especially the latter two. Will people put down their phones and talk to their families, or will that stuff get worse?
The interest rate business is a last-ditch effort, and the FED is out of ammo. That's all they know how to do though, besides printing money. That they will do. Inflation is quite a bit higher than as advertised by the BLS and will go higher still.Replies: @JohnnyWalker123, @anon, @Charles Erwin Wilson
There are many gigs in the gig economy, as long as the internets are working.
https://nypost.com/2020/03/14/business-booming-for-cam-girls-amid-coronavirus-outbreak/
NY/NJ/CT govs just jointly agreed to a similar shutdown of bars, gyms, eateries etc. as well as schools. Like that famous Pascal quote, the question now is whether Americans can just sit home quietly and stay out of trouble for any length of time. The behavior you see on Black Friday — after just one day of sitting around at home with the family — suggests the answer is no.
Another question is how far state governors are willing to push all these new restrictions
A landlord’s single biggest expense is interest on the building mortgage. Lower interest rates allow him to refinance and reduce that expense. He can then afford to charge less rent to waitresses.
But, given no decrease in demand, why would he?
Lol. Thats some serious trickle down.
The interest rates are already low. Yet rents have been increasing some multiple of “inflation” for years now. Where are all those benevolent landlords looking to do a transaction to then pass the savings on to their customers?
Even assuming banks waived the various prepayment, lockout, and yield maintenance provisions built into commercial loans, a refinance takes a couple of months.
And then what? The LL cuts fixed expenses by 1%. Then he is going to turn around and lower contracted rent rates in his building with the savings?
It would make more sense, and even then not much sense, for the fedgov to just create a voucher program like section 8 in which rent is paid to LL directly based on a subsidy calc’d on lost employment days.
But thats too much paperwork. This is all too interconnected. A program can’t get going fast enough to filter through actual needs, abuses, manipulation, and efficiency. Nope. Helicopter money or bust.
People need relief today, not a structural capital deflation that carries no mandate to pass the savings to the consumer.
Just write a check to every legal resident. Its all funny money anyhow. The illegals can get a free bus ticket “home”. Maybe some sammich money too. Why not.
The Landlords and other asset owners are gonna do what they want anyhow.
Give the people a way to buy their junk for a month or two. If they squander it, so be it. At least the gubmint did something.
After all, who can show how the trillions of lube injected into “the market” and the banks hasn’t been squandered and or stolen?
My “wealth” is down 30%. My down payment for a house I was looking to buy has shrunk. My defensive gold positions are now jammed down by liquidity (or so ‘they’ say) desperados fleeing to cash as well. And my interest checking account makes an even smaller fraction of inflation.
Its great that I can get a 3% mortgage in a RE bubble. But just because that rate used to be 3.25% doesnt mean I am gonna pay more for the same house.
And now none of my clients are doing business so my already tenuous income as self-employed means I will have a hole in my income that those same banks will frown upon should the stars align and I apply for that mortgage.
Just give me some money already. I’m tired of the eggheads justifying the fleecing of treasure based on some economic theory that can never be proven and always seems to result in the same thing: More wealth at the top and an even more fragile system in its wake.
If the gov wants to play out this charade of saving our lives by cratering the economy for our own good, they need to just go all the way and hand out money. But no, we can have actual hyperinflation until the assets have been repriced and joe sixpack’s precious 401k is conpressed into a gubmint cheese panini.
Landlords lowering rent. Fukin hilarious.
California Legislature will consider a work hiatus due to coronavirus
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-03-15/california-legislature-will-consider-work-hiatus-due-to-coronavirusState legislators "have been told" (by who? some staff lawyer?) that they cannot substitute a video feed (or else what? what is the sanction? a judge will issue an injunction? laws passed will not be enforced?).
This is a situation where you just do it. And if someone complains, you say, "Bless your heart!" and ignore him and continue doing your work.Replies: @Achmed E. Newman, @Anon, @Mr. Anon
“Told” by some state attorney who looked up the laws that were passed at some point during a previous health crisis.
Money does not magically appear from the sky
What do you call QA, or Fed injections into the repo market?
What with fees and other charges, re financing sometimes doesn’t work out as planned. Plus the banks often provide only new 30 year loans. So more interest over the years
And no one would ever lower rent unless the units were empty.
How will they pay for their treatment if they get corona?Replies: @danand, @Jim Bob Lassiter, @Hypnotoad666
Who will the landlords rent their properties to?
Helping out tenants in any way is communism and must never happen in any fashion or God will turn the earth into a pillar of salt (at least that's what Protestants say it says in their various Protestant bibles).Replies: @Jim Bob Lassiter
How does one convert low interest short term commercial money into permanent or semi-permanent low interest mortgage financing?
This is happening around the country. What it amounts to is government officials who will not miss a single paycheck due to all this, telling private businesses: Some fraction of you – maybe a large fraction of you – are going to go out of business and maybe even go bankrupt. Stay safe.
Or not lower the rent and just make more money off the rental unit.
California Legislature will consider a work hiatus due to coronavirus
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-03-15/california-legislature-will-consider-work-hiatus-due-to-coronavirusState legislators "have been told" (by who? some staff lawyer?) that they cannot substitute a video feed (or else what? what is the sanction? a judge will issue an injunction? laws passed will not be enforced?).
This is a situation where you just do it. And if someone complains, you say, "Bless your heart!" and ignore him and continue doing your work.Replies: @Achmed E. Newman, @Anon, @Mr. Anon
It’s probably the Law. Sounds like a provision of a sunshine law. But, hey, why should legislators feel obligated to obey the law?
If we're headed into a recession, stocks are a bad idea.
If inflation will be high, annuities and bonds are a bad idea.
Outside of highly desirable areas, real estate probably is a bad idea.
I'm thinking Gold.
Let's say you put your assets into a money market account. Then buy Call options on Gold. Then when Gold shoots the moon, you exercise your Call options. The spread between the Call value and actual value (which will have increased substantially during the coming panic) is your profit.
What do you think?Replies: @El Dato, @Jim Bob Lassiter, @Hypnotoad666
Buy and hoard Hollywood movies on DVDs.
If we're headed into a recession, stocks are a bad idea.
If inflation will be high, annuities and bonds are a bad idea.
Outside of highly desirable areas, real estate probably is a bad idea.
I'm thinking Gold.
Let's say you put your assets into a money market account. Then buy Call options on Gold. Then when Gold shoots the moon, you exercise your Call options. The spread between the Call value and actual value (which will have increased substantially during the coming panic) is your profit.
What do you think?Replies: @El Dato, @Jim Bob Lassiter, @Hypnotoad666
If you think people are over-reacting: buy stocks as they will bounce back shortly.
If you think people are under-reacting: buy ammunition and stored food.
Rent is a result of supply and demand, the owner’s costs are only one factor in it. A reduction in interest rates due to refinancing, which is not a simple process for rental property, is not going to be automatically passed on to the tenants. In most cases, rates have been so low for so long, you aren’t going to have that much savings refinancing rental property anyway. Lenders aren’t going to make loans at close to zero. I talked to someone buying a home who locked a rate a few days before the panic started. Mortgage rates haven’t even dropped enough for the float down feature to lower the rate by 1/8 a point.
How will they pay for their treatment if they get corona?Replies: @danand, @Jim Bob Lassiter, @Hypnotoad666
If I’m not allowed to go to the gym, does that mean they have to refund my monthly dues during the quarantine period?
This kind of thing generally falls under the contract principle of “impossibility” or an “act of god.” In other words, they are naturally excused from their obligation to give me access to the gym.
But there is another equitable principle of preventing “unjust enrichment.” Why should they get the windfall of collecting monthly dues for nothing, especially if they aren’t having to pay employees or utilities, etc. during this period?
I smell some class action lawsuits coming on.
If they are closed, it's probably true (depend on contractual language) that they are not in default to the extent that you could sue them for additional damages - i.e. the "cost to cover" but you don't owe them the fee either.
If I contract to sell you wheat at $10 a bushel and I don't deliver, you can go out into the market and buy the wheat elsewhere (at say $12/bu.) and sue me for the $2 extra it cost you. But not if I can't deliver due to force majeure. But if I don't deliver the wheat you don't owe me the original contract price of $10. The entire deal is called off - I am excused from delivering but you are excused from paying.
In the gym context, "cost to cover" as a result of unexcused closure would mean the cost of going to another gym.
And who knows what kind of one sided language they put in their contract.
And if local schools don’t reopen at all this spring, that’s a 30 percent cut in their calendar year. Do I get a partial rebate on my school taxes?
Than same issue could apply to universities. “I did not pay for an online course, I paid tuition for in-class teaching.” Lawsuits should be filed and tuition reimbursed.
Credit card interest rates are 20%+. It doesn’t affect anyone’s behavior if they drop a point.
More details please – what brand is it? Did you self install? How much did it cost? Etc. Note that heating season is rapidly drawing to a close in many parts of the US.
I actually have a humidifier attached to my furnace but it stopped working a number of years ago and I never bothered to fix it. When it worked, it worked too well and my windows were fogging from the humidity. It was a maintenance headache because it operated with evaporative pads that would get crusted with minerals from the water. I know there are types now that use steam (basically a kettle that boils water) but when I looked at them I was very unimpressed by the quality of the construction – the boiling vessel looked like a plastic milk jug, the whole thing looked flimsy and not worth the price, especially not if you had to pay a HVAC contractor to install it.
In lieu of that, I have been using an ultrasonic humidifier in my bedroom. Somewhat of a pain in the butt to fill every night but not a lot of maintenance needed. Some white dust on the furniture from the minerals in the water. Inexpensive. Only serves one room.
The unit is plastic with some metal, it looks sturdy enough. The controller is digital (Model 60) and reads the relative humidity in the system -- around 38% on installation and now ~42%, after a day. It calls for installing an outdoor temperature sensor, but the lead can run up to 300 feet.
On the DIY scale, installation calls for at least "intermediate" skills. It took me two 11-hour days (including 2 trips to Home Improvement Center), but that This Old House required some plumbing, some cleaning, and a little sheet metal work. So another $70 in parts. Your job will probably go faster.Replies: @Jack D
What we have is an updated version of the evaporative, where the reservoir is detachable, closed, capped, and sits on the device upside down with the cap actually a valve that releases a drop to working tank the mesh draws from. (You get a bubble like a water cooler.) I really like it.
Sure with hard water the mesh will eventually crusts up, needs some rinsing, maybe eventual replacement. But its effective and not breathing dust.
If you're using the ultra-sonic and it's not bugging your lungs ... great. I'd just err on the side of not breathing that stuff in.Replies: @Jack D
Waitresses become lap dancers at Dames ‘n’ Games?
In the context of 2.2 trillion, wouldn’t 330 million amount to a rounding error? Just UBI every American a cool mil’. What’s the issue? I guess we can’t give the untouchables any reprieve.
https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/the-million-dollars-per-person-affair-is-telling/
Closing movie theaters, bars, etc. is not an unreasonable precaution to take. I wonder if the city fathers will close down Los Angeles’ Skid Row?
Seems to this ignorant hillbilly that area would be a perfect site for cultivating a bumper crop of the Wuhan Flu. Methinks it would be a good idea to clear all the folks who are squatting there along with their possessions and then power wash the streets.
Of course this would only make sense if steps were taken to prevent another occupation of the area. And I also recognize the irony of an anti-statist recommending local government action.
Not allowed to is different than not open. If the gym is open for business then they can probably keep your dues.
If they are closed, it’s probably true (depend on contractual language) that they are not in default to the extent that you could sue them for additional damages – i.e. the “cost to cover” but you don’t owe them the fee either.
If I contract to sell you wheat at $10 a bushel and I don’t deliver, you can go out into the market and buy the wheat elsewhere (at say $12/bu.) and sue me for the $2 extra it cost you. But not if I can’t deliver due to force majeure. But if I don’t deliver the wheat you don’t owe me the original contract price of $10. The entire deal is called off – I am excused from delivering but you are excused from paying.
In the gym context, “cost to cover” as a result of unexcused closure would mean the cost of going to another gym.
And who knows what kind of one sided language they put in their contract.
The profit-maximizing rent is the same regardless of your debt burden. The relative price of a can of Coke or Pepsi isn’t affected by either company’s debt burden; neither is the cost of rent.
Also, commercial loans like this aren’t nearly as easy to refi as home mortgages (which, unlike most forms of debt, are required to be prepayable without penalty). Refinancing can happen, but from what I’ve seen, it’s generally going to require a complex renegotiation.
However, commercial real estate interest rates are often floating, in which case their interest expense drops without a refi.
Has to be said:
But don’t people bowl alone nowadays…
I actually have a humidifier attached to my furnace but it stopped working a number of years ago and I never bothered to fix it. When it worked, it worked too well and my windows were fogging from the humidity. It was a maintenance headache because it operated with evaporative pads that would get crusted with minerals from the water. I know there are types now that use steam (basically a kettle that boils water) but when I looked at them I was very unimpressed by the quality of the construction - the boiling vessel looked like a plastic milk jug, the whole thing looked flimsy and not worth the price, especially not if you had to pay a HVAC contractor to install it.
In lieu of that, I have been using an ultrasonic humidifier in my bedroom. Somewhat of a pain in the butt to fill every night but not a lot of maintenance needed. Some white dust on the furniture from the minerals in the water. Inexpensive. Only serves one room.Replies: @ic1000, @AnotherDad
Re: whole-house humidifier — On the advice of my HVAC guy, I installed an Aprilaire 500, bought for about $160 at Big Box Store. It is only for forced-air heat, of the type you describe — attaches to the furnace and operates with evaporative pads. And as you say, the pads get crusted with minerals from the water, they will require changeouts once or twice a heating season ($12 each).
The unit is plastic with some metal, it looks sturdy enough. The controller is digital (Model 60) and reads the relative humidity in the system — around 38% on installation and now ~42%, after a day. It calls for installing an outdoor temperature sensor, but the lead can run up to 300 feet.
On the DIY scale, installation calls for at least “intermediate” skills. It took me two 11-hour days (including 2 trips to Home Improvement Center), but that This Old House required some plumbing, some cleaning, and a little sheet metal work. So another $70 in parts. Your job will probably go faster.
I don't see why having them pay part of the cost here, considering they have the money and have the most to lose, would be wrong.
It's time for them to start acting their age, for once in their lives.Replies: @Yak-15, @Reg Cæsar
Unlike their parents.
Or children, for that matter.
No man’s life, liberty or property are safe while the Legislature is in session. – Judge Gideon J. Tucker
The unit is plastic with some metal, it looks sturdy enough. The controller is digital (Model 60) and reads the relative humidity in the system -- around 38% on installation and now ~42%, after a day. It calls for installing an outdoor temperature sensor, but the lead can run up to 300 feet.
On the DIY scale, installation calls for at least "intermediate" skills. It took me two 11-hour days (including 2 trips to Home Improvement Center), but that This Old House required some plumbing, some cleaning, and a little sheet metal work. So another $70 in parts. Your job will probably go faster.Replies: @Jack D
Thanks for the response. I haven’t looked at mine (also an Aprilaire but an older model) but I’m guessing it could be fixed and that would be easier (and cheaper) than replacing it. I’ve had it unplugged for so long I don’t even remember what was wrong with it that caused me to abandon it in the first place. The other alternative would be to find one that fits the existing hole in the plenum. The electrical and water lines are there already so that would shorten the install.
re: “Economic question: How do lowered interest rates filter down to waitresses?”
The service industry is filled with people living from shift to shift, including a lot of illegals. How do you think this immediate freeze on these jobs with impact urban crime rates? I’m thinking muggings and robberies will spike.
They need cash to pay rent, eat, and take care of the bills. So the best way to help Joe/Jane Sixpack is to give them direct cash. Universal Basic Income (UBI), at least until this crisis subsides, is the answer. It'll keep people and businesses afloat, as well as help mitigate any risk of a recession.
Over the last few days, we've given the major banks $2.2 trillion. Imagine if that had been given out to the general population. That'd be around $25,000 for an "average" 4 person family. Just think how much that'd help ordinary people, while making it financially easier for them to avoid going to work and spreading the virus.
It's interesting that it's "controversial" to give people UBI, but it's "mainstream" to cut taxes, spend more on the military, and inject liquidity into the financial markets.
Life under the rule of oligarchs.Replies: @Bill P, @Neoconned, @Jack D, @prime noticer
“Universal Basic Income (UBI), at least until this crisis subsides, is the answer.”
this is THE worst idea in the entire collection of ideas about how to respond.
‘at least until the crisis subsides’ is the key phrase.
once in place, it will NEVER end.
ok, well, it will end once the nation ceases to exist. so technically it will end. but not before then.
President Biden will keep the free money flowing as long as tax paying Republican voters are able to bear the weight of the third world America 2.0. which won’t be long.
The “Nation” is nothing more than an Economy full of consumers. GDP CPI DJIA. Whatever.
This nation is already gone. Sold.
The civnats admit to as much every time they celebrate the Real Americans and their statue of liberty stories and natural conservatives just waiting to vote for the next Reagan.
The left agrees. The future is a brown female consumer vaguely not white with curly hair and a list of demands.
The tax cattle you speak of are already on the run or on life support. We are one or two elections from utopia regardless of what the cabal does with fake finance.
Kicking the can down the road is the only policy in play.
Keeping the Fed grease in the gears of the black box of elite financial levers may keep hyper-inflation at bay long enough for the silents and boomers to die wealthy, but it won’t last. Even though they keep trying and the holy “market” keeps saying GFY.
And their “socialism just hasn't been done right yet” spawn are gonna vote in free shit even if they do inherit the wealth stolen from them and the next ten generations because they don’t have a purpose, a culture, a community, or a reason to preserve some vague notion of a Nation.
They just want stuff. The same stuff they grew up with. The same cheap stuff that was traded for social capital. Hot ashes for trees. Enjoy it.
No borders, no nation. Funny how the economic glue of nationhood is always used to hammer on some dissident or alt this or that but those same economic big swingin dicks are too cowardly to do anything about how we have come to be where we are vis a vis open borders and global financial fetishisms. Because that would be racist or sexist or islamo-homo-phobic. Pussies.
In the meantime, asset inflation and all the rest of the actual costs that impact family formation and upward mobility get inflated because QE8 “the ocho” demands more liquidity so something can be moved somewhere - or else something very bad happens!
End of life care eats up a lot of resources. Maybe UBI is not the best, but at this point why not give people a deck chair and an umbrella. We hit the iceberg in ‘65 and there aren’t enough lifeboats. What happens we people figure that out for realz?Replies: @The Wild Geese Howard, @Neoconned
“Over the last few days, we’ve given the major banks $2.2 trillion. Imagine if that had been given out to the general population”
i wish people on the dissident right would stop making this argument. not only it is technically incorrect, it is stupid. that money is not in the M2 money supply. it chases stuff that’s not part of CPI.
if the average citizens suddenly got 2 trillion distributed between them, nobody would be able to afford anything, as the price of everyday stuff would inflate to the moon.
UBI has exactly this effect. suddenly 100 million morons chasing the same house, apartment, SUV, food, pair of shoes.
If they don’t have to pay mortgages on the property, it would.
If they own the property free and clear then they’re pretty much swimming in money anyway so missing a month or two of income isn’t going to kill them.
Also landlords have to be able to deal with vacancy anyway so they can’t run with zero cash/credit buffer anyway.
Not hardly. Property taxes, insurance, & HOA fees eat up 90% of my gross rental income; and that's if nothing major needs replacement like a roof this year - $30K in assessments per unit!Replies: @Neoconned
Neo, Trump and Congress will do what they are told to do.
Next: Newcastle suspends coal shipments. Cornwall, tin mining. Alaska, ice. D.C., hot air.
(Just kidding about the last.)
this is THE worst idea in the entire collection of ideas about how to respond.
'at least until the crisis subsides' is the key phrase.
once in place, it will NEVER end.
ok, well, it will end once the nation ceases to exist. so technically it will end. but not before then.
President Biden will keep the free money flowing as long as tax paying Republican voters are able to bear the weight of the third world America 2.0. which won't be long.Replies: @Screwtape
Like how QE1 ended? lol.
The “Nation” is nothing more than an Economy full of consumers. GDP CPI DJIA. Whatever.
This nation is already gone. Sold.
The civnats admit to as much every time they celebrate the Real Americans and their statue of liberty stories and natural conservatives just waiting to vote for the next Reagan.
The left agrees. The future is a brown female consumer vaguely not white with curly hair and a list of demands.
The tax cattle you speak of are already on the run or on life support. We are one or two elections from utopia regardless of what the cabal does with fake finance.
Kicking the can down the road is the only policy in play.
Keeping the Fed grease in the gears of the black box of elite financial levers may keep hyper-inflation at bay long enough for the silents and boomers to die wealthy, but it won’t last. Even though they keep trying and the holy “market” keeps saying GFY.
And their “socialism just hasn’t been done right yet” spawn are gonna vote in free shit even if they do inherit the wealth stolen from them and the next ten generations because they don’t have a purpose, a culture, a community, or a reason to preserve some vague notion of a Nation.
They just want stuff. The same stuff they grew up with. The same cheap stuff that was traded for social capital. Hot ashes for trees. Enjoy it.
No borders, no nation. Funny how the economic glue of nationhood is always used to hammer on some dissident or alt this or that but those same economic big swingin dicks are too cowardly to do anything about how we have come to be where we are vis a vis open borders and global financial fetishisms. Because that would be racist or sexist or islamo-homo-phobic. Pussies.
In the meantime, asset inflation and all the rest of the actual costs that impact family formation and upward mobility get inflated because QE8 “the ocho” demands more liquidity so something can be moved somewhere – or else something very bad happens!
End of life care eats up a lot of resources. Maybe UBI is not the best, but at this point why not give people a deck chair and an umbrella. We hit the iceberg in ‘65 and there aren’t enough lifeboats. What happens we people figure that out for realz?
Whiskey has pointed out 80% of consumer purchases aare made by or influenced by women....
If women atent having kids....and men arent blowing money on families etc....whos going to buy the crap to keep the economy running much less corporate sales at good levels?
That is unlikely; We are currently running a $Trillion deficit every year, with no measurable inflation. We are in global economy now. Inflation occurs when too much money chases too few goods & services. One advantage of globalization is there is almost no possibility of “too few goods and services”. When price rises for anything, containerful of stuff just comes over the oceans. There may be temporary shortages as we are now seeing with TP and disinfectant, nothing permanent.
I actually have a humidifier attached to my furnace but it stopped working a number of years ago and I never bothered to fix it. When it worked, it worked too well and my windows were fogging from the humidity. It was a maintenance headache because it operated with evaporative pads that would get crusted with minerals from the water. I know there are types now that use steam (basically a kettle that boils water) but when I looked at them I was very unimpressed by the quality of the construction - the boiling vessel looked like a plastic milk jug, the whole thing looked flimsy and not worth the price, especially not if you had to pay a HVAC contractor to install it.
In lieu of that, I have been using an ultrasonic humidifier in my bedroom. Somewhat of a pain in the butt to fill every night but not a lot of maintenance needed. Some white dust on the furniture from the minerals in the water. Inexpensive. Only serves one room.Replies: @ic1000, @AnotherDad
Jack, the ultrasonics sound cool. So AnotherMom bought one of those several years back to replace the evaporative (pot/mesh/fan) type we had. Our Seattle burb is about 2/3 Cascade snowmelt and 1/3 local wells and so it was spewing that mineral dust. I didn’t want to have that shit in my air and did not want to buy distilled water for it, so had her take it back.
What we have is an updated version of the evaporative, where the reservoir is detachable, closed, capped, and sits on the device upside down with the cap actually a valve that releases a drop to working tank the mesh draws from. (You get a bubble like a water cooler.) I really like it.
Sure with hard water the mesh will eventually crusts up, needs some rinsing, maybe eventual replacement. But its effective and not breathing dust.
If you’re using the ultra-sonic and it’s not bugging your lungs … great. I’d just err on the side of not breathing that stuff in.
There are demineralizer cartridges available that cut down on the dust. They work for a while but you have to keep replacing them and they are not cheap. You could also feed the humidifier from something like a Zero Water filter pitcher. Still cheaper than distilled.
What we have is an updated version of the evaporative, where the reservoir is detachable, closed, capped, and sits on the device upside down with the cap actually a valve that releases a drop to working tank the mesh draws from. (You get a bubble like a water cooler.) I really like it.
Sure with hard water the mesh will eventually crusts up, needs some rinsing, maybe eventual replacement. But its effective and not breathing dust.
If you're using the ultra-sonic and it's not bugging your lungs ... great. I'd just err on the side of not breathing that stuff in.Replies: @Jack D
The dust in the air has not bothered me . There is dust in the air anyway. At least this is clean white dust (mostly calcium and magnesium carbonates) -when I lived in NY the dust was sooty and black. The inhalation of carbonate dust is not thought to be harmful. I’m guessing that the stuff falls in a plume and most of it settles on surfaces within the first few feet and never makes it to my lungs. The most annoying part is that you have to keep dusting the furniture.
There are demineralizer cartridges available that cut down on the dust. They work for a while but you have to keep replacing them and they are not cheap. You could also feed the humidifier from something like a Zero Water filter pitcher. Still cheaper than distilled.
But you can still crap on the sidewalk and throw your used needles anywhere you like, right?
The teachers don’t have to worry. They’ll still be paid their salaries for not working.
Checkmate, anti-racists.
It looks, as if th had srious problems: Complete lock-down in Spain.
Kock-down and state of emergency called out in Bavaria.
Danemark lock-down
France: Closes - - -restaurants (and the borders)! - Begium - dito.
Switzerand and austria: Borders closed. No movies no nothing. Playgrounds closed!
GB - changes strategy - GB goes in the direction of - - - Sailer/Cochran style lock-down, that's what they're heading for right now. Maybe still without the masks, but that could follow fast.Replies: @YetAnotherAnon
“Maybe still without the masks, but that could follow fast.”
If they can get any masks, that is.
I seriously wonder if one of the factors behind the UK’s strange “let everyone but granny get it” strategy was simply that there weren’t enough masks available, so they were incapable of trying the HK crush-the-curve strategy – I assume, like everything else, the masks are made in China and the Chinese needed them.
In the UK you can hardly find hand sanitiser, simple stuff to make. I think I’ll knock some up myself next week, assuming I don’t get gouged on the gelling stuff (polyacrylic acid).
I think the Millennials will be hardest hit by this kind of shutdown. Not only do they work in the restaurants, bars, and coffee shops, they are the ones that seem to frequent them the most, especially the latter two. Will people put down their phones and talk to their families, or will that stuff get worse?
The interest rate business is a last-ditch effort, and the FED is out of ammo. That's all they know how to do though, besides printing money. That they will do. Inflation is quite a bit higher than as advertised by the BLS and will go higher still.Replies: @JohnnyWalker123, @anon, @Charles Erwin Wilson
Where is your evidence for inflation? Energy prices are way down. Interest rates are way down (a friend of mine just bought his first house with a mortgage rate in the twos). Food prices rose, but that has been a while back.
I used to be a Milton Friedman monetarist. But my empiricism dissuaded me from that perspective. I see no evidence of inflation, but I am open to more data.
.
* My basic charge for being hooked up to electricity and gas has gone from 6 bucks to 22 bucks in a 25 year period. That ain't no 2% - it's 5.3% compounded annually.Replies: @Neoconned
No more bowling in L.A.? It’s like Shabbos everyday or something.
I hope that Ralph’s stays open, even if the In-N-Out Burger is closed.
UBI and debt jubilee.
The debt jubilee may not be formal but the likely coming inflation will make it effectively a debt jubilee.
The seventies had this in partial form.
The world is never going to go back to where it was.
This election cycle is the Boomerdammerung.
If i hadn’t been (mostly) boycotting iSteve since Trump inauguration or so, you would have heard that from me 6 months ago.
And the iSteve commentariat has been complete fail on corona virus. This was all utterly predictable, and actually continually predicted, absolutely no later than Jan 22 when Xi locked down Wuhan and Hubei.
You guys have been asleep at the wheel for almost two months.
Kind of like how panic shoppers now who have been ignoring virus, Steve is panic blogging now, rediscovering a whole bunch on the virus that is pretty well established if one had been following East Asian and other sources.
I used to be a Milton Friedman monetarist. But my empiricism dissuaded me from that perspective. I see no evidence of inflation, but I am open to more data.Replies: @Achmed E. Newman
True, energy prices have been very stable since they crashed after the summer of ’08. That’s a good thing. You can see shadowstats for more, but under the Inflation topic key on Peak Stupidity, you can see examples of fairly high inflation in many foodstuffs (and no, it’s not abating), in building materials (numbers like 3 x since the mid-1990s), autos, auto parts, auto insurance, health insurance, utility bills* … it goes on. I’m one of these “noticers” when it comes to prices, Charles.
.
* My basic charge for being hooked up to electricity and gas has gone from 6 bucks to 22 bucks in a 25 year period. That ain’t no 2% – it’s 5.3% compounded annually.
The 2008, 2015, and 2019 market corrections to the TRUE PRICE(under 2$ a gallon) were breaths of fresh air from Wall Street trying to smother the American consumer w inflation.
Food you're dead right on. You can't even go out to eat for 2 people at some sh-thole like IHOP or Waffle House for under $35....
Fast food dumps in the Deep South of you get a combo you're going to pay ~20-28$ for 2 people!
I wished i lived in your area. The MINIMUM power hookup cost w my local utility co-op is like $60 and no, i am not exaggerating....
Where do I sign up to change my oil buck nekkid? Or, am I supposed to pay?
my proposal (though there's no legal out practical way to do it) is that if you really want to hit the pause button you could implement a suspension of
rent, mortgage, loan and interest payments for two months.
That would relieve major stress for pretty much everyone without too much distortion (except for the most responsible people who own and have no debt... they wouldn't get anything out of the deal)Replies: @Achmed E. Newman, @Cloudbuster, @Twodees Partain
“What are they REALLY going to do?”
Maybe they’ll give them a pass on sleeping in the parks and shitting in public.
It impacts the level of disposable income (real or perceived), for both the waitress and the customers. Cheaper credit is a boon especially to those living on the relative economic margins as they tend to have higher need to utilize borrowing. Much greater marginal utility.
Meanwhile, a 100 bps cut makes a big difference to people and organizations paying 2% interest rates. It reduces their expense by 50%. They can afford to do a lot more borrowing. Now, maybe some of that borrowing will also go to wasteful projects. But the point is that such a large change in borrowing costs is enough to motivate behavior, which affects the economy one way or another. Also, people and organizations paying low interest rates are those who understand interest rates and are therefore paying attention to them when choosing to borrow.
The “Nation” is nothing more than an Economy full of consumers. GDP CPI DJIA. Whatever.
This nation is already gone. Sold.
The civnats admit to as much every time they celebrate the Real Americans and their statue of liberty stories and natural conservatives just waiting to vote for the next Reagan.
The left agrees. The future is a brown female consumer vaguely not white with curly hair and a list of demands.
The tax cattle you speak of are already on the run or on life support. We are one or two elections from utopia regardless of what the cabal does with fake finance.
Kicking the can down the road is the only policy in play.
Keeping the Fed grease in the gears of the black box of elite financial levers may keep hyper-inflation at bay long enough for the silents and boomers to die wealthy, but it won’t last. Even though they keep trying and the holy “market” keeps saying GFY.
And their “socialism just hasn't been done right yet” spawn are gonna vote in free shit even if they do inherit the wealth stolen from them and the next ten generations because they don’t have a purpose, a culture, a community, or a reason to preserve some vague notion of a Nation.
They just want stuff. The same stuff they grew up with. The same cheap stuff that was traded for social capital. Hot ashes for trees. Enjoy it.
No borders, no nation. Funny how the economic glue of nationhood is always used to hammer on some dissident or alt this or that but those same economic big swingin dicks are too cowardly to do anything about how we have come to be where we are vis a vis open borders and global financial fetishisms. Because that would be racist or sexist or islamo-homo-phobic. Pussies.
In the meantime, asset inflation and all the rest of the actual costs that impact family formation and upward mobility get inflated because QE8 “the ocho” demands more liquidity so something can be moved somewhere - or else something very bad happens!
End of life care eats up a lot of resources. Maybe UBI is not the best, but at this point why not give people a deck chair and an umbrella. We hit the iceberg in ‘65 and there aren’t enough lifeboats. What happens we people figure that out for realz?Replies: @The Wild Geese Howard, @Neoconned
It is possible that our insane elite have decided there are just too many of us useless eaters and now is the time to collapse the global economy in the name of climate change.
NPR will get right on it though. I can already hear the lisps, uptalk, and vocal fry. And those are just the males.
But yeah, its all on the same axis: fear induced self-imposed behavior modification, global financial controls and central banking ‘emergency’ architecture that never goes away, massive wealth transfers resulting in lower standards of living and entry-level asset inflation, and systemic social engineering designed to distance people, engender distrust and suspicion, and increase reliance on centrally commanded norms and choice prioritization.
The ‘existential’ (borrowing a fave word from the leftoid) aspect of an invisible force that requires us to cooperate (in our own enslavement) or else face total annihilation is a convenient tool to usher in globalism. Alien invasion, climate change, deadly virus. All useful plot devices from the same bag.
If only we would have had the balls to stand up to the actual alien invasion...Replies: @Neoconned
The “Nation” is nothing more than an Economy full of consumers. GDP CPI DJIA. Whatever.
This nation is already gone. Sold.
The civnats admit to as much every time they celebrate the Real Americans and their statue of liberty stories and natural conservatives just waiting to vote for the next Reagan.
The left agrees. The future is a brown female consumer vaguely not white with curly hair and a list of demands.
The tax cattle you speak of are already on the run or on life support. We are one or two elections from utopia regardless of what the cabal does with fake finance.
Kicking the can down the road is the only policy in play.
Keeping the Fed grease in the gears of the black box of elite financial levers may keep hyper-inflation at bay long enough for the silents and boomers to die wealthy, but it won’t last. Even though they keep trying and the holy “market” keeps saying GFY.
And their “socialism just hasn't been done right yet” spawn are gonna vote in free shit even if they do inherit the wealth stolen from them and the next ten generations because they don’t have a purpose, a culture, a community, or a reason to preserve some vague notion of a Nation.
They just want stuff. The same stuff they grew up with. The same cheap stuff that was traded for social capital. Hot ashes for trees. Enjoy it.
No borders, no nation. Funny how the economic glue of nationhood is always used to hammer on some dissident or alt this or that but those same economic big swingin dicks are too cowardly to do anything about how we have come to be where we are vis a vis open borders and global financial fetishisms. Because that would be racist or sexist or islamo-homo-phobic. Pussies.
In the meantime, asset inflation and all the rest of the actual costs that impact family formation and upward mobility get inflated because QE8 “the ocho” demands more liquidity so something can be moved somewhere - or else something very bad happens!
End of life care eats up a lot of resources. Maybe UBI is not the best, but at this point why not give people a deck chair and an umbrella. We hit the iceberg in ‘65 and there aren’t enough lifeboats. What happens we people figure that out for realz?Replies: @The Wild Geese Howard, @Neoconned
One of the better posts ive ever read on this site….you sound like a Zero Hedger….or at least before that site became doom porn…
Whiskey has pointed out 80% of consumer purchases aare made by or influenced by women….
If women atent having kids….and men arent blowing money on families etc….whos going to buy the crap to keep the economy running much less corporate sales at good levels?
If they own the property free and clear then they're pretty much swimming in money anyway so missing a month or two of income isn't going to kill them.
Also landlords have to be able to deal with vacancy anyway so they can't run with zero cash/credit buffer anyway.Replies: @Anon
If they own the property free and clear then they’re pretty much swimming in money anyway so missing a month or two of income isn’t going to kill them.
Not hardly. Property taxes, insurance, & HOA fees eat up 90% of my gross rental income; and that’s if nothing major needs replacement like a roof this year – $30K in assessments per unit!
If 90% of your gross is flying out the window that leaves you w what? A few grand a yr maybe in after tax profit?
Maybe sell your unit and invest the proceeds in a non tradable REIT? Maybe something in the health care sector or a retirement community? Many REITs pay dividends and depending on your domicile state you won't have to worry about anything but capital gains and dividend taxes....Replies: @Anon
My point is that a 100 bps across-the-board drop in interest rates doesn’t make much difference to the people paying 20% interest rates. It only reduces their interest expense by 5%. They can’t really afford to do that much more. If they really badly need the credit for some emergency expense, an extra 5% probably isn’t going to make or break them. In my experience, people taking on credit card debt are almost exclusively impulsive decision-makers who don’t really understand interest rates. I’ll allow that my experience doesn’t cover the whole human race though.
Meanwhile, a 100 bps cut makes a big difference to people and organizations paying 2% interest rates. It reduces their expense by 50%. They can afford to do a lot more borrowing. Now, maybe some of that borrowing will also go to wasteful projects. But the point is that such a large change in borrowing costs is enough to motivate behavior, which affects the economy one way or another. Also, people and organizations paying low interest rates are those who understand interest rates and are therefore paying attention to them when choosing to borrow.
If landlords are unable to rent their properties, conservative God-fearing rock-ribbed capitalist Republicans will bail them out while worshiping at their Ayn Rand, Ludwig von Mises and Milton Friedman shrines.
Helping out tenants in any way is communism and must never happen in any fashion or God will turn the earth into a pillar of salt (at least that’s what Protestants say it says in their various Protestant bibles).
Not hardly. Property taxes, insurance, & HOA fees eat up 90% of my gross rental income; and that's if nothing major needs replacement like a roof this year - $30K in assessments per unit!Replies: @Neoconned
Is it even worth owning the property with all that over overhead & extra expenses?
If 90% of your gross is flying out the window that leaves you w what? A few grand a yr maybe in after tax profit?
Maybe sell your unit and invest the proceeds in a non tradable REIT? Maybe something in the health care sector or a retirement community? Many REITs pay dividends and depending on your domicile state you won’t have to worry about anything but capital gains and dividend taxes….
Good points. Probably not worth owning as a cash-flow investment. But I bought this waterfront place five years ago as a foreclosure with the plan to retire to it. It's tripled in market value since I purchased it. I could raise the rent $200/mo, but my tenant has been in there five years and I've heard from him just once. So, I'll just hang on a couple more years until I move in.Replies: @Neoconned
.
* My basic charge for being hooked up to electricity and gas has gone from 6 bucks to 22 bucks in a 25 year period. That ain't no 2% - it's 5.3% compounded annually.Replies: @Neoconned
I love William’s Shadow Stats site. I’d disagree on gasoline prices though i think the market hasnt let upfrom the 2005 price surge.
The 2008, 2015, and 2019 market corrections to the TRUE PRICE(under 2$ a gallon) were breaths of fresh air from Wall Street trying to smother the American consumer w inflation.
Food you’re dead right on. You can’t even go out to eat for 2 people at some sh-thole like IHOP or Waffle House for under $35….
Fast food dumps in the Deep South of you get a combo you’re going to pay ~20-28$ for 2 people!
I wished i lived in your area. The MINIMUM power hookup cost w my local utility co-op is like $60 and no, i am not exaggerating….
Conspiracies aside this is not so far fetched. Climate change will dovetail into the corona narrative for sure. Kind of surprised it has not been front and center yet. Probably due to orange man bad eating up all the air time.
NPR will get right on it though. I can already hear the lisps, uptalk, and vocal fry. And those are just the males.
But yeah, its all on the same axis: fear induced self-imposed behavior modification, global financial controls and central banking ‘emergency’ architecture that never goes away, massive wealth transfers resulting in lower standards of living and entry-level asset inflation, and systemic social engineering designed to distance people, engender distrust and suspicion, and increase reliance on centrally commanded norms and choice prioritization.
The ‘existential’ (borrowing a fave word from the leftoid) aspect of an invisible force that requires us to cooperate (in our own enslavement) or else face total annihilation is a convenient tool to usher in globalism. Alien invasion, climate change, deadly virus. All useful plot devices from the same bag.
If only we would have had the balls to stand up to the actual alien invasion…
Helping out tenants in any way is communism and must never happen in any fashion or God will turn the earth into a pillar of salt (at least that's what Protestants say it says in their various Protestant bibles).Replies: @Jim Bob Lassiter
Come to the head of the class for your teacher’s gold star of the day.
If 90% of your gross is flying out the window that leaves you w what? A few grand a yr maybe in after tax profit?
Maybe sell your unit and invest the proceeds in a non tradable REIT? Maybe something in the health care sector or a retirement community? Many REITs pay dividends and depending on your domicile state you won't have to worry about anything but capital gains and dividend taxes....Replies: @Anon
Is it even worth owning the property with all that over overhead & extra expenses?
Good points. Probably not worth owning as a cash-flow investment. But I bought this waterfront place five years ago as a foreclosure with the plan to retire to it. It’s tripled in market value since I purchased it. I could raise the rent $200/mo, but my tenant has been in there five years and I’ve heard from him just once. So, I’ll just hang on a couple more years until I move in.
Good points. Probably not worth owning as a cash-flow investment. But I bought this waterfront place five years ago as a foreclosure with the plan to retire to it. It's tripled in market value since I purchased it. I could raise the rent $200/mo, but my tenant has been in there five years and I've heard from him just once. So, I'll just hang on a couple more years until I move in.Replies: @Neoconned
All i can say is enjoy hanging w the HOA Nazis….you couldn’t pay me to live in a community w those nit picking idiots roaming around trying to fine me because my baby mama’s garden gnome is too blue for the HOA home & garden connoisseurs tastes….
NPR will get right on it though. I can already hear the lisps, uptalk, and vocal fry. And those are just the males.
But yeah, its all on the same axis: fear induced self-imposed behavior modification, global financial controls and central banking ‘emergency’ architecture that never goes away, massive wealth transfers resulting in lower standards of living and entry-level asset inflation, and systemic social engineering designed to distance people, engender distrust and suspicion, and increase reliance on centrally commanded norms and choice prioritization.
The ‘existential’ (borrowing a fave word from the leftoid) aspect of an invisible force that requires us to cooperate (in our own enslavement) or else face total annihilation is a convenient tool to usher in globalism. Alien invasion, climate change, deadly virus. All useful plot devices from the same bag.
If only we would have had the balls to stand up to the actual alien invasion...Replies: @Neoconned
Per chance are you a sociologist or an economist? Your last few posts have been brilliant sir.
Ha, you’re riffing off this, aren’t you? Right?
https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/the-million-dollars-per-person-affair-is-telling/