Day of Chaos 2: a.Covid-19 thread.

[IndigoPrime]

More outdoors time: good. All day outside in the UK: not really viable much past September!

[The Legendary Shark]

As it says in one of those articles, open the classroom windows.

[Tiplodocus]

Corridor Crew did a fun video explaining exponential growth a few months back.

https://youtu.be/e02eiX866N4

[TordelBack]

As it says in one of those articles, open the classroom windows.

No argument from me, on any grounds!  I had a very jovial history teacher from Castlebar who used to jolt each flagging classroom with the bellowed instruction "Staaay with me lads*!  Staaay with me!  Throw open those windows, let in a blast of the Atlantic** breeze! "

*it was a mixed school.
** it was in Dublin.

[Jim_Campbell]

Yesterday, over 1700 new cases were recorded.

1940 cases today. I think our days of tentatively venturing to the pub are at an end...

[Jim_Campbell]

Although, as I noted above, the headline covid death rate has fallen and remains low, there have been numerous reporting changes to the figure (some of the reporting criteria have been problematic and did need addressing) but excess deaths are unaffected by these.

Since it was reported that the UK deaths had fallen below the statistical five-year average a few weeks back, it's been rising steadily since.



I'm not sure if we're supposed to think that the small-but-steady rise in 'flu like deaths' means that we're experiencing some kind of minor flu epidemic in August, but it doesn't seem terribly likely.

Add to that, the 3,000 new cases reported yesterday (when weekend reporting traditionally sees a large drop in cases followed by a statistical correction Mon/Tue) and you have a picture of a situation that the government very much does not have under control.

Their current tactic of telling everyone it's time to get back to normal is either reckless, incompetent, or both.

[shaolin_monkey]

Their current tactic of telling everyone it's time to get back to normal is either reckless, incompetent, or both.

It's murderously criminal is what it is.

[The Enigmatic Dr X]

Their current tactic of telling everyone it's time to get back to normal is either reckless, incompetent, or both.

It's murderously criminal is what it is.

But surely the alternative is economic armageddon? (Genuine question).

Damned if they do, damned if the don't?

I see no right course of action, and I fear that national consensus is fracturing. Too many point out the negatives of a course of action without highlighting the negatives of their counter-proposal.

I worry about society. This is polarising when there are no clear alternatives to choose between. And we are in danger of entering a world of local house arrest and censorship lifted straight from 1984, thought police included; "agree or be re-educated as to why you should agree."

[Jim_Campbell]

But surely the alternative is economic armageddon? (Genuine question).

This is an entirely false dichotomy. Firstly, if the government was prepared to magic up the same amount of money they did on "quantative easing" (aka, recapitalising the banking system) then they could have run the furlough scheme and carried the increased benefit bill for two years. Recapitalising the banks saved not one single life.

Secondly, if the government was operating an effective mass-testing system, testing asymptomatic people in the general population at random, coupled with a functioning contract-tracing system, then localised outbreaks could be identified far more rapidly, and far more local restrictions brought into place. You could probably lock down to specific post codes and lock them right down. If that means telling people to stay in their houses and government bringing them food and essential medications for two weeks, so be it.

Not doing the first was a political decision, the failure to do the second was also political, in as much as the government chose to secretly dole out responsibility for testing and tracing to its palpably incompetent cronies. (Seriously... Dido Harding? She's been a fucking disaster everywhere she's gone.)

[Jim_Campbell]

A boring footnote on "quantitative easing", and government borrowing in general.

As a rule, the government borrows money by issuing bonds on the bond market. All government money comes this way — the idea that your tax goes into a big old pot that the government uses to pay nurses and teachers is a fiction. The government decides what it's going to spend in a given year, then issues bonds to raise that money. These bonds will typically have two-, five-, ten-year yields.

What the government does with your tax money is pay off the bonds from previous years that have fallen due, effectively maintaining the government's credit rating. Note that this number is already known to the government for any current year — it knows exactly how much money it will have to find to service previous years' debts that are now due in the current year.

The Tories favour issuing short term bonds on the general markets because that means they can shovel money into the pockets of their already-rich mates who buy them, but in exceptional circumstances, you can issue ones with much more long term yields. For example, as part of the abolition of slavery, the government of the day decided to simply buy out British slave-owners. It issued bonds to raise this money that weren't paid off for about 150 years.

Alternatively, the government can get the Bank of England to buy the bonds (as it basically did with quantitative easing). Since the BoE is literally able to create money out of thin air, the terms for those could be as favourable as the government likes — they could create a special 'Covid Bond' on a two-hundred year yield, the BoE could quietly write them off fifty years down the line, there are loads of jolly little wheezes a government can use when it issues its own currency via a state bank.

It's true that you can't run a government indefinitely this way because of the upwards inflationary pressures it creates in the medium to long term (hyperinflation in the Weimar Republic in the 30s, or in Zimbabwe more recently are often cited as examples) but current economic theory holds that some inflation is economically necessary and inflation has been at historic lows for over a decade — there's lots of wiggle room here before you reach the point of people taking a wheelbarrow of money to the shops to buy a loaf of bread.

[Jim_Campbell]

(Note: that last wasn't specifically aimed at you, Dr X, in case it sounds horribly patronising. I've only really wrapped my head around the whole bond market thing recently and I just thought, as a general point, it was worth explaining why, in exceptional circumstances, that the government literally can create money out of thin air.)

[sheridan]

. For example, as part of the abolition of slavery, the government of the day decided to simply buy out British slave-owners. It issued bonds to raise this money that weren't paid off for about 150 years.

I didn't know about that.  Though having just done a little research I see that the British goverment was paying descendants of slave owners as recently as 2015.  No money for the descendants of slaves though.  Makes you proud to be British doesn't it?  Though constant refusal of Freedom of Information requests make very much make it look like the government is still rewarding descendants of slave owners (already among the wealthiest in society).

[sheridan]

Back on topic - any thoughts on the current NHS Test and Trace app?*


* currently in trials on the Isle of Wight and Newham.

[The Legendary Shark]

A boring footnote....

Not boring at all, Jim, and very clearly presented.

I know we come at things from different perspectives (you as a statist and me as an anarchist) but I think we both want much the same thing - a safe and prosperous society.

One of the major bars to a better society, arguably even the major one, is the current monopolistic money creation process. I would be in favour of a (suitably reformed) state taking full control of this process for the good of society and not, as is currently the case, for the profit of a small "elite" class.

As for "contact tracing," I think it's all very nice until a Hitler or a Stalin gets his hands on it.

[Jim_Campbell]

As for "contact tracing," I think it's all very nice until a Hitler or a Stalin gets his hands on it.

The off-the-shelf solution developed with Apple and Google for mobile phones didn't share *any* personal data off the phone itself. It used anonymised flags so that, on the centralised side, there was no way to connect data to specific people. The government didn't want to use that, because Cummings had sniffed a way to conduct another massive stealth data harvest.

I fear we're inevitably drifting into 'Political Thread' territory, despite the sadly-unavoidable relevance of politics to the government's ham-fisted, inconsistent response to this crisis, so I'll shut up about it.

Apologies to all for another derail.