RE:RE:It seemsCountryGent, Capitalism and Covid is a largly understudied topic. Shooting from the hip:
What strikes me as the most imporant failure in the debate: Many argue is if politicians decisions to close down restaurants or theaters are causing the economic damage, but in fact it is the existence of the virus (regardless of the politicians decisions). We even have proof for that:
There haven been cases in Europe and the US where cities are divied with different judical responsibilities and different policies in place: So in one street the restaurants were closed because of poliitical diecsions but in other streets the restaurants were allowed to stay open. Result: The economic damage in both areas of the city was basically the same.
It is easy to see why: The majority of people does not like spend money if doing so is dangerious for them. I guess it is called common sense or a healty instinct regarding self-preservation.
I don't think that we have good numbers, but we know that an average ICU-day cost at least 1500 Euro (Sorry, I do not have american or canadian numbers) and hat it takes an average 21 days to die from covid. The average covid costs 30.000 Euro. Germany, to take an example that once was said to do well, allows for 400 deaths per day. That's 12.000.000 Euros per day or roughly 1 billion USD just for Nov-Dec.
And I am counting only the dead, not the survirors, the cost of negative test or the fact that relatives of the dead are not allowed to go to work for a couple of days while getting paid. And so on...
Finally, some economic damage is done not becaue of free-market-policies but precisly becaue politicians depart from it. Many industries are profiting from Covid and still get increased subsides and/or tax reductions. That's the form of socialism that I am happy to oppose.
Stay safe everybody!
M