quote: | Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
And every airline collapses, every bar, restaurant, hotel, nightclub, sports club and gym goes out of business. The economy completely tanks, millions are unemployed, millions more have to adapt to changing child-care needs. |
Well, not necessarily. Yes, millions unemployed, but not necessarily all businesses going out of business. There are a lot of tools the government could use to prevent bankruptcies, as well as to help all those millions of unemployed get by. The economy would definitely contract, but then would rebound when things went back to normal.
quote: | Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
You asked me “why not”. That’s obviously why. It would be completely disastrous. Social distancing measures need to be phased and need to be timed right to take the worst of the sting out without fucking up the whole country in question. |
Again, I'm not suggesting we do it, I'm just saying that it is possible. Not trying to be pedantic, either, just saying that extreme measures could be taken. It's not impossible.
At the end of the day, it's a political choice. What is worse, for the government: shutting down much of the country for 1-3+ months, or having a per capita death rate much higher than the rest of Western Europe?
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