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Comment by roenxi | Hacker News Reader

> I'd much rather live in Sweden or Germany, where people have sufficient trust in their government...

I'm a bit hesitant to compare to either of them because I can't read the local news. That being said, didn't Sweden go with a lockdown-lite policy?

The Sweedes do have the freedom to die from COVID-19 because public health orders are affronts to their liberty.

EDIT And the lockdowns are threatening something like 265 million people experiencing famine [0]. "flag-wrapped know-betters demand Golden Corral reopen for buffet service" is trivialising a serious thing here; the economy isn't a nice-to-have. It is the major generator of all the prosperity that exists in the world. It is too complicated for me to understand causes and effects, but if it doesn't start back up again ASAP the hurt will get worse.

[0] https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2020/apr/21/c...

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There appears to be much hand-wringing over what a upper level government may do. Why not cede such power to lower level jursdiction where those conditions are mostly closely monitored?

Locally, I see city and county governments taking a tack of making slightly differing decisions regarding what to open and keep closed. For example, my city is keeping parks and playgrounds closed; the county is doing the opposite? Why? each other's data shows the historical use trends and such data plays a large part in making reasonable, responsible descisions.

BTW, I'm in Georgia (US state); while the national media makes it out like we're backwoods country idiots, our local governments are very effective in making reasonable choices. Plus the vast marjority of folks are wearing masks and self-distancing. Most people aren't stupid. They only want the freedom to start their lives back up, plus not depend on the state and national governments for their very survival.

They have the freedom to but most are still staying at home. The economic impact is similar, cinemas are closed, concerts are cancelled, etc.

Demand isn’t going to go up magically because of reopening. I’m not seeing much evidence for pent up demand outside of hair cuts, which are not exactly essential

I'm not sure about that. I'm ready to go to the gym, go out to restaurants, and just yesterday they took the caution tape off of the school playground and lots of kids were there.

I don't think demand will immediately return to 100%, but I think quite a few people are itching to get out and spend money and enjoy life. Maybe not in some areas, but most of the country is probably ready to go.

40% of households making under 40k a year have had a job loss since March

Is this an argument for lack of consumer demand?

Keeping things shut down isn't going to help these people get back to work.

I think this is an argument for lack of money to be spent since a hefty portion of people have lost their jobs and paychecks don't happen instantaneously and unpaid bills probably come first.

Sure, but it's circular logic to suggest that there's no need to rush reopening since demand will be low anyway... (As others have said)

When you need those jobs created by reopening to get people back to work and closer to the point of having disposable income again.

This isn't pure chicken & egg, since consumer debt is tightening up while business debt is getting cheaper. Plus the only way we're going to alleviate fear is by opening and seeing what happens.

Even testing vaccines will require that leap of faith at some point. After all, what good would a clinical trial be if the patient quarantined during it?

Here’s one example. Restaurants will likely be operating at 50% capacity or below for the foreseeable future. Their business model does not work at 50% capacity. Many, many jobs are not coming back.

Sure, but that's artificially limited supply. Which isn't an argument for saying there's lack of demand.

Consumer confidence is being eroded more and more every single day, and the savings rate of an American has almost doubled to 13% in the past 2 months. Purchasing power of an average American has most likely decreased somewhat, if not significantly, given the unemployment numbers. All of those things don’t just bounce back like a rubber band when the country is “ready to go”. It will be years before we get back to the GDP numbers we were seeing pre-Covid and that’s probably considering that everything trends upwards from here on out, which is highly doubtful.

People are surprisingly ready for a serious respiratory disease.

Sure,the Swedes technically have had the freedom. But comparatively, they've also had more disease than countries with a mandated lockdown. Honestly, though, it is scarier doing this in the US: Sweden has a robust health care system and a safety net. Which means that folks that do get the virus aren't going to get hit with an expensive ICU bill after having lost their job, even if they work at a small business that would not be covered under FMLA regulations in the US.

Not to mention that they've been heavily criticized for mishandling the lockdown.

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