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Comment by tootie | Hacker News Reader

This isn't weasel speak at all. They're pretty clear that it's risky. They're just saying that they won't condemn protestors as taking frivolous risks the way anti-lockdown protestors or fun-seekers are. Police brutality, systemic racism, income inequality are all major public health risks in their own right.

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I don't understand -- are keeping people out of work and isolated at home not public health risks? If non-Covid related factors are being considered in weighing against the risks of exposure they should all be considered, not only some of them, selectively.

Don't be obtuse. Of course all factors were considered. Keeping people out of offices and shops is not a public health risk. People becoming impoverished and losing health insurance is. That's why the federal government spent $2T protecting people's financial health to offset the damage. The bigger question is why health care access is tied to employment, but there's no way the current regime would consider dealing with that issue.

Also, you're comparing government policy with an academic opinion.

No. Unemployment is generally regarded as a public health risk, beyond the immediate insurance consequences. There will moreover be people who suffer long-term impacts that these short-term payments can only partially mitigate.

That seems like a good argument to expand unemployment benefits during a global pandemic, and I suspect most public health officials would agree.

A number of countries have implemented wage subsidy schemes, in which the government pays employers to keep employees on payroll even while there is no work for them to do due to the COVID-19 lockdown. Those schemes are in some ways better than unemployment benefits, in that they maintain the employer-employee relationship which increases the odds the job will still be there to go back to when the crisis is over.

UK: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/claim-for-wages-through-the-coro...

Australia: https://www.ato.gov.au/general/jobkeeper-payment/

New Zealand: https://www.employment.govt.nz/leave-and-holidays/other-type...

Ireland: https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/employment/unemploymen...

That makes sense. I intended to refer broadly to programs to compensate people due to lockdown-related reductions in income.

How does it work with workers in the food service industry where the workers are paid cash? Or maybe that’s not common outside the US

Well, in Australia's case – the wage subsidy comes from the Australian Tax Office (ATO), which is our equivalent to the IRS. So if you haven't been withholding income tax from your employees, you can't get the subsidy for them (unless you confess your past tax evasion, which obviously you aren't going to do.)

But, paying employees cash only is much harder than it used to be. Many customers now only want to pay card. The tax office sees the card payments coming into your bank account, if you try to pay your employees cash it is easy for them to catch you. So, I think the number of workers actually hurt by that is relatively small.

COVID-19 has accelerated the transition from cash to card payment, because the health advice was to avoid cash payments (due to risk that cash may spread Coronavirus), and many businesses responded by refusing to accept cash entirely.

> So, I think the number of workers actually hurt by that is relatively small.

Guarantee you it is a huge number in Canada, and probably the U.S. as well. Tax fraud in food service, bars, and kitchens is the norm here in Ontario.

That's a unique US thing. In countries like New Zealand people in the service industry get the same minimum wage as anyone else ($18.90 per hour) and don't rely on tips, they're normal employees and go through the same normal tax system.

That's why there is the joke about people from overseas not knowing how to tip.

Seems to be a US thing. In Germany, every company can as for "Kurzarbeit", short-wok, or all or part of its employees. Which are on the payroll, thus properly registered, unless the company cheated. In whch case I wouldn't be surprsed of that company just closes shop and fires everyone.

It gets tricky for temps and contractors, so. If you are a temp, and employed by a third company lending you ut, that company can ask for Kurzarbeit. In agriculture and food processing, most of the work force are temps emplyed by sub-contractors. Thearetically, they are covered. In praxis, they are more often than not screwed. The sub-contractors sub-contractor is potentially ot evena german omany to begin with.

Shining light on this, is one of the few good things about Cocid-19, if you ask me.

Unemployment is not the real problem there—people not having money is.

If the government would continue—and increase—the individual stimulus checks, it would matter much, much less how long the lockdown must continue. People would still be able to support themselves and keep themselves healthy.

The career damage from forced unemployment lasts longer than an unemployment check.

> Keeping people out of offices and shops is not a public health risk

Telling people to stay at home all the time does have a negative impact on many people's mental health. It can both exacerbate pre-existing mental illness, and in some cases even cause the new onset of mental illness.

> Of course all factors were considered.

That's not entirely accurate. Even Faucci answered, in response to Rand Paul, he was a virologist. Not a economist, etc.

There's been little public acknowledgement of increases in suicides, illness from delayed med treatments, economic fall out affecting deaths, etc.

Fauci doesn't set policy. The CDC doesn't set policy. Even the White House has limited authority. Policy was a mishmash set by governors and mayors with or without support from DC and based on recommendations from multiple health, public safety and economic advisors.

I'm not for or against Fauci. He did what he was asked to do. The problem was he was thrust to the front as The Expert. Again, not his fault. However, that did compromise our ability to have seats at the table for all the unintended consequences.

I didn't hear any virologist claiming that isolation isn't a health risk.But it seems to take more time to have serious effects, COVID-19 on the other hand has the short term effect of overwhelming a health care system an causing thousands of deaths. And the lock-downs have never been planned to be permanent, were they?

Actually that's a good point and damn scary: anti-lockdown protests are very risky, but these are supposed to be fine?

Not being in the US, I hadn't realized the incredible double-standard at play. The US seems to be almost completely paralyzed in trying to deal with this virus, various social dynamics that have been festering for decades are coming to light now.

Is that the job of health officials to determine? Whether a particular political cause is worth the risk?

"Andrew Sullivan calls our attention to epidemiologist Tara C. Smith, who moves with that curious herd of 'experts' suddenly not terribly concerned about social distancing when the protesters filling the streets are left-wing rather than right-wing. Writes Sullivan: 'The message to normies: going outside is killing grandma. The message to woke kids: never mind!'

"So which is it? Were people like Smith lying before about the danger of spreading the virus, in order to promote a political agenda? Or being honest about it but now willing to endanger countless lives, in order to promote a political agenda?

"Adding smug cluelessness to her dishonesty and/or recklessness, Smith also sniffs that the difference is that those who rallied to end the lockdown were merely 'protesting for their ability to get a haircut.'

"Yes, of course, haircuts. It had nothing to do with wanting to get back to work in order to support their families, salvage businesses it took a lifetime to build, avoid depleting their life savings, get their kids back in the classroom, etc. It was all about haircuts." [0]

I think that excerpt makes my point for me, so I won't belabor it. Unless you want to apply the obtuse label to yourself like you did to bmmayer1.

[0] https://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2020/06/what-science-is-say...

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