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Comment by simonw | Hacker News Reader

"I really don’t think anyone really sat down and thought through these issues when the lockdowns were announced."

People clearly thought very hard about this. Different parts of the world came to different conclusions about it. Nobody thought that the lockdowns wouldn't cause immense amounts of economical and societal damage.

The calculation was whether they would have a worse impact than letting huge numbers of people die. And huge numbers of people died anyway!

I'd like to learn more about the economic impact of over a million deaths (in the USA). I would expect that to affect communities and industries in very complicated ways as well.

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I thought it was very weird how the parent comment just glossed over it all as if it wasn't an issue.

Most of those deaths probably had a positive or null effect, since they primarily occurred in the 65+ demographic.

edit: It is interesting to contemplate the possibility that the death of so many seniors exacerbated the inflation problem. That's a lot of assets that were previously tied up in retirement accounts and real estate that suddenly flowed into the hands of middle aged people.

You are on to something there.

Additionally, if we had people sit down and think about the situation, we would have protected and isolated the elderly instead of the insipid and endless all or nothing crusade we were handed instead.

Current CDC estimate has 220k deaths among working age people (under 65). Maybe you’re not meaning to minimize that impact, but that’s sort of how your comment reads

Seems callous and erroneous. Also ignoring increased morbidity and strain on the healthcare system. Plus that would have the opposite effect on inflation

65+ and often at the lower end of economic scale (at least in the USA). I can't imagine that much flowed. E.g., housing prices would have feel as supply outpaced demand.

For the non 65+ that died, that's a negative for the economy. Loss of productive years, etc.

There are also follow on effects. My Inlaws passed away over the last three years. It has been a huge time sink and blow to productivity this whole time.

Long Covid among the survivors is the big unknown to productivity

not to mention the millions of people who basically cannot work anymore because they've be irreparably damaged by COVID...

I'm sure a good chunk of the same people who were "irreparably damaged by COVID" would have been irreparably damaged by diseases such as lyme, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, etc. in another universe.

What's Your point? You are suggesting that this people would find another disease to get out of job market? If so that is some high level dystopian stuff you believe.

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