I have issues with German Lopez’s analysis at Vox.com on California’s response to COVID-19. I think it’s proceeding from flawed assumptions.
As you’re no doubt aware, California was the first state in which the governor issued a statewide lockdown order and now it’s the state in which the largest number of cases of COVID-19 have been diagnosed. The underlying premise on which I think that Mr. Lopez’s analysis is based is that the purpose of the lockdown was to minimize the cases of COVID-19. That was never the purpose. The purpose was to avoid overwhelming the health care system, allow time to prepare, and control the rate of spread.
California is a very big state so it’s not terribly surprising that it would have a lot of cases of COVID-19.
Let’s stipulate, as I’ve pointed out before, that if you locked every individual in a hermetically-sealed cell, we could stamp SARS-CoV-2 out completely. Along with the population. The economy would collapse and a lot of people would starve. So that’s out as a solution. IMO California’s problem is that they proceeded as though minimizing the number of cases were the objective without bolstering their ability to handle more cases at the same time sufficiently. They were too successful. They should have relaxed the restrictions a little earlier. Yes, people would have contracted COVID-19. But as long as the restrictions were relaxed just a little they should have been able to manage the new cases.
Then relax a little more, manage the new cases, and so on.
As it is despite the panic-stricken tone of the news coverage, California isn’t doing too badly. Its cases per million are about half that in Illinois and a third that in New York while its death rate per million population is a third that in Illinois and a tenth that in New York.
Northern California has the highest percentage of workers in the U.S. that have jobs that can be done from home, and weighted by wage, its even more striking:
Rank among Top 100 Metros/ Share of Jobs / Share of Jobs Weighted by Wage
1. San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA / 51% / 66%
2. Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV / 50% / 64%
5. San Francisco-Oakland-Hayward, CA / 45% / 58%
93. Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, CA / 30% / 35%
98. Bakersfield, CA / 29% / 36%
99. Stockton-Lodi, CA / 29% / 33%
100. Cape Coral-Fort Myers, FL 28% / 34%
I assume that jobs that can be done from home were to some extent previously done from home, at least in part, particularly in high wage jobs were such flexibility might be a form of compensation. The shift from going to work to staying at home would not only have been easier, it would have had relatively few economic or social impacts.
I’m not sure I agree 100% with the judgments here; educational services can be provided from home, but should they or how do you account for lost productivity from home?
https://bfi.uchicago.edu/working-paper/how-many-jobs-can-be-done-at-home/
‘The underlying premise on which I think that Mr. Lopez’s analysis is based is that the purpose of the lockdown was to minimize the cases of COVID-19.’
No, the underlying premise is that the lockdown must continue, with time out for social justice protests, until everyone has received a 100% effective vaccine complete with a tracking device for contact tracing. Or until OMB is removed from office. Whichever comes sooner.
Sorry if my cynicism is showing.
As politicians struggle to find policy, it looks like the public is voting with its feet.
Many don’t believe the virus is a threat to them , others do but calculate the risk and accept it.
Much like smoking. Much like driving.
I doubt that it will disappear so I’m assuming it will become a fact of life, another risk, but with risk diminishing as treatments improve.
What I think Governors should do is find a way to double the number of ICU beds before flu season hits.
That’s what I have said for five months.
“What I think Governors should do is find a way to double the number of ICU beds before flu season hits.”
It has always looked like there was a bit of a seasonal component to Covid, though not as much as the flu. So we already have 2-3 times as many deaths as a normal entire (bad) flu season (plus many, many more extended hospitalizations) and we aren’t close to having a year’s worth of cases. We have gotten better at treating Covid, but there is a good chance our real test has yet to come. I know that certain men of science have proclaimed that the only reason to think we might have a second wave is political beliefs, but second waves in the fall are pretty common with respiratory viruses. We already have our plans, but not sure how well it will work this time. The hospital lost a lot of money in the first round and there will be a lot of resistance over closing services so that we can increase ICU beds.
Steve