Conversation

Before-after diffs of previous western crises Black Death: High Middle Ages (1000-1300) to age of exploration (1400-1500) 30 years war: Holy Roman Empire to enlightenment WW1: Victorian-Georgian to Modernist-Progressive WW2: Modernist to post Covid19? Place your bets now.
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The one bright spot: more modern crises seem to last less long. So I’d say 3-5 years for this one to pass. Of course you may not like the new world, but that’s your problem, not a crisis.
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Why so long? What effects from this are really gonna take 5 years? Again, as with all this stuff, I'm probably naive but I can't picture the illness lasting that long and I can't picture the economic effects lasting so long. 2 years maybe
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I don’t think you’re appreciating the sheer magnitude of the economic devastation. It’s an order of magnitude more than 2008. A fragile house of cards has collapsed. It’s not, like Trump claims, a blow to a healthy system that will bounce back fast.
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Okay I see that, but there seems to be a qualitative difference between this and 2008. 2008 was about a problem within the financial system itself. It made employers and individuals warier of that system.
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The financial system is mostly irrelevant. That’s mostly just a casino for rich people to gamble on the economy. It’s the economy itself that’s been hit hard. The economy is not the same thing as the financial system. This is a proper economic crisis, not a financial one.
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Hmmm right. Why doesn't X corporation just hire back 80% of its employees (assuming they got X cash to stay afloat and then extra to cover lack of demand) when this is all over though? What keeps a proper bailout from helping? Or am I confusing economy and financial sys again?
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