General Discussion

CaliforniaPeggy

(149,580 posts) Tue Mar 24, 2020, 03:39 PM Mar 2020

How Many Dead for the Dow? By Eric Hensal, who was a close friend of WCGreen. Copied w/permission.

Acceptable death continuum

For Trump to say the public health cure is worse than the COVID-19 pandemic, he presents a calculus of acceptable dead versus economic damage. This is opposed to Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s “If it saves one life, I’m happy.” Here is the acceptable death continuum.

So how many people dying is worth a faster economic recovery ?

Trump horrified progressives weighing the economy against people. But Cuomo’s statement of solidarity, while poetic and caring, is an absurd hypothetical. Considering public health intervention’s social cost is not, in itself, irrational. Progressives must walk through the impulse and implication of Trump’s “cure” to persuade an American majority to support difficult public heath measures.

"Trump uses imagery of letting grandma pass without suffering to sell a different policy.”

Our economy does not face death

When is a cure thought worse than a disease? A difficult chemotherapy with little hope to prolong life. An end-of-life resuscitation with vents and feeding tubes with no chance to recover. Trump supporters likely carry these experiences in mind while listening to him, hence the power of his statement. He uses imagery of letting grandma pass without suffering to sell a different policy.

But our economy faces no such death challenge. There is no asteroid impact, no crop-destroying blight, no Yellowstone super-volcano shattering our world catastrophically. We will have access to the same natural resources, food production and labor as we did before COVID-19. Once people can work, the economy will recover over time.

Trump’s concern is the timing of a recovery, rather than its inevitability.

Dying for the Dow

What is Trump’s measure of a strong economy? His lodestar has always been the stock market. He will point to jobs, but always comes home to the Dow. The markets, disturbed by Trump’s March 11 incompetence which expressed starting at March 12 crash, need reassuring. Trump believes simply declaring victory will end the downward spiral. Put the Dow Index on one side of the policy balance scale.

Assume Trump could end social distancing. Specifics can be argued, but this would increase COVID-19 spread and raise deaths this year. Put this death count on the other side of the scale.

My progressive response to Trump’s cure: No sacrifices to a Wall Street Golden Calf. No death for the Dow.

So Trump believes a Dow Index recovering on his timetable is worth a fixed number of additional deaths. He may present it as disbelief in expert opinion or a gut optimism, but this is what he is saying. Evidence is clear that social distancing reduces COVID-19 impact. But Trump’s distrust of all things foreign plus his abiding concern over the stock market recovery drives him to accept more death.

Who benefits ending the cure? Trump benefits. Shareholders benefit. Billionaires benefit. Who does not? The elderly. Recovering cancer patients with compromised immunity. Soon-to-be-sickened returning workers. The Federal Government should help workers shelter in place, keeping food on the table, the lights on, bills paid. Our real economy will recover in time. But Trump would allow fellow Americans to get sick and die for an illusion of the pandemic’s end to boost the stock market now and speed his return to the golf course.