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~*Official #COVID-19 Thread of Doom*~ Revenge of Omicron Prime

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Commissar SFLUFAN

Commissar SFLUFAN

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EU's top scientist reportedly resigns over bloc's virus response

 

The Financial Times is reporting that Prof Mauro Ferrari has resigned as the president of the European Research Council (ERC), saying he has been “extremely disappointed by the European response to Covid-19”.

 

The paper reports that the EU’s top scientist, who only started a four-year term job on 1 January, was disappointed at having failed to persuade Brussels to mount a coordinated response to the pandemic.

 

His resignation letter.

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Massdriver

Massdriver

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3 hours ago, sblfilms said:

There is increasing feeling in the small business world that the $349 billion for small businesses is basically a back door bank bailout program. The main reason that the PPP is run through banks, but banks have almost all decided to limit applications to businesses that have an existing business account with them, and in some cases requiring an existing credit product with the bank. The thinking is that the banks are using these federally guaranteed loans to prop up business that owe them money or otherwise generate significant revenue for the bank. I don't think that line of thinking is without merit and sounds about right for the financial sector.

This could end up being the case. I'm going to be real curious how they handle ours.

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1 hour ago, Massdriver said:

This could end up being the case. I'm going to be real curious how they handle ours.


Our main issue with the PPP is that our business is really heavy on fixed costs like our lease, and kinda light on payroll since we are only fully staffed three days out of the week. So the requirements on how to spend the funds make it less attractive to our purposes, though it still may be worth doing. I put in an application with all supporting docs on Friday and have had no movement at all from my bank (BBVA), I am not holding my breath on it and am mostly looking at other means to further decrease our expenses until we can re-open.

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Commissar SFLUFAN

Commissar SFLUFAN

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11 minutes ago, DarkStar189 said:

Has there been official word when we will start getting the stimulus money(the $1,200 per person thing)? 

Quote

How and when do I get the payment?

While Americans with Social Security numbers do not need to apply to receive the payments, the Internal Revenue Service needs to already have bank-account information on file in order to send out cash via direct deposit. For those who have direct deposit on file with the IRS, the payment will reportedly be delivered as early as Monday, April 13. (According to the Washington Post, the electronic checks will be processed on April 9 and should be delivered by April 14.) For those who will receive the check by mail, NBC News reports that the checks could take as long as five months to be delivered.

 

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Signifyin(g)Monkey

Signifyin(g)Monkey

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55 minutes ago, sblfilms said:


Our main issue with the PPP is that our business is really heavy on fixed costs like our lease, and kinda light on payroll since we are only fully staffed three days out of the week. So the requirements on how to spend the funds make it less attractive to our purposes, though it still may be worth doing. I put in an application with all supporting docs on Friday and have had no movement at all from my bank (BBVA), I am not holding my breath on it and am mostly looking at other means to further decrease our expenses until we can re-open.

We’re definitely on the bubble of a very scary small-business holocaust.

 

Short read putting it in perspective for anyone whose not sure just how big a percentage of the economy small businesses are.
 

Quote

With an average daily income of only $7 above daily expenses, the typical small business has a median cash buffer of 27 days of burn before it runs out of money.
 

Karen Mills, prior head of the Small Business Administration (SBA), said recently that “20%, even 30%, of small businesses could fail even in a good scenario.” Without immediate support to buffer the cash flows of stalled businesses waiting for the economy to reopen, it is a matter of days until millions begin to shut their doors, driving unemployment up significantly and sending the economy into a tailspin. 

 

Small businesses make up over 99.9% of businesses, employ about 59 million people (about 47% of the U.S. private workforce in 2015), create over 41% of new jobs, and account for 45% of GDP.

 

A Goldman Sachs survey of 1,500 small businesses found that 96% of owners were already feeling the effects of COVID-19. More than half said their business would not be able to continue operating for more than three months because of the economic stresses caused by the pandemic. 

Hope our resident small-business owners here manage to survive the storm.  @sblfilms

@Massdriver

...and anyone else I’m missing.

 

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1 hour ago, Signifyin(g)Monkey said:

We’re definitely on the bubble of a very scary small-business holocaust.

 

Short read putting it in perspective for anyone whose not sure just how big a percentage of the economy small businesses are.
 

Hope our resident small-business owners here manage to survive the storm.  @sblfilms

@Massdriver

...and anyone else I’m missing.

 


It's tough stuff. We just spent a significant chunk of our reserves that we had been setting aside for the last couple of years as a down payment on the property that our drive in business sits on. A few hundred thousand up front and a 3.5ish million dollar note I personally guaranteed in JANUARY :facepalm:

IMPECCABLE TIMING, COVID-19!

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I was listening to the Freakonomics episode from last week where they had a bunch of economists and Cory Booker talk about the stimulus bill overall, and I think it was Austan Goolsbee that suggested the one time payments would actually be better served being delivered later in the year, because the wage replacement with the enhance UE benefits were actually really strong and there really isn't anything to spend money on in the broader economy right now. But in a few months, juicing the private sector with stimulus cash may provide the jump start to general consumer spending we absolutely will need. Thought it was an interesting perspective.

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CastlevaniaNut18

CastlevaniaNut18

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I had my shift canceled tonight and that's the first time in nearly 4 years of working at this hospital where it's happened. My job is safe, I work a 40 bed med-surg unit, so we won't be closing, but admissions have been way down. We normally stay full, but we're down to under 25 patients tonight, which is probably the lowest I've ever seen it. Plus, they closed a smaller med-surg unit next to us, so those nurses are either getting canceled or moving to our floor for the time being, leaving an excess of staff.

 

Crazy times. But I'm still better off than a lot of people, so if this doesn't become a normal thing, I'll be okay and not fuss too much.

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mclumber1

mclumber1

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Just now, thewhyteboar said:

Republicans don't want mail-in ballots because the only way they can win is by suppressing votes. 

 

The thing is that Republicans can and do win in areas that do mail-in balloting.  Yeah, it's been some time since a Republican was in charge of WA or OR, but those states do have Republican House members, and dozens of state legislators, not to mention hundreds of county and local Republican politicians.

 

Also, lol at Trump for basically saying "Do as I say, not as I do" when it comes to mail-in balloting.  That piece of shit just voted by mail like a month ago. 

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silentbob

silentbob

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Waiting for this to be a Trump response to no on mail-in ballots.

 

TRUMP: “How else are people able to seal their envelope and send in their vote, without possibly sending Covid-19 when they lick to seal them”

 

RANDOM REPORTERS SHOUTING OUT: “a sponge” “damp towel” “use tape” 

 

TRUMP: “You can only send licked envelope through the mail. I know, I’ve tried with the *mumble mumble* method. It Doesn’t Work *a little quieter” It Doesn’t Work *a litter quieter* It Doesn’t Work”

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b_m_b_m_b_m

b_m_b_m_b_m

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17 minutes ago, mclumber1 said:

 

The thing is that Republicans can and do win in areas that do mail-in balloting.  Yeah, it's been some time since a Republican was in charge of WA or OR, but those states do have Republican House members, and dozens of state legislators, not to mention hundreds of county and local Republican politicians.

 

Also, lol at Trump for basically saying "Do as I say, not as I do" when it comes to mail-in balloting.  That piece of shit just voted by mail like a month ago. 

Statewide though

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Signifyin(g)Monkey

Signifyin(g)Monkey

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1 hour ago, mclumber1 said:

 

The thing is that Republicans can and do win in areas that do mail-in balloting.  Yeah, it's been some time since a Republican was in charge of WA or OR, but those states do have Republican House members, and dozens of state legislators, not to mention hundreds of county and local Republican politicians.

 

Also, lol at Trump for basically saying "Do as I say, not as I do" when it comes to mail-in balloting.  That piece of shit just voted by mail like a month ago. 


Regardless of the principle of the matter, trying to win by minimizing turnout is not a good long-term strategy anyway, as much as it may yield dividends in the short-run.

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Massdriver

Massdriver

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2 hours ago, sblfilms said:


It's tough stuff. We just spent a significant chunk of our reserves that we had been setting aside for the last couple of years as a down payment on the property that our drive in business sits on. A few hundred thousand up front and a 3.5ish million dollar note I personally guaranteed in JANUARY :facepalm:

IMPECCABLE TIMING, COVID-19!

The bank is usually the one worried about its clients, but in this case I'm starting to worry about our bank, which is a moderate sized regional bank. They are lending to a lot of real estate projects, and with the stay at home orders, I'm wondering how they're going to hold up if no one pays their lease.

 

Our business is somewhat recession proof because we are processing food with a reasonable portfolio of domestic/export. Aside from some hiccups in logistics (the port of Houston even closed one day because they had a case), we are pretty much running full speed ahead. However, we are small enough to where a COVID case would significantly hamper our operation, which is why we are emphasizing social distancing as much as we can. We can't afford to shut down. We are doing everything we can reasonably do to mitigate risk, but I don't know if I've ever been this stressed out trying to put fires out every fucking day, and lately almost half my time seems to be spent on issues around the virus.

 

Edit: P.S. We are in the middle of planning a wedding, or we were. It's impossible to do with all the uncertainty. It's pretty much dead in the water. It looks like the wedding may be a very small event.

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Keyser_Soze

Keyser_Soze

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1 hour ago, CastlevaniaNut18 said:

I had my shift canceled tonight and that's the first time in nearly 4 years of working at this hospital where it's happened. My job is safe, I work a 40 bed med-surg unit, so we won't be closing, but admissions have been way down. We normally stay full, but we're down to under 25 patients tonight, which is probably the lowest I've ever seen it. Plus, they closed a smaller med-surg unit next to us, so those nurses are either getting canceled or moving to our floor for the time being, leaving an excess of staff.

 

Crazy times. But I'm still better off than a lot of people, so if this doesn't become a normal thing, I'll be okay and not fuss too much.

 

Reminds me of my last week at the hotel. Luckily you're a nurse so you could used elsewhere.

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Jason

Jason

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1 hour ago, Signifyin(g)Monkey said:

Regardless of the principle of the matter, trying to win by minimizing turnout is not a good long-term strategy anyway, as much as it may yield dividends in the short-run.

 

Except that they've succeeded in taking over the courts, which both makes it easier to keep the turnout minimization going and allows them to neutralize the opposition's ability to do anything even if they lose the other branches.

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