We Could Make Going Outside (Relatively) Safe—But it Might Mean You Only Get to Use the Park or Beach One Weekend a Month
Greetings from Day 40 of de facto house arrest here in Washington, D.C. For nearly six weeks, residents who do not work essential jobs have been directed to remain inside whenever possible. It’s a policy that all but a handful of states have implemented to some degree as the rate of infections, and deaths, skyrocketed around the U.S. at the end of March.
For the most part, things were fairly calm here in April, when average temperatures were in the 50s. That patience is starting to fray. Since last weekend, we’ve had a few clear, beautiful days, including last Tuesday—Cinco de Mayo. Across the city, there were reports of young merriment-seekers throwing social distancing to the wind as they crowded around Latin American restaurants offering discounted tacos and take-out margaritas. This is just one example of what we’ve seen across the country, beginning last weekend when thousands of Americans flocked to beaches and public parks during a balmy beginning to the month. Images of these outdoor revelers have rattled mayors and governors desperate to avoid another surge in COVID-19 cases, several of whom have closed parks and shorelines as a result.
The images of overcrowding are a simple case of too many people wanting to use a limited common resource—in this case, space. I was reminded of an lesson from ninth-grade Spanish class on how Mexico City, where emissions from millions of cars have contributed to devastating air pollution, instituted a policy in 1989 called Hoy No Circula, or “No Circulation Today,” in which vehicles were banned from the streets one day a week based on the the last letter of their license plate.
I suspect the point of the lesson was to practice counting to nine in Spanish, but the implications here are much larger. When demand exceeds capacity for something that the government controls but doesn’t explicitly charge for, there are only two solutions: Close down all together, or find a way to ration.
“I could teach a third of my microeconomics course using this example,” economist Michael Makowsky told me. Over the next hour, talking on Zoom, we worked through a thought experiment: could spatial rationing keep the U.S. (relatively) safe from COVID-19? Makowsky walked me through three possible tiers of regulations that could make spatial rationing—with a given amount of trial-and-error.
Any possibility of selling Americans on the notion that the once unlimited resource of the outdoors must now be rationed is as much a social phenomenon as an economic challenge. Without some social stigma to silently enforce non-compliance, the penalties for violation would have to be drastic. It’s hard to feel too much scorn when seeing thousands of happy people at the beach. However, if, about two weeks from now, new COVID-19 cases spike in areas that have “reopened,” it will be far less difficult.
Ashish Shah of Goldman Sachs Asset Management discusses the wave of fallen angels as rating agencies downgrade the debt of blue-chip companies at the fastest rate since the financial crisis.
OVER THE WEEKEND
The Impact on Children Is Unclear but Worrying
Earlier today, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said state officials are investigating 85 potential cases of “pediatric multisystem inflammatory syndrome,” which health officials say appears to be linked to COVID-19. Reports say three children have died from the health issue in New York so far.
If you’ve been tracking the news about adolescent cases of coronavirus, this is what experts are now calling the symptoms that doctors had, to date, been saying looked similar to those typical of Kawasaki disease.
Trump Administration Economists Predict Unemployment to Get Worse
On Friday, the U.S. federal government put out its worst jobs report in a century, showing some 20.5 million jobs lost in April, and a nationwide unemployment rate of 14.7%. (No, the chart below is not a mistake)
Today, Kevin Hassett, a White House senior economic adviser, told CNN that it’ll probably be “close to 20% in the next report.” This extraordinarily rapid economic collapse has put millions of middle- and working-class Americans at risk of financial ruin—while enabling the richest of the rich to accumulate even more wealth.
Also in the White House…Staff Worry the Virus is Spreading Through the West Wing
Two staff members—Vice President Pence’s press secretary Katie Miller, and President Trump’s personal valet—have been confirmed positive for COVID-19. Now, according to the New York Times, many others are self-quarantining at home, including (among others):
Dr. Robert Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Dr. Stephen Hahn, the commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
Stephen Miller, senior advisor to the president (and husband to Katie Miller)
“It is scary to go to work,” Hassett, the White House economist, told CNN today. His fears likely resonate with many Americans who, as some states reopen, may face difficult choices ahead: what if, for example, your employer wants you to return to work, but you feel it is unsafe? Can you be fired? TIME reporter Madeleine Carlisle spoke on Wednesday with labor and employment legal experts about your rights in this and other scenarios.
According to data gathered by Johns Hopkins University, the total number of confirmed cases passed 4 million on Saturday. Here the countries with the most reported cases so far:
However, these figures remain unreliable for many reasons, not the least that so many cases are likely to go untested. Relatedly, there has been rising concern that when we do test, the tests we are using don’t always detect cases accurately. Though the research is still early, even the gold standard of COVID-19 testing appears to have a significant chance of showing “false negatives.” That puts many patients in a dangerous purgatory filled with stress and uncertainty.
To our moms and all the other mothers out there, thank you for everything you’ve done and continue to do, especially in these most difficult of times.
Thanks for reading. We hope you find the Coronavirus Brief newsletter to be a helpful tool to navigate this very complex situation, and welcome feedback at coronavirus.brief@time.com.
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Today’s newsletter was written byChris Wilson and Elijah Wolfson.
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