Below is a letter (somewhat edited) I wrote to a friend this morning.
How are you handling the CV19 situation there? I hope you're healthy and will continue to be healthy. I don't know about you, but I feel so blindsided by the whole thing.
...
I worry about and for everyone. I see no way out of this for at least a few months, and meanwhile so many people will have been pushed to the edge. I try to control my despondency by thought-blocking and thinking about positive things, but every once it awhile it hits.
So far, Ms. Eclectic and I are okay. We're both over 75 and have some health issues, and so we're trying to be careful... very careful. Over a month ago, we visited our oldest son and his wife and their new son, but since then we have had only two outings together: once to meet some friends in a parking lot where we opened our trunk and the friends put a bag with homemade masks and shields in it. And once when we took lawn chairs to an open park and sat in the sun, well away from everyone else, while I tried to fly my kite.
Our visit to our son was the last time we saw any of our children, grandchildren, or great grandchildren in person. We miss the hugs, kisses, and laughter together. We Facetime, but it's not the same.
Meanwhile, I'm going stir crazy, but fortunately only some of the time, and I have it under control when it hits. I know it's a bit risky, but I get out of our condo unit every day. Some days it's just to climb some stairs up and down here within our condo building; other days I go for walks. Rarely, I go out to do shopping. Every time I leave the unit, I take hand sanitizer with me and use it after any incident when I might have touched some surface. And every time I go outside the building, I wear a mask.
Mostly, now, I walk in residential areas, not on popular paved walking trails; it's easier to avoid other people in residential areas.
If I'm just going for a walk where at worst I'll pass jogger or biker, I wear a homemade mask, but I line it with two layers of paper towels and two layers of Kleenex tissue to improve the filtering. For shopping, I have an N95 mask that I wear, but I've had to trim and reshape my beard and sideburns so it fits properly. We also take our temperatures frequently now. We have become borderline paranoids. At our age and in our states of health, we figure the odds are high that we're goners if we get it.
... Our sons have both been able to arrange most/all of their work to do it at home, but our daughter and some of our grandchildren and their families are really beginning to feel the economic effects of the shutdowns.
Meanwhile, my three main outside social activities are gone:
- Encore, the concert band, no longer rehearses and will likely have to cancel our June concert. I'm hoping things are under control enough we can resume in the fall.
- I no longer do stage work, but the mystery dinner theatre shows have been canceled until fall at the earliest. I'm hoping those can resume then, but who knows if customers/clients/restaurants will want to hire us even then?
- I (used to) play bridge weekly with three other men, but of course we no longer see each other, not even to get together with the others (or anyone else) in the building.
[addendum: It's been so long that I forgot to add a fourth thing: we like to eat in restaurants, and can no longer do that. We order takeout or delivery now and then, but not often, and yes we are amazingly careful (I hope) when interacting with others in those situations. ... pay in advance, get it left outside our building where I'm waiting 15' away, or have them set it outside their establishment for me to pick up, etc.]
I miss the social contacts. Of course I'm much more actively exchanging emails with some friends and relatives, and I spend far too much time on "pandemic porn", watching counts and policies.
I'm also doing some writing. I've published two more novels (see my .sig file below) and am working on another, but I'm not getting much written on it because of all the emotional and other distractions caused by Covid19.
I fear that we are in for a major economic depression. In addition, I fear all the central planners who want to reshape society and economic activity without regard for the benefits of individual freedom and choice. And I really worry about the ever-present nationalistic, protectionist tendencies I see regaining strength everywhere. This pandemic will set the world back by 3 years, if not 30 years. This is just one of the many very serious reasons I despair.
I felt early on, thinking about our friends and relatives who work in and/or run small businesses, that we (our countries) needed an emergency assistance programme in addition to our otherwise reasonably adequate social safety net. Everyone in those positions was completely blindsided (as were most of us), even if they saw it coming in early January (when most of us were more concerned about Australian wildfires). So many businesses will have to shut down, and so many landlords will lose massive amounts of income as business and residential tenants default on rent payments (and many in Ontario will actually choose to do so because the province has put policies in place to protect tenants who miss a couple of months of rent payments). And so many residential tenants on the edge will eventually lose their apartments. Shelters are overflowing and find it difficult to practice any kind of distancing. And people living on the financial edge will face serious mortgage issues.
So many little people will be hurt. So many.
Believe it or not, I'm glad politicians are trying to help out those people. Yes, even I, John Palmer, quasi-libertarian, Mr. small-gubmnt, think it is right for gubmnts to do this. But I detest the bailouts of major corporations, and I resent the fact that so much tax money will be used for the cronies in the name of helping out the little people.
Where is the money coming from for all these programmes??? Before this happened, both the US and Canada were already grotesquely adding to their deficits and debts despite the good economic conditions (when budgets should have been in surplus!), and now there's less wriggle room.
Will they raise taxes? How much? and on whom? Now would be a great time for tax reform, but instead of a simple flat tax without all the deductions and exemptions exploited mostly by the rich, I'm afraid we'll see a return to higher marginal tax rates for high income folks, and we'll return to the sluggishness of the pre-Thatcher "English Disease" and the pre-Reagan era.
Will gubmnts borrow? Now is not a bad time to lock in long-term debt at low interest rates, but watch for runaway inflation and stagflation about two years from now. And with inflation, interest rates will go up considerably.
And I further resent the use of the term "stimulus". There's nothing to stimulate! This is a major supply-side shock to the economy, and until people can start producing goods, and especially services, we can't help but experience a major drop in GDP.
Anyway, I'm sure I've rambled on far too long. Despite the despair I feel, I'm also fairly happy and contented. We're okay, and for now so are our progeny.
I hope you and yours are doing well.
Economics and old age have much in common: Both dwell on foregone opportunities
