A part of me wonders where the damage from limits ends and the unavoidable pandemic damage begins.
Like, a friend traveled for a CFB game a couple weeks back. Got a flight that is almost never cheap at a good rate and a hotel in a college town where you just don't get that. And it was at a game that was more than 3,000 below reduced capacity (25%).
Like a lot of folks would naturally stay home, but how many is an interesting question.
That's what I wonder too. If everything is "open", how many people will still go? Will it be enough for these businesses to survive anyway?
I
really miss travel. My wife and I loved going places. Sometimes that was wrapping a weekend around one of my business trips so there was airfare/hotel. Sometimes that was a trip to wine country (Paso or Napa) involving a fair bit of consumer spending, dining out, and hotel/airbnb. Sometimes we'd just get away for a weekend in San Diego.
I've put all that off, and will continue to put all that off, until and unless we either have a vaccine or reach a point by spring where all hope of a vaccine is gone.
Now, I'm just one anecdotal point. I don't know if most people would be like me, or if most people would return to their old ways if things were reopened. But I'm one example of several thousand dollars of economic activity over the course of a year that won't simply return just because Gavin Newsom says things can reopen--it will take more than that.
The cure cannot be worse than the cause. There has to be balance.
Tough to say. Some offer ideas about what we should be doing NOW. Some don't or won't.
I've offered ideas, mostly about messaging reasonable ways to remain safe in a world of partial reopening.
I do wonder where your balance point is. It's easy to say "the cure can't be worse than the disease", but what's your concrete balance point?
Would you allow restaurant reopening for indoor at full capacity?
