"Only I Can Fix It!"
Donald J. Trump
39
Paul Krugman implied the real solution yesterday. Get rid of an idiot president who cuts funding to the CDC, puts a superstitious dolt in charge of the crisis, and claims the disease is "under [my] control" when we don't even have a cure.
120
I do not think doctors can save us from market fluctuations but would agree that we need solid public health services, kept as far away from partisanship as possible--if we can.
The markets have had shocks before and will have them again. We've been overdue for something to trigger a correction. I remember the vacillations from the oil crises of the 1970s.
In the meantime, as others have suggested here and elsewhere, keep an eye on CDC updates: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/summary.html .
11
Because Juris Doctor Mike Pence once proudly proclaimed that he is ' a Christian, a conservative and a Republican in that order' what could go wrong in the American coronavirus response that not a doctor Jared 'Hidden Genius' Kushner can't correct and fix?
Coronavirus may prove to be much better at it's biological science evolutionary fit survival economic business than any winner of the Swedish National Bank Prize in Economic Science in memory of Alfred Nobel like Doctor Paul Krugman or any winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine like Doctor James Watson.
15
Asking the new Coronavirus Czar, Mike Pence, to make a hand washing video, with him starring, might be a solution. Be sure to use the “This is the Way We Wash Our Hands” song for background music, please.
34
Finally we are asking how doctors can save us, not Federal Reserve, But we have been watching the growth of Coronavirus pandemic for over a month and been totally lax and didn't learn the lesson. Diamond Princess had been sitting in Yokohama for weeks, and from patient zero whom debarked in Hong Kong to more than 700 and counting out of total 3500, nothing was learned. Yet Japan allowed thousands to return home with public transportation and now they are turning positive. U.S. public officials met with those returning from Wuhan with no protection according to whistle blower. NYT has been accusing China for not listening to Dr. Li and allowing the spread and yet we have been doing even less while gloating about our superiority of governance.
25
CDC on how Covid19 spreads, updated with a day or two lag:
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/transmission.html
Per the web site, “the virus is thought to spread mainly from person-to-person:
—Between people who are in close contact with one another (within about 6 feet).
—Through respiratory droplets produced when an infected person coughs or sneezes.
These droplets can land in the mouths or noses of people who are nearby or possibly be inhaled into the lungs.”
Limiting economic activity that accelerates person-to-person transmission is actually desirable, even if it means lower stock prices. Keep a healthy distance from others (6 feet). Wear gloves, wash hands frequently, keep common surfaces clean.
10
The stock market was looking for an excuse for profit taking. It has one now. Stocks do not have real, tangible value. They are only worth what someone is willing to pay you. Hence a bankrupt company has $0 to pay you so your stock is worth $0.
The smart people started planning on taking their money out a few weeks ago when Dr. Fauci was saying corona-virus was nothing to think about. They bet that once again he would be wrong. These same smart people will get back in the stock market as soon as it craters. This is what they do.
7
It is even more ( rate cuts) undesirable that you cite. There is no such thing as acting preemptively with monetary stimulus. Markets decide. Everything. The artificially low rates we have endured for years only have assured that the arrival of the inevitable recession(s), only make it more difficult cope with down the line. Now, Trump has openly made Fed policy into a "political" charade. It only encourages more irresponsible behavior on the part of Congress and the President. Fiscal policy has been ignored or squandered as an economic tool. All Republicans know is"tax cuts." Why? They are systematically looting the Treasury for the benefit of their supporters in the wealthy class. Trump is already suggesting "tax cuts" as a response to the virus. You can expect that the Republicans will react to our spiraling debt by trying to cut your Social Security and Medicare benefits. For some, they may prefer the virus to that miserable life. The first step on the road back is to get Trump out of office. Mike Bloomberg is smart, competent and decent. Who would you hire if you were on a Board of Directors?
21
Mr. Appelbaum sounds a bit like Donald Rumsfeld. You go to war against the coronavirus with what you've got. Strong medical response? We don't have universal health care, dude. Everyone is offering a piecemeal solution save one candidate to the catastrophic prospects of contagion of this & any future outbreak. You didn't mention his name.
'Getting back to normal' is burying one's head in the sand.
10
My first response to this headline was: duh! Of course a rate cut won't solve a public health crisis. The next was: how typical. At a time of malignant science illiteracy, we censor the experts and put a prissy zealot in charge (having already picked apart our infectious disease defense forces).
This is a warm-up act for the coming climate crisis, where the attack is gradual and spotty but the targeted lungs belong to the entire globe -- and everything living there.
30
Thank you for words of sanity.
9
Only Doctors can save us?
Please don’t be so mioptic who do you think really cares for patients when they are sick? It’s a whole crew of people..nurses, respiratory techs, lab techs..
28
I am fully in agreement with Trump on this: China purposely unleashed this fearsome virus on to the world to make the Dow tank and thus doom Trump's prospects in the next election. And the fake new media is abetting the nefarious intentions of the Chinese by exaggerating the viciousness of this epidemic.
I read somewhere that some super idiot (was it Pence?) has said that this virus was created in a Chinese military research lab and then let loose on its own people to test its effectiveness and then allowed to fly off to America via many other countries in-between.
And since he cannot do much about the fast spreading of the virus itself, he is throttling down the spread of the news about the actual spread. And he is absolutely right in putting some ignorant people in charge of managing this thing that has gone viral.
Let all of us idiots get behind Trump on this.
7
This administration is so far doing every incompetent thing to deal with COVID-19 crisis, the worst being the multiple cuts to the CDC, not listening to experts putting Pence in charge and gagging everyone.
Nonetheless let us hope that a full blown nationwide epidemic does not happen. This could mean many thousands of deaths.
13
You must mean nurses....really. Nurses are the front line!
23
Even when there is a global crisis Trump and his goose steppers are blaming Democrats and the news media. How pathetic.
29
Comment 2:
Comment 2:
The South Korean leaders prepared for this. They’ve already tested 1000s. We on the other hand have tested around 500 people. The Koreans have at least 1 company producing kits to test for the virus. As there has been a problem with the CDC’s test, why aren’t we copying the Korean test and manufacturing it here? But let’s remember we no longer have factories to produce our goods. For years the ‘wealth creators’ (WC) have been shipping jobs overseas. They pay the workers in China et al slave wages. But the WC charge us outrageous prices, make obscene profits and pay no taxes. If our goods aren’t being made in China et al, we will run out of many things. We may run out of medicines that are completely or partially manufactured in China. So much for being dependent on the global economy! But didn’t the SG promise to bring back manufacturing jobs to the US? Good thing I never believed him. Wonder how he’ll explain the shortages! Oh, yeah he’ll just tell another lie! The sad thing is that his base will suffer but they’ll still believe him!
FYI: If you need time away from all the craziness I understand that the movie, Greed, is very funny. SEE: nytimes.com/2020/02/27/movies/greed-review.html
2
Perhaps America's radical right Reverse Robin Hood Republicans will finally come to the reluctant realization that a well-funded government leading the scientific way and universal healthcare system are better approaches to keeping Americans alive and healthy.....as opposed to gutting the government in order to paint the toenails of the rich in gold while spoon-feeding the masses with ignorance, spite and divisive red meat.
Many Americans will die because many Americans cannot afford to go the doctor, and because Pastor Mike Pence is the Coronavirus Czar
Many Americans will die because Donald Trump gutted the White House pandemic experts team in 2018, firing Rear Adm. Timothy Ziemer from his post leading the global health security team on the National Security Council amid a reorganization of the council by then-National Security Advisor John Bolton, who disbanded Ziemer’s team of health experts.
Tom Bossert, whom the Washington Post reported “had called for a comprehensive biodefense strategy against pandemics and biological attacks,” was also been fired by the Trump Administration in 2018.
Many Americans will die because Republican leaders - and those who vote for them - think that government, science and the public health are not worth paying for.
The Republican Party is not the 'party of life'.
Merchants of Death is a lot more like it.
November 3 2020
57
A great article.
3
The Coronavirus Pandemic is a genuine worldwide disaster, and Trump has made it worse by denial and incompetence.
Trump is concerned that this looks bad for him. His natural response to any crisis is to lie, cover up his own mistakes, and blame others. VP Pence will do whatever Trumps says. We cannot trust anything they say.
Under Obama, the US government was prepared. But after Trump cut the budget of the CDC two years ago, experts predicted that this would hurt American preparedness:
“Why American could become vulnerable to the next major pandemic”
https://time.com/5177802/cdc-budget-cuts-infectious-disease/
Every American death will be on Trump’s head.
22
In all this chaos, I was surprised to hear Larry Kudlow utter the words which gave witness to the fact that the economy (Wall Street) is not the people (Main Street). In an effort to quell panic in the stock market he said this would calm down and for those invested and those , uh,.....the average person on Main Street, don't panic. Wow, finally an admission that the two are not joined at the hip in this economy.Us and them. Disclaimer: I am one of "those invested", but I still understand what's good for Wall Street is not always good for Main Street. BTW, if one wishes to revel in conspiracy theories, how's this one--the government response is so slow so as to allow GOP cronies to buy low in the stock market. The response will crank up when they are satiated--and markets will stabilize. As ridiculous as the 'Democratic Hoax', but why let a good conspiracy theory go to waste?
14
Insurance companies with deny treatment and all appeals we may be forced to make.
2
I am afraid it is more than the virus that is affecting the markets. The virus, as horrible as it is, is a symptom of a overvalued market, cutting interest rates and cutting regulations before they were necessary drove the prices up and increased the deficit beyond all reason.
9
Smart column: Medical problems require medical solutions, financial problems require financial solutions and political problems require political solutions. Everybody should stay in their lane and focus on their role and move forward.
15
Investors will decide what the US economy will be. They are afraid of consequences from coronavirus extension. So the economy should be bad. These guys never learn to think properly.
4
The CDC is headquartered near my home. Many friends work there or are retired from the agency. Listen and hear a unified "amen!" to this warning.
Meanwhile, my two U.S. Senators continue as Team Trump lapdogs. Our governor-a man who always puts politics ahead of public health-appointed a "task force" with no defined public information mission.
The consequences of muzzling medical information and choking preparation for an oncoming catastrophe are frightening. Tragically, much of the confusion can be avoided by sound public health policies.
Lowering interest rates is what you would expect from a Babbitt government.
22
It is time for Trump to be a leader. Stop whining and complaining. The US ended WW2 with the Manhattan Project. An Atomic bomb built by the best global scientists working around the clock. Trump Must create a global team of the leading medical researchers working non stop to create an effective vaccine to defeat the virus. A new Manhattan project to save lives and restore world confidence. And Mr.President this will help the Dow Jones.And it might help you get a second term.
4
That will never happen because scientist form their opinions based on facts while Trump forms his facts based on HIS opinion. As an individual who must be the smartest person in a room, he rejects all who have well formed intellect. What we are witnessing is not a public health response but a propaganda response to control message and a political response to use (improperly) the tools of government.
20
Whenever there is a crisis, Trump's reaction is to declare it a hoax to make him look bad.. Rogue operatives in the executive branch? A Democratic hoax. Peculiar weather resulting from climate change? A Democratic hoax. Damage to Puerto Rico from a hurricane? A Democratic hoax. Now a potential epidemic . A Democratic hoax.
Since he lies all the time, he assumes that his adversaries are doing the same thing.
37
Mandatory free face masks for all plane and train travel would be a start.
6
@99percent
Won't ever happen. First you said a dirty deplorable 4 letter word... Free. Second, face masks cause problems with surveillance and the US police state will not tolerate not being able to ID and track innocent people.
2
There was an industrial recession in the US, Japan, and some European countries in 2019. Presumably this has not changed this year given the already deceleration in China during the same period before Covid 19 was named. This is something of a chronic condition after 2008. The service sector may be next given slow down in hospitality industry. Finances or the world of stocks is even more removed from the real economy and will be the last to notice it. There’s no indication that virus is the cause of this stagnation. It is perhaps the catalyst that brings the overvalued market down to earth. However, poverty and misery will be blamed on the virus, but the social system that created the conditions for it won’t be mentioned (just like in 2008). For starters we don’t have a decent health care system to address a pandemic.
15
Excellent article.
Two points however:
1. The markets are crashing, not because of what Trump and his administration are propagandizing to the American people - that it is the fault of fear mongering by the media to bring him down; it is dropping fast due to fact that a lot of American investors are more fearful of their fellow investors freaking out and pulling their money out to save their own financial hides. Thus they freak out themselves.
2. Doctors have an important role in healthcare, but more importantly you must realize that they don't provide the majority of care to sick people - it is the nurses, and the many other highly skilled people who also care for people, comfort them and their families, and save lives. Such people as respiratory therapists, nursing assistants, occupational and physical therapists, speech pathologists, and many, many others.
By the way, I'm not a nurse, I'm a doctor
41
When the president of the United States blames the first two days of a market drop on something that hadn't yet happened (the Democratic debate) rather than listening to warnings about an emerging pandemic, you have no hope of focused intelligent response. Dr. Anthony Fauci is the guy who should be in charge, not lapdog Pence. We do have a lot of dedicated medical professionals in this country. But if they do not get the test kits, the money and the support they need from politically focused myopic leadership this will be a lot worse than it needs to be.
36
@Frank
Fauci went on TV in Jan saying corona-virus was nothing to be concerned with and that we needed to focus on this year's flu. Also remember he was the one who got it wrong on Ebola and PPE for people treating Ebola patients in the US.
Trust and listen to him, no. There are better sources in EU and even the WHO. Just remember he has a government position, he may be a better brown noser than he is an infectious disease expert.
6
People need to be forthcoming and follow recommendations.
It’s clear some came out of China to the west coast without quarantining themselves.
That is now the threat.
3
The stock market is all about short term goals. Like, “how much money can I make in the next fifteen seconds?” kind of short term. The virus will burn out, then the markets will be back with a vengeance. It’ not like 2008 when things were ascribed a value they didn’t have, and debt was mismanaged. Nothing is changing except people are getting the flu. Ninety-eight percent will recover, the rest will provide new job and housing opportunities. All this “crash” does is allow the wealthy to buy up assets at bargain prices, because people (most of us) without a substantial cushion have to sell them off in a bear market just to survive. The wealthy came out of the last crash looking good. I sold them my house to survive, and now they rent it back to me for my old mortgage payment plus 20%. In other words, once you get over the flu, somebody else is going to be the new owner of your house.
10
@Peter
Look closer, it is 2008 all over again in much of the US. The Rust Belt and Flyover not so much as these areas are still in a depression.
2
I am sorry about your, apparently, ill-informed decision to use your house as an ATM and that you did not invest during your 40-year working life so that you could now view the equity markets through the lenses of long-term gains. Long term investors recognize the the US has had a consumer economy for a very long time. We know that when regular folks stop spending their money, for whatever reason, the economy tanks. A pandemic spreading across the nation will slow them down, and the stock market will experience a sell off. During that turn-down regular workers investing in their 401-Ks will get some great buys! I’m not sorry; that’s how the long-term works.
2
Correct: the public health response is crucial.
Put the scientists in charge and do what is needed to contain this illness.
This is predominantly a medical problem, even if the Fed is required to deliver an interest rate cut.
5
The healthcare teams in the US that are responsible for much of the intellectual and boots-on-the-ground care needed to adequately respond to a viral pandemic have been kneecapped by the ineptitude of the djt administration. The administration knows no better. They are chronic liars and cheats and they have gotten away with it. They will not reform.
They are muzzling healthcare professionals and trying to redirect attention elsewhere so people do not see how unprepared they are.
Also, the vaccines, antimicrobials and other definitive treatments take time, months and years, not hours and days.
No, the republicans have screwed up again. Will they pay a price at the ballot box.
One can only hope.
15
If Trump and politicians (everywhere) screw up massively on Coronavirus, the political climate might turn so that people will demand "technocrats" instead of "ideologues" (going forward). So, for survivors, perhaps long term good news.
5
Comment 1:
Well said!
The stable genius (SG) sees everything in terms of money. He doesn’t care about the suffering of the peons. So what if some peons die! It’s more important to save his billions or is it millions?
The situation with COVID-19 is going to highlight problems that our nation faces. One is the lack of leadership at the highest level. The SG has gutted vital federal agencies that prepare for times like these. This week the SG censured CDC experts after they corrected his lies about the virus. Do the experts need to set up an underground CDC in order to protect us from the SG’ lies?
What gives me hope is that once again dedicated public employees won’t be silenced. A whistle blower has filed a report related to this situation. She has already been subjected to retribution. The past few days state/local health officials have spoken publically about those in their communities who are sick. The SG can’t muzzle all health officials in the country.
9
America's health care is just about as good as the Boeing 737-8.
5
You are talking about Americans here. You know the same people who run to the doctor demanding antibiotics every time they get sick. The same people who want that pill to take just as they come down with the flu. The one that doesn't cure the flu. It just knocks a day off the course of the illness. As with a viral illness, the economy runs the same way. Sometimes you have to just ride it out. Let the illness run its course. But just remember it will take a while for things to go back to the way they were even after you get over it. Don tells you to run to the medicine cabinet and take two rate cuts or tax cuts and call him in the morning. Problem with that is you may feel better the next day, but just like with taking pills, those nasty side effects can sometimes linger and become chronic problems. Then who you going to blame? The 'doctor' or the person who just HAD to have something that would make you feel better like yesterday? Remember "I alone can fix it"? Dr. Don's Cureall for whatever ails you is usually no more than a sugar pill. Best to keep that in mind when you look at the flashy ads.
6
There is still a lot we don't know about how severe this coronavirus outbreak will be, and it may turn out much less severe than feared, but it we escape relatively unscathed, it will only be by luck. I am a primary care physician in a clinic with 35 other physicians and we provide care for over 50,000 patients. We attempted to order N95 masks earlier this week by our supplier, McKesson, and were denied because their stock is already so low. We were allowed to order 400 regular masks but no more, and half this shipment won't arrive until the end of March. I sent my nanny to Home Depot to buy some masks and they were out of stock across the city. How in the world are health care workers going to protect themselves? I used the numbers published by the NEJM yesterday to calculate the following: if 50% of the US population is infected with the coronavirus and 5% of those infected need ICU care, that calculates to 4.125 million ICU patients across the country; and half of those ICU patients will need mechanical ventilation. We do not have near enough resources to handle this. And how many of these people will be underinsured or not insured? This is almost unfathomable in so many ways from just the primary care office, to urgent care, to ER, to hospital, to ICU- the entire healthy care system could collapse.
15
@Elaine
The US death care system is working just fine. It keeps people alive as long as possible with the maximum number of medications and treatments that will not cure but will stave off the Reaper a few more months.
A total collapse may be the only thing that brings Americans to their senses. Fact that tell of people choosing between food and insulin, going without care because they cannot afford a $10 copay, having to drive 100+ miles one way to see a primary care doc and a specialist is more than 250 miles one way, flying in doctors to staff a rural Hospital that serves an area with a 150 mile radius are not motivating anyone to fix or change the system.
But here is reality, the system will collapse, doors will be closed, and patients cut off from care. Before sunrise the next day a new system will be in the works and care will be available. People are fed up with all of our broken systems. It won't be a pretty sight but it will result in a better system than we have right now.
4
@Elaine Ah yes, the unpleasant reality. Not enough ventilators. Who is going to be the bearer of that bad news? I am afraid it will be the doctor. Not the family doctor. The ER doctor or the hospitalist. Unknown to the patient. And this is not new. It was the same situation with SARS. And Trump and Mulvaney and Limbaugh will all tell you the Democrats didn't want you to have a ventilator. And 40% of America will believe that too. And Republicans will quickly fund start up companies like "VentAmerica". So every American who wants one can have one. For the low, low price of 2999.* * a portion of the sales will go to the Trump for re-election fund.
10
"The best way to limit the economic impact of the coronavirus is not to lower interest rates but to limit the number of Americans who contract the disease, to nurse them back to health, to develop a vaccine, and to return life to normal as soon as possible."
Of course our government can focus mostly on what happens in the US, but in our globally integrated economy, what happens in other countries has significant economic impact here. Those of us who work for or with global organizations probably have started to see significant curtailments of work and work-related travel in Asia and parts of Europe. Sales and production are both significantly reduced in many countries, particularly in Asia. If this goes on for an extended period, the economic impact on the US will be significant even if the disease is controlled here.
2
So its not really the falsely idealized and overrated doctor class this writer appeals to - but rather its really, really, really good governance. Like extraordinary governance.
Something we're in severe short supply of these days. From the Oval thru the Senate, right thru the House, and then out thru to the hinterlands. Poor, inept, unresponsive, underfunded, often corrupted, very partisan (esp. in Red zones) too often racist and sexist and wealth prejudiced (in favoring wealth) governments. Places where a poor neighborhood suffers from tainted water supplies, while a richer 'hood gets its nice and clean. Or a richer community has ample access to ER's, walk-in clinics - while poorer ones have little of those things. Where they must rely on publicly funded resources, that are always under the cost-cutting machete (esp. under Trump) and are scrambling for the basics.
Where roads and electrical and communication infrastructures are better maintained in the tony zip codes, but left to deteriorate where the lesser folks live.
Good governance is what this author is talking about, and what a majority of voters are seeking to get back, this year. To head us that way, again. Governance aimed at making all our lives better, no matter the zip code, or allegiance to a political party ones elected employees belong.
Good governance is what defeats this problem, and most others. But apparently a fair number of us, approve of shoddy governance, as long as the other side gets "owned".
13
Doctors can't undo the damage the media has already done.
Getting a message out is one thing.
Printing endless hypothetical apocalyptic scenarios is classic National Enquirer, and not something the Times or any other "reputable" outlet should engage in.
"Reputable" in quotes, because they all - are - engaging in this activity. Add to that the wanton spreading of knowingly false narratives in the political arena over the past few years and one has to wonder if these outlets serve a useful purpose any more.
1
For countries with national healthcare systems (I live in one and it is excellent), dealing with corona is a matter of organizing, emphasizing and prioritizing resources. For the US and its massive costs of testing and treatment, it can swiftly turn to chaos. If there is one silver lining in this tragedy, maybe it will be the push we need to get to a more efficient medicare for all system, with a private component for those who can afford it. Medicare for all is good for society and therefore good for all -- no matter what strata of that society you reside in.
5
Bone spur has one priority -> Bone spur. If the market goes down because climate change floods major sections of the country then he will want the most immediate fix for those sections of the population that might vote for him. Wall street can buy a rubber tube to float on. IF he gets covid-19 he will want the most expert, expensive medical people there to cure him. The rest of us can wait to see what mother nature has planned for us. It's really that simple. Oh, then he will make up shallow lies about what a great decision-maker he is. There is no cause-and-effect. Only events that need his response in a way that portrays him as a "stable genius."
That's what we get with a minority-vote elected official.
11
Using a limited amount of test kits officials had to limit the amount of testing done to check the spread.
And many of the items needed to stop the spread are manufactured in China.
This COULD be a problem.
3
If this doesn't scream for universal public health care, I don't know what does. Maybe you feel ill, but it costs a minimum of $150 just to be seen by your doc (if you have one), so you avoid going until you've spread the virus throughout your whole family. They don't have insurance either, and work in minimum wage jobs that don't pay for sick days. So they go to work sick in order to pay the rent. They infect everyone at work, who then infect everyone in the restaurant - you get the picture.
This country, with its for-profit medical care, is a disaster waiting to happen. Hospitals will go bankrupt taking care of uninsured patients, or they will be turned away. Insurance companies will be forced to go after patients who are too sick to pay their bills or families of those who have died from lack of care.
And if a vaccine is developed and it costs $200 for treatment, guess who won't get it? The underinsured and uninsured of course.
America's health care system is rotting from the inside out. This virus may we'll be the thing that takes it down.
6
@Amy Haible
We can only hope this will be trigger that brings people to their senses. But this is America, are there enough people left with decency, compassion for other human beings, and good sense?
5
"Only the doctors can save us now"
Maybe, but they need nurses, public health statisticians, laboratories, hospitals, epidemiologists, etc. Especially, epidemiologists.
Don't oversimplify.
It's "Only the medical and public health systems can save us now." (That's part of the "Deep State".)
7
The first goal is to protect the populace with the best advice for staying virus-free and what to do if you start having symptoms.
The next goal is to diagnose the sick as quickly as possible.
The third goal is to provide the best medical care for the sick, while also protecting first responders and healthcare workers.
Meanwhile, Congress should pass veto-proof legislation freeing the CDC from censorship by the Trump administration. The CDC must be free to plan, disseminate information, and do whatever is necessary to calm people, ensure rapid accurate diagnoses and effective care for those who need it. THIS IS IMPERATIVE!
I totally agree with the Op-Ed and thank the Times for your stellar reporting and willingness to devote so much space to covering this story and providing the best possible information and advice.
Right now, we cannot expect government to save the markets. And the info and advice here is excellent.
Trump is panicked over the markets. And wants something done to stabilize them. For fear he will lose the election.
Tough!
Government’s focus must be on PEOPLE’S HEALTH FIRST! Health and wellbeing can be mitigated. The markets, at the moment, cannot be.
9
We need medical doctors, climate scientists and ecologists. Climate change damages ecosystems and damaged ecosystems pose health risks not only for humans but also for animals. The risks of communicable and non-communicable disease are rising along with all the other risks associated with climate change. The coronavirus outbreak is not the end of this story. Time to embrace the One-health approach proposed years ago by the World Health Organization: https://www.who.int/features/qa/one-health/en/
2
The situation debunks the myth of „the free(unrestrained) market can do it all!“
You can‘t have it all : take the Trump policies of taking away all restrictions to money and the markets, all costs of opportunity to provide for a safe marketplace, and enjoy the stock rallying and at the same time expecting the control of natural desaster by expertise and professionalism you just complained about being to costly or needless.
I‘m sure the traders know about that, the financial sector being one of the most effective and intense in information gathering and processing.
Wallstreet doesn‘t have the tools to restrict itself, it has to perform regardless what the given environment is!
For Trump this is all a firework - you can only use it once.
Everything he touches dies! Literally!
We need a profound medical response to the epidemic. But don‘t expect it to come from Trump. His base is in Stockholm sydrome
2
Well tell it to the suppliers that are pulling back their technicians and engineers to home country headquarters. Tell it to the Barcelona hotel where I am staying that has a 10% occupancy.
At some point the breakfast staff will have to go - since there are no customers for it - or the hoteliers will take a hit to the bottom line. Pain that will assuredly be shared.
So business by business, town by town, state by state, this problem will grow. Panic aside, with Covid 19 mortality rates of between 2.3 & 4 % - and much higher within subsets of the population, it ain't no seasonal flu with a 0.1% mortality rate.
But of course, it is all a left wing Democratic plot to tank the market in Trumpolandia.
9
More emphasis has to be given to the difference between short and long term effects of both the pandemia and the markets. Panic is a short-term reaction that can have bad long-term effects.
Spending in preventing the spread of the virus may be a better long term economic policy than the short-term policy of cutting interest rates. The reaction of the markets points more towards the lack of presence of the government to deal with the pandemia than to the pandemia itself.
3
Pharmaceutical companies and Trump can save the markets.
Once the existing drug testing in China is completed & if the results are positive, then the markets will recover soon of the lost territory. Or we can wait till early next year when the vaccine comes to the market.
Or president Trump can cancel all the tariffs from Chinese imports & Xi Jinping does the same and also fulfill its promise purchasing more US goods & services, then markets will roaring back in force.
Of course, FED rate is another matter. But we don't want to go to much lower rate. It will be bad for the future economy for a long time.
On the one hand, trump says there is "nothing to see here"...."not to worry".
On the other hand, he is proposing a tax cut to deal with the fallout of the effects of the virus, so there must be something there.
In either case, Mother Nature does not care. She cares not about trump, or the Markets.
1
The republican solution to any and every problem seems to be another tax cut.
4
If the common flu is a bigger risk to the health of Americans, why the over reaction to the Coronavirus?
It’s due to the ease with which it is spread and the longer time people carry it, especially the part where they show no symptoms.
1
@Boethius
Everyone has a good idea that they will feel like dog droppings for a few days then be on the mend with the flu. There is also a vaccine (rarely covers "this year's flu bug") and an anti-viral medication. Everyone who had the flu knows they have a very good chance of surviving another bout.
COVID-19 is an unknown.
1
I think people are freaking out because we have no legitimate leadership in the American government. Don't you find it concerning that the president of the United States lies all the time?
2
Voting Republican has become an activity analogous to watching an episode of Matlock with a tall glass of Metamucil: ordinary for the elderly, but a marker of eccentricity among the young.
With that in mind, as a Never-Trumper, I'm wishing that the coronavirus, with it's affinity for the elderly, has a nice long stay in this country, just in time for the 2020 elections.
2
I am no fan of Donald Trump, but I am beginning to wonder if he and that lapdog Mulvaney may actually be right (for once) when they accuse the media of intentional excessive hyperbole concerning coronavirus?
With the vast, vast majority of coronavirus cases presenting as a cold or the normal flu (and the severe cases seeming to hit hardest on the demographic that already suffers most in flu season) I now ask the question: "If the media had never uttered the word "coronavirus", would anyone have noticed the difference between this and a bad flu season"?
I fear the answer to my question will, in the long run, turn out to be "no".
I also wonder if the CDC and NIH folks want to hit back for the budget cuts that should not have happened?
But if the stats end up looking like nothing more than a bad flu season, the media will have to explain if its over-reaction was for politics and/or reader eyeballs. The medical community will have to explain if it was exacting payback for stupid budget cuts.
My sister (with her doctorate in nursing) is a pediatric nurse practitioner, who sees runny-nosed kids every day, and she thinks the hyperbole is very overblown.
Yelling "fire" in a crowded theater used to be considered a violation of public trust. Query: is it now just marketing?
2
What about the stock market? Are you going to blame investors for panicking?
Oh, that's right, Americans have to bow down to the wealthy.
2
If the coronavirus spreads throughout the U.S., as it is likely to do, and if it continues to be a major health concern for the next 8 months, we can expect Trump to stop calling it a hoax. It won't be because he cares about science or the thousands (millions?) of Americans affected. No, he'll embrace it as a national medical emergency and an excuse to cancel the 2020 elections. You see, it wouldn't be prudent for 130 million people all going to the polls and coughing and sneezing on each other.
Don't laugh. Trump will do it if he thinks he can get away with it.
2
It looks like COVID-19 is bound to spread all over the globe sooner or later. Tinkering with national economic measures (FED) or even preventive health measures (CDC) is a futile exercise. Now that communal transmission is confirmed and even recovering patients are getting reinfected, there is little hope to contain the virus.
If this reading of the available information is accurate, then governments and international organizations (WHO) are engaged in a great illusion. They're way behind the curve.
What to do?
Keep fingers crossed until a vaccine is developed. That alas is many months -or years- away.
The response we need is a fully-funded CDC. It is a travesty that the current administration proposes a substantial cut to their budget. The CDC is an important part of the health care ecosystem, along with health care professionals, and the NIH, who try to keep us healthy and safe every day. One need only look at their web site to get a broad sense of the potential threats that are out there.
The CDC, NIH, and other governmental agencies are an important part of a fabric of services that are (or were) enacted for the betterment of society. And I continue to be dismayed that this administration appears to be dismantling them aided and abetted by some of the people we apparently elected to represent our interests.
A fed cut and/or a middle class tax break is not what we need under these circumstances. We need competent professionals engaged in scientific research and we need an administration who believes in science and works with others to promote it.
8
Speaking of doctors, and I am one, is anyone listening that this virus may have been around for a long time? Meaning we have survived as a species with it amongst us and maybe we ought to consider the same proven advice for prevention, namely don’t go to work//in public while sick, wash your hands throughly, and seek medical attention when needed. By the way, how many other viruses are out there that we haven’t tested for yet? We cannot panic every time, but continue to mobilize resources and educate the public properly.
4
Doctors can't do it alone. It will take all of the health team from Nurses to technicians to first responders.
3
This is a virus that has been reported upon in the medical literature for quite some time. In fact, Gilead and others were already testing approved and experimental drugs against it for some time. There are several papers in the process of peer review that will provide information to the medical community and the public in a while. Secretary Azar made it clear the other day when he lied about being unaware of the socially transmitted case in the US that considerations about treating this virus have been deferred to the profit making interests of the pharmaceutical industry and their stockholders. Remember Donald Rumsfeld? Rich man. As will many of Trump, his GOP Party collaborators, and Azar himself be when partially effective treatment that will need to be taken lifelong to prevent symptomatic recurrence is “discovered” This is entirely about money.
2
Monetary policy a lingering topic but interest rates so low already mainly just chatter.
Locked here in China in one of hundreds of thousands of urban setting under confinement the only activity is seeking food on one side and supplying it, if possible, on the other.
And what does that mean for people needing income and none being earned in other sectors of the economy. Factories are not finding workers or supplies as needed.
Oh yes, supply chains the real meaning of globalization.
These are the larger questions that the Fed has no expected response. Interesting times while they last – and how long could that be?
Fiscal policy may find its way back to charm.
The current selfish and atomized system of health insurance is hindrance to develop a coordinated response to a contagion that is social in nature. The for profit and short term system of health insurance is inadequate to address the scale and far from individual problem we face. Medicare for all!
6
I am a Professor of Medical Genetics. Reading about the unexplained cases of coronavirus in the US and elsewhere raises the possibility that the Coronavirus was for a long time indigenous to humans where only recently a pathogenic variant or unknown co-factor. result in a flu. If true, asymptomatic carriers were for a long time present in the human population. The botomline-Covid-19 is essentially a flu with low mortality rates that may have went molecularly undiagnosed for a long time. Caution and 14 days quarantine of carriers are a good approach until a vaccine is at hand, but all the hype and economical panic may have much more dangerous consequences than the virus itself
..
12
The economic panic is only a displacement intrinsic to the stagnant growth and low investment in productive capital. The virus os only a metaphor for it. The deceleration in China can be making ill the global system of capital accumulation. Although the virus is real and need to be seriously considered. It is also a catalyst to a crisis that has been brewing for a while and manifested in tariffs, nationalist posturing etc.
3
@lieberma
Coincidental emergence as you suggest is highly unlikely.
Coronaviruses are not the same as the influenza viruses.
2
*metaphorical displacement of a problem in the political economy to the worries of viral contagion
Am I missing something--or is it Mr. Appelbaum? The value of stocks has been vastly inflated by massive borrowing from speculators and by corporations speculating on their own stocks. Once those stocks go South they'll be left holding piles of debt, even at present-day low interest rates. When the other shoe drops is when all Capitalism breaks loose.
4
After the last tax cut, having gone to the wealthiest, proved to be such a touchy topic that it's never mentioned by the GOP, there's been talk of another one, actually directed at the middle class. That seemed to be a non-starter but now it has resurfaced with the coronavirus and as we head towards the election. It will be framed as an emergency measure to jump-start the economy but would be nothing more than a blatant payoff, and a paltry one at that. Whatever their political leanings, nobody's mind will be swayed for the price of a box of Tide.
9
Trump can manipulate financial data, employment data, even weather data. But he can’t manipulate a microbe’s trajectory without science, something he has shown no interest in.
15
As an ICU specialist, it is with grim resignation that my unit, like other units all around the world, are preparing for the worst while hoping for the best.
If and when it hits, we expect the initial phase to be the worst... Like all viruses, COVID-19 will hit those most susceptible first, and accordingly both the severity of illness and the death rates will be higher among those patients infected early. Similarly, those exposed to high viral concentrations (I.e. unprotected healthcare workers) will also be affected to a greater degree and accordingly have a higher mortality rate. As those with predispositions to the virus either recover or die, and more stringent control methods take hold, the outbreak will subside somewhat until one day a vaccine becomes available. Then it will remain in the background as a sporadic cause of pneumonia.
Current advice is that the initial ‘crisis’ phase will last 20-24 weeks. During this time, critical care units can expect at least double the normal workload, while the workload on emergency departments and family practice clinics will likely triple. At least 20% of staff are expected to become sick themselves and thus be unavailable to staff the units for at least part of the surge period. Supply chains are struggling to meet demands at present and this will get worse. This is what we are preparing for. Keep Calm and Carry On.
54
But doctors are, like, educated and experienced professionals. As such, there’s no place for them in our current administration. The only thing that will save the markets from coronavirus will be new hires who’ve sworn fealty to Donald Trump.
4
Lower interest rates and more money will mean nothing if you’re struggling to breathe.
While a level of business is crucial to the functioning of any society, the most important task is the preservation of as many lives as possible.
7
No, Doctor, you can't save the markets from Trumpitiis. In fact, the effect of the coronavirus on the markets is only incidental. However, the effect of Trumpitis on the markets is manipulative and deliberate.
9
An opportunity for Mr. Bloomberg to spend some of his money on something other than himself and his bid for the presidency. Bloomberg could become a leader and sponsor COVID 19 vaccine development, PPE for first responders, more test kits for state and local health departments. He could put his money where his mouth is and respond to this brewing crisis as a private citizen.
15
@Lillie
"Bloomberg could become a leader and sponsor COVID 19 vaccine developmen"
So this is what our country has come to, so controlled and dominated by the rich that we have to rely a some rich people to decide whether or not to undertake critical action in a national emergency?
3
Corona virus is the talk of the town these days. There is so much hype & fear mongering... markets are crashing, there is talk about falling into recession
This is a virus related to common cold viruses & afflicts both humans & animals. Vast majority of patients have a rather mild illness with fever & other flu like symptoms & recover without any problems. A small percentage, mostly elderly with COPD, Chronic heart ailments & other chronic illnesses die. e mortality rate isis around 2-3%. By comparison, the mortality from Influenza is far higher.
So why do we need this very exaggerated response? Why can't we treat the very sick with supportive care & other conventional means. The patients with milder illness can be treated with rest, other symptomatic treatments like we do with flu.
I just fail to understand the Coronavirus hysteria!
1
@firoze javaid
Influenza mortality rate is about 0.1%. One in one thousand.
Covid-19 is well above that from the best data so far.
13
Here’s a great economic response to the corona virus: Put everyone who does’t have health insurance or Medicare, on Medicaid, and pay for it. Yes, cover immigrants, so everyone who needs it can get medical care.
In rural Kansas it would help keep medical infrastructure financially viable.
9
Vice President Pence to the rescue. Solid medical know-how.
13
Easing by the Fed is designed to get people out of their homes and into the workplace.
Contagious disease control centers around keeping people isolated from each other.
The Fed is without a doubt the wrong tool for the job.
7
Well, Pence and his prayers will take care of that.
8
"The best way to limit the economic impact of coronavirus is a strong public health response."
And a free market. Apparently a research firm in Israel had already been working to develop a "general use" vaccine and just happened to be working with another variant of the corona virus for testing:
https://www.newsweek.com/coronavirus-vaccine-weeks-away-being-developed-says-head-israeli-science-research-institute-1489694
1
@hm1342
Any new vaccine will have to undergo tests for efficacy and safety. Then be mass produced and distributed around the world. That will take months.
And, about half of the funds for the research came from the Israeli government.
Then why is your top headline at this very moment about the drop in stocks? "Our money is disappearing! Oh... and people are getting sick and dying."
3
Invoking war powers act to produce what? Any why the delay for testing kits and emergency supplies? To jack up the prices for Azar’s pharma buddies. It doesn’t take a genius to know that the role of a lobbyist is to make money for his clients. And now we have Senator McSally pushing “border security”. The virus started in China not Mexico. McSally is an embarrassment right up there with Fox News.
26
So I’m guessing now is a bad time to ask if we can please address the burn out and suicide crisis impacting physicians? Probably not. The next year or so make break the “healthcare” system entirely.
7
Sure. Even a truly health-savy Executive administration could only do so much to combat the spread of the corona virus. But there are simple things that a leader can do. For example, we know that frequent and vigorous hand-washing with soap and water is the most effective deterrent against the virus. Why doesn’t the President make a public health commercial in which we see him exiting a men’s restroom then going to a sink and washing his hands with soap and water, while he tells us that “washing your hands with soap and water is the most effective way to stay healthy. Make it a habit.”
1
Too much simple common sense for this group if incompetents and grifters.
17
Let’s be inspired by pox/flu parties. Go visit a sick friend. Get it over with early, before the rush.
3
Really? Everyone in my family gets virus induced asthma. There are a lot of people whose immune systems are compromised. More people getting sick will not protect them.
5
Before Trump was anywhere near being a candidate I watched coverage of him saying the vilest things about longtime residents within sight lines of his Scottish golf resort. He vowed to displace everyone and I think he did. I wonder if the people at his rallies know, or care, that he despises them? Do you understand that Trump and his henchmen don’t care how many of us die? He’ll lie about the numbers and having fired anyone who can count whose to contradict him. The only people who might object are those lying, disloyal socialists.
13
Know what? Democrats SHOULD be using the Trump’s bungled response in order to bring down this “President”. Trump does zero to instill confidence and does less to actually take care of uS citizens. As long as his optics are in place, his simpleton mind is content. What a cowardly, narcissistic, and deeply troubled man-child.
15
Trump voters need to wake up.
12
Instead of working on public health issues and preparedness on coronavirus, VP Pence spent Friday in West Palm Beach speaking to Club for Growth and probably seeking Trump-Pence campaign contributions. Trump-Pence do your job instead of braying about others like Trump calling coronavirus the new Democratic hoax. Pathetic.
56
Let' see. So far, Trump has: (1) blamed the coronavirus as a Chinese "plot" against him, (2) blamed it as a Democratic "plot" against him, (3) said it was nothing more dangerous than a cold, and (4) appointed the most inept person in the administration to oversee public health efforts. Have I missed anything?
And yet, Trump will, once again, turn to the Fed to "save him" from the disaster that will hit this country.
Trumpists, no one is blaming your "president" for this virus. But we are blaming him for his negligent, reckless "response" to the crisis. His lies have gotten him through three years of a disastrous presidency. But he cannot lie his way out of his incompetence on this one. Mike Pence as "Virus Czar"? Truly Kafkaesque.
The world markets aren't reacting as they have this week because they are run by ignorant, foolhardy people. They know this health crisis is real, and the only unknown remaining is the scope of it throughout the world.
In 2016, more than half us (and the majority of voters by some three million) saw Trump for the fraud that he is. Why the rest of you didn't is beyond me. Does his racism appeal to you that much, that you are willing to believe the basest of lies he makes?
Well, Trumpists, more of your "president's" lies are all you are going to get, should you or your family members come down with this illness. And now the rest of us must pay for your willful ignorance.
Thoughts and prayers.
95
Pence in control??!! For the COVID-19: This will get worse before it gets better , and the market may not recover , regardless of what Trump wants!
Note that Mulvaney now thinks that the American populace should just turn their TVs off. How callous can the Trumpists get??!!
11
Conservatives can't admit the a virus could change anything in what they called their politics.
4
Vote M4A to save the stock market!
Yes! Blind us with science!
1
Oh boy, here come the mandatory adult vaccine laws we've all been waiting for.
Earth to Trump Country: all he cares about himself and Wall Street
5
A timely reminder.
"Save the money!" is a dumb slogan when thee real danger is a very human illness.
2
This comment isn't off topic, it's viewing the problem at a different and far more fundamental scale.
---
As usual, economists & pols can't get fundamental.
The coronavirus / economy problem is but another symptom of our coding-to-environs mismatch, primarily monetary code, but legal & other codes too.
ie
“The rule of thumb is that the complexity of the organism has to match the complexity of the environment at all scales in order to increase the likelihood of survival.” Yaneer Bar-Yam — "Making Things Work"
From an earlier NYT article today: "...personal consumption is 68 percent of G.D.P.”
Exponentially accelerating complexity has rendered GDP as an archaic manner of measurement.
As the dominant, short-term drivers of evolution on Earth, humans have been creating vast global relationship structures — essentially doing multi-scale selection in-&-across Geo Eco Bio Cultural & Tech networks for centuries — with the world's dominant information processing mechanism or app — humans deploying monetary code.
Fail.
The app can't encode complex relationship-value information with exponential dynamics, in-and-across Geo Eco Bio Cultural & Tech networks.
The app's computation specs lack sufficient information processing Reach, Speed, Accuracy, Power & Creativity — All of which are fundaments of passing selection tests.
Exhibits A & B: Air & Water in Revolt
ie
The Sky & Ocean are being armed with weapons of mass extinction.
Verily, a flock of Black Swans coming home to roost!
2
The Trump sycophants are some of the most incompetent economic analysts ever assembled. TV analysts like Kudlow haven't a clue. Neither do PR men like Mnuchin. Lowering federal interest rates will do nothing to assist supply side industries being hampered by this pandemic. In contrast, it will slow the recovery by making products cost more. Trump is the most profoundly ignorant president in US history. His Cabinet is a menagerie of sycophant, clueless, incompetent clowns.
6
Shouldn't you shave your beard?
1
Coronavirus: China city awards $1,400 to patients who report ...www.businessinsider.com › coronavirus-china-hubei-qianjiang-city-re...
A city in China is offering an award of 10000 Yuan to encourage people to come in for testing and found to be infected with the virus.
May be Trump administration can offer either a monetary award, a coupon one can cash in for no income tax for 4 months to encourage "carriers" and infected individuals to come in and get tested.
1
Dare we hope for a National Health Service plan out of this ordeal?
8
Good to read that a member of the Editorial Board is speaking out.
Please Mr. Appelbaum, with the US facing a pandemic, which candidate has the temperament and ability to work with multiple healthcare professionals, and put the work first, not herself?
It's the candidate whose emotional and intellectual expertise has been demonstrated for years, Senator Elizabeth Warren.
We've seen the current president further dissemble under duress (and we've read the NYT article on how Senator Klobuchar treats her staff-not well at times), but who has consistently kept healthcare for all a goal, and kept her cool?
Please refocus your Editorial Board's candidate choice with the pandemic in mind.
It couldn't be a better path to choice.
2
It is critical to understand Donald Trump has no empathy.
Therefore, he is more interested in the release of Pence propaganda than critical health news to contain the virus.
He does not care how many people interact or die from COVID-19.
He cares only about re-election so he will not be prosecuted for his numerous crimes.
14
This member of the editorial board doesn't know doctors or the public health system. Most doctors treat patients one by one; they don't treat the public. It is departments of public health that tend to population based health and disease.
Public health institutions, with their several specialties of medical doctors, the Ph.D.'s, the epidemiologists, statisticians and other specialists who work in public health are beholden to federal, state and county governments for funding. You do know Trump has been cutting funds for the CDC, our premier public health institution, as he has been trimming off all expertise he doesn't understand (and that's a lot of experts). And Anthony Fauci, premier virologist at NIH, now has to have his comments to the public approved by Pence. OUCH! So I'd say it's only government that can build up or destroy our public health institutions that this editor would have save the markets.
And even if funded, public health measures that might reflect badly on Trump will be disallowed and heads will roll.
4
Has it ever even occurred to you that the lives and health of people and families might very well be more important than the stock market? Didn’t think so.
1
The Fed Can't put millions of Chinese workers back to work to build all those tiny parts the supply chain needs to build all those things you were buying for Christmas, and Now won't be able to get as they run out of the system.
Besides the fact that the market was in Bubble High near a pop target range and was going to correct soon anyway. This a Perfect time to do so, it hides the true nature of the bubble, pushes all the Blame onto something that's sorta kinda going on, yet might not be all the cause.
Trump just wants it up and up and up, and that is bad for the system really. The more nations closing themselves off, the More people out of work, the harder it will be to Grow, Duh!
Talking heads on TV and on the pages and comments will blame the wrong things, It is a global system, it can't take a worker shut down that is going on. Most americans Don't have millions in the stock market, Yet if your job depends on parts made in China, you already know the pinch is on. The Fed can't fix that. They could just hand you all 3 months salary to tide you over and that'd put you on steady ground.
1
And truly the best way to limit the political fallout from the Coronavirus is the same, a strong public health response, with care available to all at an affordable price.
I write this recovering from a really nasty flu bug, today being the first day my temp returned to normal. Not fair to get the flu shot and get the flu, but that is the world we live in.
If there is a strong outbreak in the US, there will be a lot of very angry people looking for someone to blame for the deaths of their loved ones, and believe me, while I was sick nothing was more important than getting better...thoughts and prayers just won't cut it.
And if Big Pharma and their lobbyists in the White House think the American people will let them gouge consumers terrified at the thought of their kids dying, that would bring out the mobs in a big way.
Hugh
5
Trump is much more concerned about how he is perceived than actually limiting the spread of this virus. Trump wants the stock market numbers up for his personal political reasons, so the feds do what he wants. To heck with how lowering interest rates could negatively effect the economy after the election
5
We have a bunch of simpletons in this administration who are CNBC junkies. All they want is an excuse to generate free speculation money whether through tax cuts or low interest rates.
This editorial is obviously correct, but you wouldn’t know it by all the baying for a rate cut. Don’t hold your breath for a more rational response to the virus threat.
3
Honestly, there is nothing good in this economy. It was a high market because of tax cuts for the wealthy and a lawless president, something that lets criminal corporations know they can be as criminal as they want, which had them confident they could make money. However, things will always change, and they have.
I actually see no real harm in a market adjustment. I know it pains the greedy, but they will still be rich, so all this whining is just rather annoying.
Does this not look like a plague sent from God to punish the money changers. Doesn't your God do those types of things. Oh, wait, the true God is money, isn't it.
Don't worry about the people, they like to suffer. That's why they like Trump, Bloomberg and Biden.
4
As long as the WH's first priority is salvaging Trump's re-election campaign (and not focusing on the health and well-being of the American people), this situation is NOT going to end well. Every message, motive, and maneuver that is delivered by Trump and his cronies will have to be checked, double checked, and triple checked to see if there is one shred of truth that will help people, or if we are being lied to over and over again to trick the American people into believing that Trump and his sycophants are on the case. We need real help and honesty here . . . and all we're getting are the lies and coverups of people pretending they know what they're doing while the cameras roll. Have Trump and his band of incompetents not yet realized that this crisis is NOT a reality TV plot twist???
1
The supply line from China has been cut due to a virus that is highly contagious and deadly for some. The stock market reacts. Trump blames the Democrats. Trump has dismantled all health and science but it’s the Democrats fault. Trump says he can get all these scientist and doctors back immediately. Had he left them in place working on infectious diseases we would not have to wait for answers.
4
I find our focus on the economic effect of Coronavirus to be disgusting and decadent.
1
Mother nature is boss. Cut your rates cut whatever you want. She will cut us down to size. She will cut our consumption and exploitation of her resources when she pleases and it looks like she’s flexing a muscle right now. Exploit and cut down the wild animals for your dubious claims to medical help as the Chinese do. And she will share a virus as a special gift to reciprocate. 
Each of us and our leaders could take a different course. And respect above all mother nature who is the source of life. And clean air clean water and a controlled consumption and replenishment will bring us back into balance. We have a long way to go
255
@Joan It started with the sale of sentient wild animals and meat eaters in China. Stop eating meat!
12
Working in Emergency Room for 27 years, knowing that every new strain and known and unknown virus in town would come thru the treatment door, I could depend on the CDC to offer reliable guidance and crucial information. I never waited for the Fed to respond. I never delayed emergency treatment until the next Fed Meeting or impromptu weekend conference call.
Medical emergencies do not respond to manipulation of the financial system. Stop looking for the wrong response in the wrong place. Isn't that an alternate definition of insanity.
Let the Fed talk. Let the Fed consult.....
If you want to get healthy and stay healthy,
ungag the CDC. Get the needed medical information out for the benefit of the American people.
Trust in our social institutions is waning. Don't accelerate this decline. Don't risk your health by asking for the Fed instead of the CDC to guide the needed response to COVID-19.
550
@George Knowles
We are watching yet again the decline of yet another classic Republican "plan" in the midst of yet another Republican debacle. Recall that the Great Depression followed on the heels of the Roaring Twenties. There is never anything new in History - only the same ideas that caused a previous economic debacle.
42
@George Knowles
Solution:
Congress should pass veto-proof legislation freeing the CDC from censorship by the Trump administration. The CDC must be free to plan, disseminate information, and do whatever is necessary to calm people, ensure rapid accurate diagnoses and effective care for those who need it. THIS IS IMPERATIVE!
75
@George Knowles
You didn’t mention the prayers of Mike Pence. If what he is going to do is pray for us, we ought to know the content of those prayers. Especially if they work.
25
If not for the markets, may be for the value of human lives, there needs to be a solution. It is sickening to read articles putting everything else above the human lives. There is an epidemic out there and the question should be will we survive and NOT what would happen to the stock market.
Yes, a competent response to COVID-19 would be the best economic medicine. The lack of faith in such a response is likely one reason the drop has been so precipitous.
Putting 14 people diagnosed with COVID-19 on the same plane as other Americans being brought home from the quarantined cruise ship made no sense. That was the result of Trump's State Dept. overruling the experts from CDC who said that was absolutely the wrong thing to do. The 14 should have remained quarantined and brought home later after the disease had run its course.
Why are there so few test kits? South Korea manufactured hundreds of thousands seemingly overnight and the US has less than a thousand. Priorities!
Why is the US not leading and helping to coordinate the international effort to slow the spread, give health researchers time to develop treatments and spread out the burden on health workers and facilities that need to care for those hardest hit? The US leading international anything is a joke under Trump and he specifically cut funding to Obama's National Security task force that kept contingency plans at the ready.
Why are state and local health officials leading the response? Because Federal agencies are crippled, led by a big pharma lobbyist Azar and a science-denier Pence, who are keeping the competent public health officials muzzled.
Trump wants the market to go up? Let the medical experts take over and throw as much money and resources at the problem as they need.
589
@Yojimbo
Wall Street should keep one thing top-of-mind when trying to factor in the quirky coronavirus: Mother Nature always bats last. And she bats 1000.
54
I would’ve stated it differently: doctors, the ones working in clinics, emergency rooms, private offices, urgent care centers and local health departments can unite and work together to help identify potential carriers and immediately test, isolate and treat those patients, which will in turn limit exposure to others in the community. We physicians have to keep up with latest news and disseminate the information via all the different social media platforms available and in person at community centers, churches, schools... we cannot just wait for chaos to ensue. We cannot rely on government officials. This is a public health crisis, all hands on deck!
126
@Linda Peds MD If I become ill and have reason to believe it's this, do you think I'd consider getting tested? How much does a test cost? $500? $1000? $3000? I'd never be able to afford it. I'd have to take my chances.
33
I live in China, we're still in lock down, but what's happening here, for better or worse, will never happen in America. The social control doesn't exist.
Here's what terrified me about America's prospects with this virus: a guy came back from China, and went to the hospital and got a quick swab check. He, like many Americans, didn't have great health insurance. The cost for a quick check was over 3,000 dollars.
Think about that much money, and the average American who *might* have the virus. If it's not covered, are they going to get checked? Answer: no.
The fact that we have so many millions of uninsured people, and the fact that a basic trip to even a clinic is so hugely expensive (oh, and for the cheap clinics, those will be the most crowded, and if you look at Wuhan, that's how the virus blew up - crowded clinics), many people will refuse to be detected or treated for economic reasons.
And that's how it spreads. America's broken health care system is not ready for this.
498
@David
"Here's what terrified me about America's prospects with this virus: a guy came back from China, and went to the hospital and got a quick swab check. He, like many Americans, didn't have great health insurance. The cost for a quick check was over 3,000 dollars."
There is no such thing as a quick swab test for the coronavirus. Public health departments are running the coronavirus show not health insurance companies, hospitals, or clinics (cheap or not). Stop trying to drum up fear based on false assumptions and speculation that too is how it spreads and it is highly irresponsible.
6
@David
I can't believe that under the circumstances anyone who thinks they may have the Coronavirus would be turned away from any hospital. They must be tested or they could become a "Typhoid Mary". The broken Health Care System will be addressed after the 2020 elections when we get a Democrat in office.
19
@David
Too bad "1/7 of our economy" is more important than saving lives!
23
Wow, the most logical action turns out to be the best one too.
If only politics worked like this!
1
This shouldn't need to be said, and the fact that it's so divergent from the administration's approach is scary.
Mr. Trump and his administration seem much more concerned about coronavirus messaging than pandemic prevention, more worried about the nation's stocks than its people, and worst of all put reelection politics far, far, above fulfilling their responsibilities to the country and the world.
To misquote Donald Rumsfeld, you don't fight a pandemic with the president you want, but the president you have. The GOP in congress still wanted Donald Trump to be president even after he altered storm path data during a hurricane.
Completely aside from the impeachment, their party's actions and attitudes during the past three years are why the president we have is even more unequipped for this than when he was inaugurated.
302
@grennan
profound, concise summary of our current political status. It is good to hear it stated so simply and so accurately.
kudos
29
Mr Appelbaum sees the problem and the solution,the only reasonable solution.
Another outcome of the 1973 oil crisis was extremely high inflation caused by the effect reduced oil supply had on every aspect of our economy. After lowering interest rates to stimulate the sagging economy due to the oil shortage, suddenly the price of everything was being affected. Inflation became rampant.Although the prolonged oil shortage was the cause of the inflation, the only tool to fight inflation was to raise the interest rate. The pain this caused was unbelievable ,and had absolutely no effect on the price of oil. It did bring sectors of the domestic economy to a grinding halt.
2
Stock prices have already gotten over the corona virus. They're now going down because of margin calls to institutional money managers, and mutual fund redemptions by naive retail investors. The corona virus lit the fuse, but once the market starts to go, it will keep going.
Momentum is powerful, but it cuts both ways. Once everyone tries to sell, stocks go down, and more people try to sell. Only when everyone who wants out is out will the markets turn around.
In any case, it is not the job of the Fed to prop up the stock market. They should be looking out for the economy, and there is no indication that supply chain disruptions in China will hurt the US economy. Such disruptions may actually strengthen the economy, as re-onshoring becomes more attractive. What would hurt the US would be if consumers were afraid to leave the house to go to work or shop.
1
@Jonathan
Quite right about the Fed and the stock market. It's risky. The Fed should not protect investors from risk.
I think you are wrong about "re-onshoring". Let's see: Chinese supply is gone for a few months. I will instantaneously build a factory next to my assembly plant to make the parts I had been importing from China last month. Oops, that takes several months, so just as it gets finished, cheaper Chinese imports are once more available and my new factory is a costly white elephant.
11
America needs leadership of credible authority to tell us the truth. Properly qualified truth-tellers in the administration have been muzzled about COVID-19. Since we can't rely on the government we elect and pay for, we must turn to those elements of the media not tainted with a clear partisan bias.
We have nowhere else to turn when we elevate to positions of critical responsibility individuals who daily prove themselves to be utterly unfit to serve.
16
Cynical is correct that the Times got this wrong. Vaccine researchers, physicians, and public health workers are very different people and although sometimes the same person does both job. To say that we depend on doctors to provide a strong public health response is like saying that we need carpenters to fix that leaky pipe. If you can't get it right it detracts from your message.
2
I couldn't agree more.
During the mortgage related Financial Crisis of 2008-2009, the Fed addressed the specific issue of historically high private debt levels and volatility in capital asset prices.
By lowering rates to 0%, consumers and corporations were able to refinance debt and lower debt service levels.
Quantitative easing helped stabilized the price of Agency mortgages, and the Troubled Asset Relief Program provided capital to stop a default domino effect from creating generational destruction.
Basel III standards imposed worldwide raised asset quality and liquidity ratios on the banking system.
Monetary policy is a weak tool to use against a global pandemic.
Given interest rates are already negative and highly accommodative, there is a strong possibility of creating a liquidity trap, rendering monetary policy ineffective.
With a global pandemic like COVID-19, the ease of transmission will affect global supply chains, concerts and sporting events, community traveling and business meetings.
If employed, monetary policy might very well be shown to be an ineffectual agent to address the slowing the economy, causing investors, busineses and consumers to lose faith in the monetary tools of government.
Likewise, Trump has already created massive deficits to fuel anemic 2% growth.
More deficit spending and easy money may just cause panic and stagflation, instead of stabilizing markets.
27
If the virus had been contained there may be some point in accepting short term economic impacts globally.
As it stands it seems to be out and about. Some specialists are suggesting to just get used to the idea that it will be another long standing flu virus that will infect the whole population, notwithstanding a vaccine sometime in the next year or so.
The cure of containment, or minimising infection risk, in those circumstances seems worse than the disease, except for those that may die of course.
Regards the markets. They were overpriced anyway and a 10% correction now is better than a 20% correction later. The Fed would only be considering a cut now to "protect" the markets rather than the people.
2
Jonas Salk was working on the premise that tax cuts and prayer would eradicate polio when he stumbled on a vaccine.
164
Uncertainty is the enemy of value, so as a first order matter don't take a decline in the market as evidence of anything other than uncertainty.
As to second or third orders, Churchill rallied a nation against a bigger immediate threat by articulating the threat.
7
The only good thing that will come from this crisis is the end of Trump's political career. It could also spell the end of the GOP, but I doubt the Democrats have the self control to focus on the issues that gave us Trump. They have no real plans to address the asylum issue besides "open borders," and "spread the guilt." Meanwhile, many of our new immigrants make a living kidnapping each other's children and selling our children lethal drugs. They have no real plans to address the energy/climate change issues other than a ban on fracking and an end to nuclear power. The major players in the Democratic coalition would be at each other's throats if not for the current president who is at theirs'.
Wake me up when this is over.
1
This is an essay?
Completely slides over the question of building a public health infrastructure. Which is too bad, because that would make a good essay.
10
"Only Doctors Can Save the Markets From the Coronavirus"
Too bad the Dow 30,000 that trump surely covets escaped his grasp when it was so tantalizingly close. Since the emperor was solely responsible for the Dow's rise under his watch, he presumably has the power to reverse its precipitous fall. Coming soon: Dow 30,000 by executive order.
20:25 EST, 2/28
21
The federal government needs to be more involved with healthcare than they are currently. The other vested government interests, outside of the CDC, are Medicare and Medicaid.
We need price controls on drugs and other spiraling healthcare costs. We need to know way before a virus hits our shore what the plan of action is - and, it should be a practiced plan.
We need Universal Healthcare, but more importantly, we need federal universal healthcare policies for how to care for the young, elderly, working class and immigrants. We shouldn’t have to fear and wonder about the people we ride the subway next to, see at the grocery store, or sit by in a movie theater.
19
When you have a government full of rich people whose healthcare is PAID BY TAXPAYERS and who fly in their own private planes and limos instead of using public transport or commercial airliners, they cannot possibly know or understand what is going on in the rest of the world.
116
@Larry L
It's not only that the rich people in government don't know or understand what's going on. They just don't care--as long as it doesn't touch their wallets.
21
We just need a Big Wall to keep out the Coronavirus! It’s always a great solution to any problem.
14
It is probably true that only a strong public health response will limit the spread of the virus and its consequent economic impact, but it is very hypothetical given that the Trump administration has decimated the CDC and other Federal agencies dedicated to the threat of pandemics.
25
No, the Fed should lower interest rates immediately. The damage the pandemic will reek on the world economy is inevitable but a interest rate cut will at least revive morale for a couple of weeks. It will take the better part of a year to work it's will but by the end, the Coronavirus will utterly reshape the world economy. Summers and Geithner kicked the can down the road in 2009; this is the end of the road.
This market is on its way down, down, down another 40-50% if the Chinese supply chains are not up and running within 45 days or so.
7
Given all the economic and financial flashing lights, the COVID-19 inspired correction is healthy, and will result in market appreciation from a more solid base. Coupling fiscal or monetary policy to the outbreak is simply pandering to those who will profit most from the continued stock bubble. It does nothing for Joe Average's wages or house payment. And it does nothing to resolve the actual medical emergency we may face.
27
What about using ICE - Immigration and Coronavirus Enforcement units? They can carry clubs and weapons to get the virus. Just a subtle shift in acronym meaning.
17
2800 dead from coronavirus worldwide to date. 18,000 dead from influenza this flu season in the US alone. So far, influenza is far more worrisome.
12
@Keith Colonna
COVID-19 has a mortality rate 20 times the flu.
The transmission rate of COVID-19 is similar to the 1918 Spanish Flu, which 27% of the global population caught and over 50 million people died.
Every continent around the world was impacted.
Since 1918, the world Is far more interconnected.
You do not understand the potential impact of COVID-19.
59
@David Parsons
Actually, the rate is much lower. About 80% of individuals have only minor symptoms and recover on their own. Others are asymptomatic even when they are carrier of the virus. We don't know the mortality and morbidity rate because we only know the numerator but not the denominator. But if 80% of those infected has little to no outward symptoms, and do not show up to get tested, they are not counted.
4
@Keith Colonna - And for the Average Joe, the response should be the same: cover sneezes and coughs, wash your hands, avoid crowds. avoid your co-workers if they look sick. Stay home if you feel sick.
Doctors cannot be the saviours you are relying on them to be without expert-driven, transparent, well-funded government policy and programs backing them up.
141
I call on all people to support scientific research and public health. Without partnerships between our scientists and medical professionals, there is nothing to offer our leadership (regardless of the flaws within the current administration).
48
Precisely! Easier money will not help one iota with little to nothing to buy.
28
Re : Fed Policy
Prices are set by supply and demand. Unless demand falls faster than supply, the result is a higher price -> inflation
Consider Iphones. It is increasingly likely that their supply will decrease as the epidemic spreads in China. Unless the PRC can keep it out of Zhengzhou - increasingly unlkely
In the latter case, unless American correspondingly cut down on the purchase of Iphones, I phone prices will rise.
That is we will see inflation . And on any other product or service whose supply chain is impacted . Unless coupled to a corresponding decrease in consumption. But basic consumption (food, medicine, transportation) is difficult to cut down
So the most likely result is inflation. And to dampen that, conventional monetary theory requires to INCREASE the interest rate, not to DECREASE it.
One could argue that conventional M.T. does not apply - it was formulated for sovereign Nations, not global supply chains. But the Fed has not used this argument - yet
Rather it seem to rely that on that if the Iphone supply falls then Apple will invest in building factories in the US (rather than say Singapore). In US case a lower interest rate will help to get a factory financed, but to find the money is the least of the problem (and besides US companies sit on hoards of cash). A much bigger problem is that too much of the knowledge has left the US - and it will take years to get it back
It seems very odd
8
Not having product to sell does not lead to price increases or inflation. You cant say you want $100 more for something you don't have to begin with. Also there is always a tipping point where price actually shuts down sales. Those long lines at the Iphone store are those people who just have to have the latest gadget. The vast majority will sit back and laugh at them for paying twice as much. Inflation wont start till the prices effect food,shelter. and fuel. Three things that a modern society cant do without. Who cares about getting a new Iphone when your kids are going hungry.
1
If people are worried about getting sick or if they will lose their jobs if their work lays people off due to lagging sales, they will be more likely NOT to purchase an optional luxury product like an iPhone. Raising prices would hurt sales right now.
Raising prices on essential goods would fuel panic and shortages causing more disruption and caution with what to spend your money on.
The markets are panicking because Trump and Pence are forcing us not to trust the CDC or other federal institutions by gagging them.
We have flawed data where nobody knows if the Coronavirus is already spreading in America (assume that it is). Trusting our data will calm the markets but our prideful idiots in the white house are shouting from bullhorns that anything you hear from the government right now is deceptive manipulation to keep them rich. Any real data that might slip through will be met with threats and retaliation.
So everyone is uncertain right now and purchasing the latest gadget has sunk on the list of priorities.
@LArs
"conventional monetary theory requires to INCREASE the interest rate, not to DECREASE it."
Conventional common sense requires one to ignore monetary problems during pandemics.
All healthcare workers are at high risk for contracting Coronavirus. If the virus spreads, office-based healthcare workers may refuse to see patients with flu-like symptoms and start dumping them on ERs. It’s worth planning for this eventuality.
30
Doctors may have little to do with this, except at the very end. The onus lies on scientists - immunologists, virologists, biochemists, chemists among others. These are the people who'll develop a vaccine and perhaps anti-viral medication. And they will do this at a fraction of the pay that doctors get to administer the medication once it's discovered and/or invented. They will do it with little or no fanfare. It's important to get vocations and terminology right, even for the Times.
140
@Cynical
My great uncle was an M.D. who was a microbiologist who
authored medical textbooks that are used in medical schools today, did a great deal of research testified and publishing before Congress, and was an attending at Mt.Sinai Hospital.
If he were alive today, he'd be one of the people working on the vaccine.
My uncle is not the only medical doctor who has been involved in groundbreaking research.I know a number of medical doctors who are top researchers.
The Times didn't get vocations and terminology wrong.
19
@DJS
yes, the Times did get it wrong. I've worked as a physician and a public health worker on epidemics and the 2 jobs are very different.
6
@DJS
Like the Times, you did too. He probably be working on the vaccine as a scientist. MD's prescribe medicine. If you'd read the note carefully, it didn't specify qualifications.
There are some diseases that can be gotten from a carrier. I wonder if Coronavirus is one them. That might explain the patient in Sacramento. Then there is the incubation period to take into consideration. This is very serious and no one should be flippant. Also, a miracle is not going to make it go away.
34
@Sari They have already determined that some people are a 'Typhoid Mary' type. If this gets away from them, the only thing to do will be to shut down the country like China did. Once that happens you can kiss the economy goodbye. If we all have to sit home for 30-45 days It is going to get ugly. Rule of law will be tested. I don't think Trump knows what is coming. The USA is either going to very lucky or be tested very hard.
4
Misguided editorial. Expected more from him. Anthony Fauci, director of NIAID and the head of the CDC have been muzzled by the administration. Doctors are not in control.
Governments are massively overreacting. The mortality rate is lower than expected. It will spread and then remain in seasonal steady states just like H1N1 (now everywhere in the US) and chikungunya in Asia. Eventually we will modify our flu to include new coronavirus antigens. The markets will calm. This is the time to buy more stocks.
9
I think the issue is people are still in containment thinking- images of people in hazmat suits are hardly comforting- rather then simply accepting this new virus as another seasonal ailment with a fatality rate likely to drop further...
1
@TM
You were unable to understand his point. The NIAID and CDC are also doctors. He was generalizing, perhaps he should have said medicine vs. bolstering the stock market, or named every single kind of doctors including researchers.
1
I understood it but the article lacked specifics or any depth. He should have called out the administration for the muzzling and tied this to their general unwillingness to bring scientists into areas of policy.
"The best way to limit the economic impact of the coronavirus is not to lower interest rates but to limit the number of Americans who contract the disease"
Finally, a sane and sensible article about this issue!!
Just today morning I read that the Fed is standing by, ready to cut interest rates, and I'm wondering what are these people thinking. Businesses are suffering because people are afraid to venture out because of the virus. Does anyone seriously think that a price cut or rate cut is going to entice people to do so?
"The coronavirus is out there, but yay the price dropped by 10%," said no one ever!
129
Excellent analysis. Thank you, Mr. Appelbaum.
40
While other nations are focused on good communication and health measures, Trump cuts off the experts, accuses the media and democrats of causing panic, and frets about the stock market. Mulvaney floated the hoax idea and by next week they'll be on board with that --another overblown democratic hoax. I hope a lot of people don't die.
212
It will be interesting to see how covid19 will discriminate between Democrats and Republicans as it spreads in the U.S.
20
@Aweesker Teddy
You can bet that all those experts on FOX who are assuring us this is all overblown, will be phoning it in in a couple of weeks, or they'll be on a "previously scheduled hiatus".
10
@Tom J
Whenever I, a 30 plus years naturalized citizen of the US from "socialist" Europe, point out that quite a few other nations are functioning better than the US, e.g. healthcare, no mass murders by gun, etc., etc., the oh-so-charming right wingers tell me: "If you don't like it here, why don't you go back to where came from".
The supposedly greatest and advanced country is seriously lagging behind most other nations as to the Coronavirus, with malfunctioning test kits, not even being able to make as many test kits as South Korea. while putting the anti-science Pence to control the possible pandemic.
20
One would hope with many of the best doctors on the planet that there has already been some coordination and consultation on how to deal with this potential crisis.
7
The stock market was clearly stretched and ripe for a correction. It was trading at close to 25 times trailing P/E, and historically high P/S ratios.
It is absolutely infuriating to watch the Fed repeatedly cave to pressure from wall street. Let the gamblers lose once in a while!
107
@MS
oh so agree!
9
@MS
Just like you I had been watching the P/E and comparing it to the pre-2008 crash P/E. When the virus news broke, that was it for me. At 29300 everything went to money market. Now I watch the landslide from a safe spot.
With minimum attention I beat the quants’ algorithms.
6
"It takes months for the effect of a change in the Fed’s benchmark rate to spread throughout the economy. By then, the coronavirus crisis could be in the rearview mirror."
The federal interest rate is already low. the economic pact is global, not local. t don't think you can expect Powell to work miracles.
I agree raising consumer confidence will depend totally on the administration. if they muzzle scientists to conform with the president's false happy talk, well, investors won't return to the markets no matter how badly trump wants it.
so, Mr. President, what's it going to be: transparency and concrete information, or denial?
62
"The best way to limit the economic impact of the coronavirus is not to lower interest rates but to limit the number of Americans who contract the disease, to nurse them back to health, to develop a vaccine, and to return life to normal as soon as possible."
No one has even suggested that lowering interest rates will dispense with the need to protect the public from the coronavirus. It will however provide encouragement to businesses to continue carry on business as usual and even expand while efforts to cure the sick and develop a vaccine are ongoing,
5
The Fed effectively neutered itself by giving into Trumps desire for a rate drop when they should have been considering, if not holding the line, a slight increase in rates. Where do they have to go?
No the coronavirus' effects on economies through the world is not going to be cured with monetary policy. But it would have been nice if the FED h actually had some strategies in reserve for that future time when a little boost might be of use.
14
Neither can Mike Pence or praying. As a displacement activity, lowering interest rates will make a few people very happy and rich, though. The nice thing about free markets: There're rarely free for anyone and someone will always make money off them at the expense of the rest of us.
22
Why not?, won't everybody go on a cruise or fly to China if the rates drop. Businesses already haven't been investing capital assets and why would they start during a recession. All a rate drop would do is subsidise to top 1% and create a bigger dislocation between the Stock Market and Main Street. If it drops rates, the Fed be confirming that it is willing to prop up this ponzi scheme at all costs. Get ready for rate cuts.
93
@Charles Pape
Funny how easily they are easily they are bullied to prop up stock prices, but not very interested in the economic condition of ordinary workers.
127
If the Fed were to intervene, not only would it be ineffective but also counterproductive. Hope they listen to this opinion piece.
42
@V Sangha Doubtful. Nowadays, the Fed has an audience...of one.
2
Agreed, they need to get on top of the public health aspects of this.
One other thought: the Fed's toolbox is pretty limited. Imagine how much more effective they could be if they could also make fine adjustments to the level of a universal basic income. One more reason to seriously consider Mr. Yang's flagship issue.
32
@M.
While that might be a better solution for the general problem of slow growth, it won’t help with the supply chain problem either.
4
Unfortunately like Greenspan's fed they wasted alot of ammunition on propping up the financial markets. In this crisis I hope that the Fed will help people and the economy not the financial markets. they need to work with other central banks to restore a feeling of normalcy to the world. They should be selling their longer dated maturities now.
8
"The best way to limit the economic impact of the coronavirus is not to lower interest rates but to limit the number of Americans who contract the disease".
Unfortunately that logical approach was forsaken when the trump administration decimated the Depts. of Homeland Security and HHS and abandoned science in general. They are now desperately scrambling not so much to help Americans, but to salvage trump's reelection chances. Sorry Mr. Dershowitz, those goals are not synonymous
259
@D. Ben Moshe
Still, DHS's connection with science is tenuous.
5