Quote from: abarro81 on October 14, 2020, 09:56:21 amI'd largely defer to the economists on whether accepting mass unemployment is a wise idea, or whether it's better to borrow to attempt to mitigate it and avoid all the cascading impacts. No doubt they all disagree anyway. Clearly some things would be worth supporting for strategic reasons, in order to maintain expertise in certain areas.I always think of economists as ideologically driven mathematicians. They have a political view just like the rest of us, which explains why they band together in like minded think tanks, are funded by people who would benefit from their ideas, and are quoted by people who align with them politically because it lends a veneer of objectivity to their ideas, whatever their politics.
I'd largely defer to the economists on whether accepting mass unemployment is a wise idea, or whether it's better to borrow to attempt to mitigate it and avoid all the cascading impacts. No doubt they all disagree anyway. Clearly some things would be worth supporting for strategic reasons, in order to maintain expertise in certain areas.
If I remember my studies correctly unemployment being too low is considered a negative in some models/to some economists. Essentially if the rate goes below 5% (in the US?) then it can have negative effects on wage inflation and labour force productivity (pretty sure this is referred to as slack). I imagine that in the UK the rate is above this so its probably a none factor really
If the BMC were to end up in the position again of advising against people spending time recreating in the outdoors due to lockdown rules - either local or national - then IMO their advice should be resolutely defied, their whole management voted out at the earliest opportunity
Is this not the same train of thought Trump and his ilk used to debunk everything he doesn’t agree with. Fucking scientists and there environmental doom and gloom etc.
You could argue this if economics was a hard science, where you could make a hypothesis, run an experiment, collect data, write up, have it peer reviewed etc. But it isn’t. You can see this easily with politically driven research in harder sciences such as tobacco company funded research into smoking, or oil company funded research into climate change, it always gets debunked when the data is open to scrutiny.
Quote If the BMC were to end up in the position again of advising against people spending time recreating in the outdoors due to lockdown rules - either local or national - then IMO their advice should be resolutely defied, their whole management voted out at the earliest opportunityI've got a lot of sympathy with your position Pete but the BMC will continue to put more value on advice from actual legal experts on what is legal. And likewise you'll find the idea that you could vote them out for doing so would find surprisingly little support (though that's not to say you couldn't waste a lot of their time with such a campaign). If you feel your position is under-represented I'm sure the invite to the Covid committee would still be open.
Are we now getting into the hierarchy of scientists and which is more important.At what point does a science become a "hard" science and which has most value.
Quote from: gme on October 14, 2020, 01:07:53 pmAre we now getting into the hierarchy of scientists and which is more important.At what point does a science become a "hard" science and which has most value.Not at all, just pointing out that conflating Trumpesque climate change and biology denial with taking issues with economics is inaccurate. Covid doesn’t care who you vote for, nor does a rising sea level. Economics, and particularly the economics of govt spending, fiscal policy, corporate bailouts etc. I’d inherently political in a way that biology isn’t. What the ‘right’ answer is to an economic argument will largely depend on your political starting point.
I’m not sure this is entirely true. If day you want to look at the impact of a fiscal stimulus on output - which is an extremely hard thing to do - then the techniques and data are what they are. They present certain technical challenges and I’m not entirely sure there is a right wing or left wing way of approaching those problems.
I was aiming my discussion more following Barrows saying that we should ‘defer to economists’ about the best way to spend money (or not) to solve the issues around Covid.
If you take post 2010 austerity measures, a lot of economists thought they were a terrible idea and would lead to very low growth for years. Of course politicians, journalists and think tanks could find experts who said what they wanted to hear
No travel to wales from any UK hotspot. Just announced but which areas are classed as hotspots isn’t mentioned.
It's all moot if everyone's in a two week circuit breaker starting at half term...
Quote from: TobyD on October 13, 2020, 10:55:29 pmThe government needs to have the confidence to just say that some businesses and indeed industries will not survive a pandemic world. Travel is knackered, at least one more airline will go before Christmas I'd guess; I can't see theatres surviving and many if not all cinemas look like going the same way.That's the rhetoric of the fiscal Conservative, but it's tantamount to economic vandalism without funding in place to help these people. An extra 20 quid a week on universal credit is simply not going to cut it and is frankly insulting. What jobs are they supposed to go and get? Airily saying "they just won't survive" doesn't really suffice. 2/3 of minimum wage if you end up on the local furlough scheme is going to leave people going hungry. The government not supporting the arts and the numerous other industries affected is a political decision. There is no reason debt built up can't be treated as wartime debt and paid off over many years. Even some conservatives are beginning to argue this, but Sunak is a slave to fiscal conservatism in the face of all the evidence (see his recent conference speech). This might belong in the old "how to pay for the crisis" thread.
The government needs to have the confidence to just say that some businesses and indeed industries will not survive a pandemic world. Travel is knackered, at least one more airline will go before Christmas I'd guess; I can't see theatres surviving and many if not all cinemas look like going the same way.
Teestub saw the future by selling is NWB guidebook earlier in the week!
Very much UKB nomenclature and other 80s sites. Wasn’t something I had heated mentioned for years so I asked a group of 25 17/18 year olds last night and only two knew what it was. Ex boys brigade lads.
Quote from: tomtom on October 14, 2020, 05:00:44 pmTeestub saw the future by selling is NWB guidebook earlier in the week!You say that, but I think it’s still theoretically possible for me to drive from N Yorks to Gwynedd to go climbing! (Provided I don’t stop in any of the Covid wastelands I pass through!)