Welcome to my first email! Props to DG for the name "Almanac". Here's what I'm thinking about.

Lockdowns

I was really worried about COVID back when US cases were low double digits. Unfortunately, our governments here in the USA didn't do anything about it early enough, then once they finally got going, bungled their response for weeks.

It's now clear that we locked down too late.

The cat is out of the bag. And since we haven't made any progress on "test and trace," continued lockdowns are more or less useless.

This has become increasingly clear to me over the last month or so - the powers that be have no plan at all - but this podcast really sealed it for me.

Interestingly, I'm not sure it matters. As the data show, people make their own social distancing decisions irrespective of whether the government tells them to lockdown. Open Table data show that even where restaurants have been allowed to reopen, no one is going:

That said, bad laws are bad. At this rate, it won't be long until someone is shot by the cops for playing catch at the park. So since lockdowns aren't helping, we should end them.

Bad Laws, cont.

A black jogger was shot by white guys in Georgia. This is very bad.

The defense for the shooters hinges on "self defense" during a citizen's arrest gone horribly wrong.

Which begs the question: what does a citizen's arrest gone right look like? I can't think of one good reason to keep these stupid laws on the books.

Vaccines

I think we're never getting one. That's why you see stuff like this and this.

I'd put odds of a true vaccine in the next two years at 10%.

This means that the revealed strategy (no plan is, in its own way, a plan) is wave, lockdown, repeat. Forever?

I'm not sure how long I'll be participating in that, but I'm not ready to leave the house now. After all, if you thought staying home was a good idea in mid March (yay, "Flatten the Curve!"), it's surely more important now, given that we now have about 10,000x the active cases.

Maybe our solution looks like wearing masks, sheltering the vulnerable, and working to improve everyone else's ability to withstand the virus. Get in shape! I'm not the only one thinking this:

Balls and Strikes

In baseball, it's quite common for bad hitters to let a strike go by on the first pitch, then swing at a ball on the second.

The hitter is overcorrecting for the initial bad decision, thinking "I'm not going to make that mistake again."

That's what our governments have done with the lockdowns. They failed to do them when it mattered, so now they are doing them when it doesn't.

Another example: Trump and Congress are talking about a "Buy American" requirement for PPE purchases moving forward. Economists say it's a terrible idea, because we don't make enough PPE here.

But we would make enough if we had incentivized American manufacturing with a law like this years ago. We let a strike go by then (by not incentivizing critical manufacturing onshore), and now we're getting ready to swing at a ball.

Our Favorite Restaurants

Are probably going to close. Restaurants run on razor-thin margins in good times. These are not good times, and I don't think good times are coming back soon.

If they can survive, it will be as shells of their former selves. Many are prepared to do that, as evidenced by this proposal from 50+ SF restaurateurs. But even if their demands (which include dramatic and permanent rent cuts by their landlords) are met - they expect max occupancy to drop by over 70% and staff to be cut by 65%.

I hope they can pull it off, because I'm going to hate it if the only place to "eat out" (when I'm finally ready to) is Chili's.

Thanks for reading, see you next week!

Kit