The COVID-19 pandemic

[tomh009]

So all community centres, arena's, pools, etc., will be closed in Kitchener, Cambridge, Waterloo and the townships until further notice.

I expect that cinema's, restaurants, fast-food and cafes to be closed before the end of next week, along with a ban on gatherings of over 10 people perhaps.

This is really really bad folks. Unsure what else to say. I imagine the next month or 2 is going to be really tough though.

I wouldn't be surprised to see the unemployment rate to spike to unseen levels -- like 20 or 30%.

I also believe the possibility of the US government collapsing completely, due to their financial health (its $22T debt).

We really need to look at what Italy is doing to figure out how we should do it. The have had a 3-week lock-down in a certain area, and only know is it stabilizing. I imagine for Canada, we should look at a 6 to 8 week lock-down. Nothing until May 1 or 14. I can't see any other way.

We played the last hockey of the year this afternoon, got in just before the arena shutdown. Oh well, first-world problems indeed.

There are unlikely to be major layoffs in manufacturing, resources or in white-collar work. The ones that will suffer the most will be service jobs, particularly in bars and restaurants. But those sectors aren't big enough to get us to a 20%+ unemployment rate. Retail and food/accommodation services in total count for about 15% of Canadian jobs, but even those will not go to zero. I do expect to see 10%+ in the short term, though.

The US financial situation is ridiculous but as long as people are willing to pay for US treasury bonds at very low interest rates (and they are indeed) there will be no collapse.

Italy, France, Spain are not really comparable, nor is New York City. In all four the virus spread out of control before the government took any serious action. Here we are taking concrete actions before the virus starts spreading like wildfire. How much that will help still remains to be seen. though.