Cats, charts, and politics
U.S. workers have failed to return to the office in greater numbers this month, frustrating hopes that the rollout of Covid-19 vaccines and falling infection rates would start to lure employees back and help revitalize city economies.
I'm just spitballing here, but maybe this is because the vast bulk of vaccinations have gone to people over age 65?
I bought a new chair a few months ago and it finally arrived last week. When we set it up, however, it looked lonely. So we hauled in the teal chair that had been exiled to the living room and set it up next to the new one. What I ended up with looks like a perfect set for an interview show:
All I need now are some good lights; professional microphones; a nice camera; interesting guests willing to come to Irvine; and some decent interviewing skills.
In other words, no interview YouTube channel for me. But if I ever change my mind, I'm all set.
Here’s the officially reported coronavirus death toll through February 13. The raw data from Johns Hopkins is here.
Wait. What's this? Lunchtime photos on a weekend?
Quite so. I was up all night on Friday, so I decided to putter around and look for pictures. Eventually I puttered into Santa Ana, and at the corner of 17th and Flower there was some kind of massive auto pileup. Judging from the number of ambulances and fire trucks clogging the street, it seems like several vehicles must have been involved, which is a little odd since it was 2 am. The streets were all pretty deserted.
Anyway, this gave me a chance to play cub photojournalist, so I did. Here are a few images of the aftermath.
Holy shit! I didn't bother googling the URL for my blog before I registered it, and it turns out that jabberwocking has an . . . unsavory definition:
I sure hope this is just some random addition to the Urban Dictionary, not actually a common use of this word.
As you've probably noticed, there's a row of social media sharing icons at the bottom of every post. Unfortunately, a reader wrote to tell me about a bug: The email icon didn't just email a single post, it emailed every post on the front page. Since the icons are generated by a plugin, there was nothing I could do to fix this.
So I rummaged around for a new plugin and ended up with the icons you now see below. From left to right, here's what they do:
These all seem to work fine. If you come across any bugs, please let me know.
We passed another grim milestone on Friday: it was our first day with more than 5,000 deaths reported. Here’s the officially reported coronavirus death toll through February 12. The raw data from Johns Hopkins is here.
Kamala Harris, vice president of the United States, says the pandemic has been brutal on women workers:
About 2.5 million women have lost their jobs or dropped out of the workforce during the pandemic. That’s enough to fill 40 football stadiums. This mass exodus of women from the workforce is a national emergency, and it demands a national solution. Job loss, small business closings and a lack of child care have created a perfect storm for women workers.
It's actually worse than that. The Reuters article she links to says that the 2.5 million figure is just for women who have dropped out of the labor force. What's more, it's wrong. According to BLS figures, the number of women who aren't in the labor force (i.e., not looking for jobs) has increased from 56.5 million before the pandemic to 59.6 million today. That's an increase of 3.1 million. Add in the increase in unemployment and you get a total of 5.2 million women who have lost their jobs.
Lots of men have lost their jobs too, but women have lost more. In particular, the number of women who have dropped out of the labor force is 700,000 more than it is for men. This is especially notable since fewer women than men worked outside the home to begin with.
I still wouldn't call this a "women's recession" or anything like that, but women have clearly been hit a little harder—and that's before you account for the fact that they've undoubtedly taken the brunt of additional childcare duties. Harris isn't really right to say that the Democratic coronavirus bill helps women any more than men, but it certainly helps everyone who's lost income since the pandemic started. That's why it needs to be passed quickly.
The weather has been pretty glorious around here lately, which means the cats are spending a lot of time in the backyard lounging in the sun. Hopper decided to zip up the tree onto our patio cover a couple of days ago where she spent some quality time rolling around. She's such a cutie pie.
The New York Times surveyed a group of pediatric infectious disease experts and their message was clear: It's OK to send kids back to school. But only if common-sense precautions are taken:
The 175 experts — mostly pediatricians focused on public health — largely agreed that it was safe enough for schools to be open to elementary students for full-time and in-person instruction now. Some said that was true even in communities where Covid-19 infections were widespread, as long as basic safety measures were taken. Most important, they said, were universal masking, physical distancing, adequate ventilation and avoidance of large group activities.
This is the part that bugs me: "adequate ventilation." What does that mean? How is it measured? Who decides if a classroom's ventilation is adequate? If a building is serviced by a commercial HVAC, that's fine. With little or no change, air conditioning systems will guarantee adequate ventilation. Unfortunately, a recent GAO study suggests that nearly half of all school districts have lots of classrooms with inadequate air conditioning systems:
And if a classroom doesn't have air conditioning at all? The EPA basically says you should open some windows and maybe use a few fans. There's not a lot more you can do.
But is that enough? It sure seems like we could use some quantitative guidance here.
POSTSCRIPT: It's also worth noting that although the pediatric experts believe COVID-19 transmission is minimal in classroom settings as long as precautions are taken, they also put a lot of weight on the negative effects of kids being out of school. To some extent, they're willing to accept a small amount of COVID-19 transmission as a price worth paying to get children back in their classes.