It's time for a poll! How much do you think the world has been permanently changed by the pandemic? All of the items below are things that many people think will remain a permanent part of the landscape even after COVID-19 has ebbed into a nuisance rather than a crisis. How many do you agree about?
You can think of this any way you want, but FWIW, I would choose only items that I think are going to significantly change from their current trend. Working from home, for example, has been increasing slowly but steadily for years, so I would check that one only if I think it's going to settle in at several percentage points above its 2019 level and stay there in 2022 and beyond.
I don't think much will change. By the fall of 2022 a distant memory
Mask wearing for ordinary flu and colds
If the vaccines hadn't been developed so quickly, then yes.
Even the clear efficacy of mask wearing against colds and flu this year won't make any obvious difference unless something happens where we really have to keep wearing them at least a year longer.
In the past I always thought of mask wearing as kind of weird. I won’t think that way any more, In fact I’ll figure the person is smart/careful. I’d like to think I will continue wearing them during flu season, but I probably won’t. I’m already finding myself forgetting to put mine on when I get out of the car to go in the store.
Food delivery. I’ll still go to the grocery store but I’m more amenable to delivery now, particularly the premium grocery type. Previously I wouldn’t have bothered. I suppose there are others who feel this way.
Hand shaking. Maybe I just hope it doesn’t return. Never liked it.
The handshake won't make a departure, I'm afraid, based on my experience in China, where life has been back to 99% normal for months. I'd say if anything the handshake is less culturally prominent in Asia than in the West, so if the pandemic hasn't been able to kill it here, it won't kill it in the firm-handshake-loving USA. (I'd be happy to see it go, though).
And a look in the eye.
I really WANTED to vote for hand-shaking, but I know it won't go away, alas.
I do think Zoom meetings & mask wearing for colds & flu will be much more common in urban areas. People have become accustomed to seeing masks, and have enjoyed reduced colds and flu.
Wow, talk about destroying the planet and/or exploiting the underclass. Compared to walking to the grocery store, everyone either have their food trucked (or vanned, more likely) to their house or else some immigrant on a bicycle will have to bring it.
The alternative for most people is not walking to the grocery store, it is driving.
It's unlikely that N people all driving to the store is more efficient than one person delivering to N. (Though it could be, depending on how many other errands are folded into the grocery trip.)
Unclear what the "exploiting the underclass is about", that seems to be your hangup. One of the problems America faces is not enough jobs for those without the skills and disposition for office work. Grocery pickup and delivery is a nice fit for many of these people.
But of course you are all about the complaint, not about the solution. Today it's "exploiting the underclass"; tomorrow when robots take over grocery and delivery you'll be complaining about how these wonderful jobs are being taken away from the poor underclass. Same fscking pattern every time (cf coal mining. cf truck driving. cf manufacturing.)
What a strange, planet-destroying life that would be, driving to the grocery store.
Working from home, for example, has been increasing slowly but steadily for years, so I would check that one only if I think it's going to settle in at several percentage points above its 2019 level and stay there in 2022 and beyond.
I'd go even further than that: only check "working from home" if you think it's going to settle in at a higher level than it would have reached without the pandemic (it was increasing, after all).
Widescale working from home for years seemed like flying cars: it never really caught on despite the face that a lot of the necessary pieces have been in place for decades, and nearly all the critical pieces by the late 90s. Until it did start to catch on, that is: I had noticed a marked increase in working-from home starting around 2015 or so. It just seems like it started to become more common. I realize my observational anecdotes do not a trend make, so maybe I'm way off. But my perception is that finally (finally!) remote work was growing at a steady clip by the time the pandemic struck. And would certainly have continued to expand.
That second paragraph above is mine.
In the DC area government workers and contractor are still on maximum telework. My agency will be moving toward 40 percent of the staff being full time telework and 60 percent in the building based on viability of a job to be full time telework. All of Comptroller division will be full time telework. So of course I check the box for teleworking increasing.
A point of anecdata: my son's company president was adamantly opposed to work from home before the pandemic. He dragged his heels even into the pandemic, until keeping the office open became untenable at the end of March (in Boston). He believed that employees would slack off out of the office, and productivity would plummet. To his surprise, productivity has skyrocketed. Now they are looking at returning to the office only 20 to 40% of the time depending on role in the organization.
If his business is a harbinger, maybe some of the resulting excess office space could be turned to much needed residential space in Boston.
Here's the problem, I am already doing most of these and have been even before the pandemic.
Also, your list seems to be absolutist, all or nothing...it will be a while before I am entirely comfortable in a movie theater...also, streaming is pretty damned good. So no, movie theaters will not die....but I will be going much less frequently.
I will be doing some mandatory Zooming which I never did before, likewise Distant Learning,(I believe learning is best done in person, with others, but this will not be available).
Etc, etc...less of everything on your list....(except will not do food delivery ever, under any circumstances).
Best Wishes, Traveller
I hadn't been in a movie theater in years way before the pandemic. It's a crappy experience with bad food. So yes I think movie theaters will continue their death spiral.
Only crappy food at Regal.
The dine-in options at Marcus & AMC are pretty solid. (Big ups Zaffiro's.)
Also, always good cookies at Landmark.
Same here. For me it's the extreme loudness, the excessively long previews of upcoming movies before the movie we actually came to see and -- wait for it! -- the disappearance of the humble water fountain. Really? These guys are so greedy for couch change you can't even get a drink of water anymore unless you buy a ridiculously large, ridiculously expensive bottle of the stuff?
Count me out.
A big problem is that everyone has grown up watching TV with their family and talking out loud whenever they feel like it. Too many people continue this behavior at the theater.
If I can't pause the movie when I go to the bathroom and resume it three days later I don't want to see it.
I haven't been to a movie in a theater since 2009. It became ludicrously expensive and I'd rather just wait and pay 5$ to watch it on cable when it comes out there. If I'm going to spend money on a social activity dinner and drinks is more fun.
I answered WFH, zoom meetings, and telemedicine.
I don't think these things will completely replace their pre-pandemic counterparts, but I think economics is the boss. These things save companies money when partially (if not fully) implemented. They're going to stay.
Efficiency at all costs is king.
cmayo
I would bet that in the near future mask wearing will be categorized as not necessary, then it will become "dangerous" for people with breathing problems. The corporate makers of cough syrups, cold medicines and all the prescription drugs to fight cold and flu will want those "mild" illnesses to make a return
Big Vicks Energy.
See big tobacco
Next year it will be "people wearing masks who also have breathing problems are risking serious injury/illness."
Then when the republicans are in charge again it will be "You are no longer allowed to wear a mask in public."
You might have asked ppl to predict the scale of those measures. I think most will be scaled back completely while others may be scaled back 70-80%.
I definitely think carrying a mask with you will become routine for lots of people.
I imagine protocols requiring sick people to wear a mask could become standard throughout public transportation, airlines, and retailers.
I imagine protocols requiring sick people to wear a mask could become standard throughout public transportation, airlines, and retailers.
Required? How would that work? How would you implement a system "requiring" people to divulge that they're ill? If Americans refuse to adopt this kind of technology during the worst pandemic in a century, it's hard to imagine they'll take to it when things are back to normal.
That depends. Some places use head thermometers; if you have a fever, you'd be asked to put a mask on. Lots of people cough at some point; they'd automatically be asked to put on a mask. And of course, there's the simple question, "Are you currently feeling sick?" People will lie, but they can't hide symptoms from their neighbors who will out them.
Only changes I see are increased mask wearing during seasonal flu periods & less handshaking.
... What if the Plandemic wasn't Chinese biowar after all but actually Barack Obama's final step toward normalizing the terrorist fist bump?
TBH that sounds more like Michelle than Barack.
I plan on continuing to wear a mask. I had my healthiest year ever.
And the restaurant business will be lucky to get back to 80% by the end of 2022.
Did the Plandemic make is less lazy?
Fairly sure that everything listed will change in some degree, but that's not what the poll asked. Again, the problem with polls.
Exactly why Brexit passed.
Also why Bieber is popular.
Home schooling.
I think "Work from Home" will fade a bit, but it will be much more viable going forward as an option for a lot of working parents - at least in white collar office jobs (not so much blue collar ones).
We already know that education will be permanently impacted by it. It's quite likely there will neve be "Snow Days" again, now that they can simply shift students online.
Flight from cities will continue, and so, as a consequence, will use of mass transit, but mostly as a result of increased crime, not the pandemic. I haven't ridden the subway in over a year, and most of the people in my office are scared to do so.
Sorry, I meant "use of mass transit will continue to decline."
Maybe the office folks oughtta check the neighborhoods were the subway crime is. Mostly seems to be crappy areas. Most commuters from the Burbs take the Trains and travel from Penn or GCS and ride South or North. Not too different on those routes. 2/3 and 4/5 low crime between Flatbush snd 96th St. and my bet is you could extend that even further (Grand Army to 186?).
Exactly. It's fine if you're coming from the burbs and riding from the train station to someplace else in midtown, but people coming from Brooklyn or downtown don't feel good. Shootings in Times Square and assaults on the Upper West Side don't persuade people to live in the City. So the urban exodus will continue and use of 90% of the subway mileage will decline.
Telemedicine is probably here to stay. Now that the insurance companies and Medicare are on board with payment there's no reason to go back.
Food delivery (and takeout) probably gets a boost just because it has become convenient and common.
I don't think Work From Home is going to be above the 2019 trend line. Everyone I know (including me) is expecting to be forced back into the office at least for a while. Managers don't like it and for many workers it's not as great as they hoped it would be.
I doubt working from home 100% will become any more common, but I do think there will be greater allowance for working from home occasionally, even on some sort of regular weekly schedule-- maybe 2 WFH days and 3 in the office.
The results of this are going to be posted at some point, right?
I block google, can't see the form.
I expect most things to return to baseline.
- Remote work will stay high in my little bubble (Bay Area tech worker) - it suits the work, execs mostly don't want to see us anyway, and cube farms in San Francisco or Mountain View are quite expensive.
- I expect managers' culturally-ingrained control issues to mean most other industries revert to the mean over time.
- I think public transport is on a downward trend in general, and C19-related trends are not helping that.
- I suspect the death-of-cities stuff is way overblown, I think exits have been mainly two sets: young people who moved back home when the plague destroyed their city-life starts, and affluent people who likely just accelerated the move to the 'burbs for spawning and class-fit purposes. But I could be wrong; if I'm also wrong about remote work in other industries, there may be less need for a city phase in many careers.
On a personal note, I'm probably ending a 30 year run of urban dwelling. It isn't really because of the plague, although I can't say I'd be in the same place if I hadn't just spent a year alone in a very dense environment. Mostly, I'm just bored with doing tech work, finally, and I don't do good work when I'm bored. So I'm thinking of moving somewhere where I can afford a few thousand square feet for a workshop, to find out if I can make a living selling various nicely constructed, non-trash everyday things.
We fly to Asia on vacation fairly regularly. I always thought the people on the transpacific flight wearing masks were a bit weird. Now I will be one of them.
Handshaking is something that might notably decline. Who knows what some idiot has been doing with those death claws?
Just kind of waving politely is really the best move.
I picked Zoom instead of travel, and food delivery. But I chose food delivery only because it was closest to the thing I wished I could choose, which was remote ordering and pickup. I love that so many dining/takeout outfits now have their own app where you can order exactly what you want and then just walk in and pick it up without talking to anyone. I certainly hope that continues.