Depending on how you count, the current home page of the Wall Street Journal has four or five Omicron stories taking up the top of the page. The LA Times has seven. The New York Times has eight or nine. And the Washington Post has an astonishing 12.
Maybe that's overdoing things a bit? Instead, let's take a look at the latest exciting economic news from the BEA. First off, Americans are continuing to spend lots of money:
Hooray for us! The economy is obviously continuing to do pretty well if everyone is spending a lot more than they did last year.
In other news from the BEA, here's how each state is doing on the economic growth front:
There's not really much of a pattern here aside from the northern Mountain States all doing pretty poorly. Hawaii is the growth champion at +6.0%, while New Hampshire and North Dakota bring up the rear at -3.3%. How is your state doing?
Inflating nicely, albeit unevenly per the per-state chart…
It's pretty weird that Oregon has a booming economy and a low covid death rate, yet our governor's the least popular in the nation. (She's term limited anyway.)
Maybe the Washington Post and NY Times are on to something with their Covid-19 preoccupation. At a glance, it looks like there’s a strong correlation between taking serious public heath measures, especially vaccinations, and economic recovery. And, equally, between Democrats and strong growth.
Today I agree . Not excessive to make that the overriding story today.
Just like in spring this year, when you saw total cases low but delta rising fast from initial low levels, people do just not understand how an exponential growth rate means and what it might imply.
And omicron is delta on speed re transmission rate . It really is remarkable.
I am still hopeful it will not be worst case but I am worried. Even if omicron is far less virulent.
Possible ( would not say likely but could be ) that peak infection per day could even be 10,000,000. With maybe 60,000,000 all infected at same time . Even if hospitalization rate is 1/10 of delta and death rate 1/20 ( which is VERY optomistic) , that is maybe 5000 deaths per day eventually and hospitals overwhelmed ( in fact hospitalizations cannot get that high - eventually it is stay home and live or die). And if only 1/3 of infected get sick that could be near 10% of workforce out sick at one time . What does that do to society. 10% of police home sick when they are needed most. Grocery stores closed due to lack of personnel or supplies.
This has a small potential of societal collapse some places . Not due to total infections and deaths but due to size at peak . And could be soon as two weeks .
Anything we can do now to help flatten that potential peak makes some sense.
But New Mexico! Where Governor MLG has been strongly for protective measures, regardless of their popularity. And Texas! Where "Hotwheels" Abbott has take a strong stand against public health.
I think to some extent the correlation stands. New Mexico is highly dependent on tourism, which has obviously declined significantly.
Texas is more interesting. I found several websites which allowed me to somewhat breakout vaccination rates by county which is imperfect for a lot of reasons but also seems to highlight the ongoing battle between the large cities and Abbot. He is certainly extracting some number of lives, chaos, and an overwhelmed health care system with his fight against vaccines and vaccine passports. But the vaccination rate in cities appears to be quite high (far from ideal but higher than one might imagine). No doubt it would be higher with less “freedom” from the unsurprisingly vaccinated governor and more mandates and vaccine passports but it’s basically the story of Texas turning purple if not blue—educated incomers from blue states combined with concentrations of educated Texans in big cities.
I have a job. I get paid. My economic growth continues unabated. Merry Christmas! Oh… and I ordered some stuff from Macy’s last Saturday and they arrived today. Just in time. And on sale too.
Hell, I ordered some stuff from Amazon on Monday and it got here today. Now I can carve the Xmas ham in style!
But you won't get the confirmation email until Friday. #seriesoftubes
Can we do red and green colors for the holidays...or silver and gold since this is economic data?
Maybe have so Joy to the World (no, the other one):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVcpKjXYa5c
Hospitalization has trended down in the weak. Excessive testing is creating a imaginary bump. Full of asymptomatic cases. But Delta fading is actually helping.
That would be great--but jumps in positivity means tests are lagging infections.
As for hospitalizations, we're looking at overlapping waves--delta is falling, omicron rising. But delta is still causing major problems in areas. We'll see how omicron affects hospitalizations in a couple of weeks. Omicron cases are really shooting up, but hospitalizations are expected to be only a fraction of the other variants.
Our health care system is fraying, so capacity and potential capacity is down. Hopefully, the Merck pills will help (Pfizer pills will take a while to ramp up).
Positivity is irrelevant. Testing just creates cases. Omicron inflates positivity.
golack
With Omicron positivity is CRITICAL
Not for this wave itself but for the next one.
No tests? No results. Asymptomatic cases are plentiful with Omicron
So when the next wave comes if you do NOT KNOW you cannot make the argument about post infection immunity holding or failing because you have no idea.
And THAT is the only the 2nd part of the argument.
mRna vaccines, now that they are developed, are relatively easy to tweak. Hard to produce but easy to design.
Post infection immunity CANNOT be tweaked UNLESS you get ill.
With Omicron that isn't such a big deal because symptoms are milder. Hell, the variant resides in the brochia not the lungs for the most part -which makes it easier to spread and less serious for the host.
But we are not STOPPING at Omicron - THAT is the problem.
I noodled around the world wide stats to see how Omicron stacked up against precious waves and saw something interesting.
In South Africa they had waves that last 30 days (I believe it was Beta) Then, 3 months AFTER that wave passed Delta took off but didn't peak as high as Beta did. Or Omicron, for that matter/
So what happened from Alpha, to Beta to Delta to Omicron? They are poorly vaccinated. Could it be that the post infection immunity folks got it wrong? This varies of course from country to country
But after they stated that previous infection performed WORSE after testing against Omicron than vaccines did, by ONLY 1% difference it became clear to many of us that Omicron was a totally different animal - which was then confirmed by Israel and the UK health ministries.
Another in tresting note is that in some countries the waves
Interesting note is that in some countries the waves resulted in very uneven severity outcomes which cannot be explained away. Delta was less severe in S Africa than in the UK for instance.
I am getting a little concerned that the spread of COVID has, and will go one unabated either in the human or animal population, and that the protections we THOUGHT we had either by vaccine or post in infection immunity decreases more so that we thought. and that the next wave may be stronger than Omicron.
We won't know for months, of course, but the Israeli situation seems to indicate they are planning on vaccinating whenever, and whomever they believe they NEED to, and their citizens gladly roll up their sleeves.
The speed in which Omciron is spreading is fascinating. It may kill itself off before Delta is eliminated altogether.
Keep your eyes open, This is NOT over
Just went to the grocery store to stock up before the wave gets too bad and risky..
And, dammit, I saw more people not complying with the mask mandate today there than I have since spring when vaccinated were allowed to be unmasked. Have been really good here most times. Usually I see nobody without a mask and never more than two or three and big majority wearing correctly and not under their nose .
Tonight 8 , I counted , people without masks or hanging around their neck, including a cashier!!!. And first time ever a said something - she had no mask and was coughing and sneezing without even covering her mouth. And got yelled at back accused of racism. She was black or mixed. What difference does that make ? Another black person defended me but I hate that sort of confrontation. Surprised myself that I said anything and it was just " could you please cover your mouth when you sneeze ".
Came home pessimistic and depressed. Seems many have just got so tired of this that they are giving up just when it really is needed most to keep trying at least for just a few weeks or so. And also have talked to too many friends and family who plan to go to both Xmas and new years eve parties unmasked of course..and only talked one out of going to one of them . And all I really requested was just to not go to one party a week after the first . So, if you do catch it at Xmas party , at least you are not being a super spreader exactly when you might be peak infectious .
This is going to get bad .
"Can boring economic statistics take your mind off Omicron?"
Yes, but not for long. Witness the other comments.
Hey Kevin Drum
Merry Christmas to you, Marian, Hilbert and Charlie. Take a couple of days off. You deserve it.
We are at historically low unemployment again
Markets are at all time highs
We are at peace
So YOU should be as well
Vog
OOh
One more thing
Don't want to impose travel restrictions? Not necessary?
Covid is taking care of it for you
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/12/23/united-delta-cancel-dozens-of-christmas-eve-flights-as-covid-hits-crews.html
United Airlines and Delta Air Lines canceled dozens of Christmas Eve flights as Covid hit crews.
“The nationwide spike in Omicron cases this week has had a direct impact on our flight crews and the people who run our operation,” United said in a statement on Thursday. “As a result, we’ve unfortunately had to cancel some flights and are notifying impacted customers in advance of them coming to the airport.”
United said it was trying to rebook travelers as possible.
Congratulation folks - you anti vaxers, anti regulatory idiots. Get in fights with flight attendents. Now they are sick and CAN'T fly you anywhere.
Skies aren't so "friendly" anymore, are they?
This is what I have been saying and worrying about .
Everyone is so focused only on how much hospitalizations and deaths there might be with omicron. Which of course is very important.
But a huge number of mild cases at same time making people take off work can have major social disruptions.
Vog points out airline here and hints might even be good as a sort of travel restriction.
But consider hospital staff . Say turns out that, even at peak , omicron wave hospitalization is only 75% of what it was last winter. So we can handle that with some stress .
Will not go over capacity remaining after non covid patients. Maybe were at 70% capacity without covid peak and covid added 20% so still have 10% margin and barely OK. But what if omicron mild cases force so many staff off work that capacity is reduced by 15%? Now over capacity.
Too many think of hospital capacity in terms of # of physical beds . But mostly not the main issue ..they can find some more beds and make room if necessary. The real limiting issue is staff.
I think that's right. This winter's wave is not going to be as bad as last year's, but we've also got less capacity in terms of personnel. Our local hospital system has lost about 10% of its workforce to a combination of exhaustion attrition and people leaving because they didn't want to get vaccinated. Good riddance in the latter case, but it still means things are stretched to the breaking point. People can't go on like this forever...
Based on protocols. Most would work if allowed.
Most enjoy the time off! Silly.
Don't want to work this Christmas? Call in sick. Enjoy your family time instead. Can't get a test to show it's just the sniffles. I want to encourage everyone to just call in sick for the next week! Take the New Year holiday off too! And really... those flying on Christmas Eve really are the worst people in the world, in my opinion.
I am embarrassed to say that I flew on Christmas Day one time back in the mid-1990's. The flight was delayed and I spent most of it in an airport with some really grumpy people. Never again.
Wasn't the KKKlay n' Cuck Show just touting those two airline CEOs who said unmasked flying should be the norm?
Dozens. Out of how many flights? I’ve seen one suggestion Delta has 5400 flights a day. Still sucks if it is your flight but it doesn’t begin to approach the level of travel restrictions.
rick-
Up to 300 flights cancelled as of 3 hours ago.
So, lets say you're leaving to go home today
With Omicron doubling every day it seems. What are your chances of getting home
Will there by 2400 flights cancelled by Sunday?
+3.3% but only because our brain damaged governor is afraid to fuck too much with Atlanta. The rest of the state hates us, but Atlanta is the only thing making the state balance sheet positive.
That, and over $2000 per Georgia resident of Federal spending over what was paid in Federal taxes.
https://rockinst.org/issue-areas/fiscal-analysis/balance-of-payments-portal/
PS I am a Connecticut taxpayer. You’re welcome.
The rest of the state hates us, but Atlanta is the only thing making the state balance sheet positive.
Yep. Greater ATL is something like 60% of Georgia's population and probably at least 75% of the state's GDP. In terms of economics, it isn't so much that Atlanta helps the "rest of the state" balance its books so much as there isn't much in the way of a "rest of the state" outside that huge metropolis. It's similar to Greater Boston's position in Massachusetts, Greater NYC's position in New York, Chicagoland's place in Illinois, Metro Seattle's position in Washington or (increasingly) even the London region's place in the UK.
& two of the drivers of Atlanta's unrelenting push to economic power were putting the CDC there, followed by Ted Turner starting FAKENEWS CNN*. Must really chafe even the Proudest of Bois in the Peach State.
*I always say, Rupert Murdoch could have done similar when starting FOXnews, Turner having shown a capable news outlet need not be located in shitlib crimeinfested hellhole JewYorkCity, but in reality, effete cultural aesthetes like the FOX crew would never deign to work for a Red State News Network hq'd in Jackson, MS, or Oklahoma City, or even Nashville. FOXnews denigrates the homos, heroin addicts, Haitians, et. al., that the municipal Democrat ( ( ( leadership ) ) ) is allowing/encouraging to ruin a once great city, but after the staff go home, they luxuriate in that "depravity".
True of most states with major urban centers -- cities carry the rest of the state while rural areas bitch and moan about how *they're* the ones who pay all these taxes to support those lazy, subway-riding city dwellers.
There's not really much of a pattern here aside from the northern Mountain States all doing pretty poorly.
It's very unlikely we'd ever see "much of a pattern" when we're only measuring annualized growth from the April-June quarter to the July-September quarter.
All the states with relatively lower growth -- except maybe Texas -- are all pretty heavily reliant on extraction industries, esp. oil and gas. Which is kind of weird, because those commodities are pretty expensive right now. Oh, well. I blame Biden.
Cornpo--... Brandon was a bad dude.
Question:
Is the state GDP compared to inflation in the COL within the state, or to the headline national inflation rate? Because the trend I'm noticing isn't so much mountain north, but "rural states mostly had low or negative growth"...
Rural states are the ones where the COL is more likely to have remained lower.
If we were looking at a longer time period, then sure national rate makes sense because eventually cost increases make their way through the whole country, but since we're looking at literally Q2 vs. Q3, and then at an annual rate...
OTOH, this hypothesis only holds true if inflation has a big impact on those growth rates. If it's negligible, well, then nevermind. But if using the headline national rate takes ND from -3.3% to, say, around 0%...
Part 2: is there even any kind of inflation data for states, beyond some vague measure of cost of living?
Oh and Kevin? Watch the cats for this:
And here we have Ohio State University
https://www.studyfinds.org/covid-19-infections-in-deer/?amp
Saying Covid - 3 variants of COVID have been identified in deer and the study suggests, without a lot of explanation that it could be transmitted to humans
{snip}
Prof. Bowman believes if deer function as a viral reservoir for COVID, it would result in one of two likely outcomes. First, COVID would mutate in deer, leading to the transmission of new strains to other species, including humans. Second, the virus could survive in deer unmutated while it simultaneously continues to evolve in humans.
At some point, when we don’t have immunity to the strains infecting deer, those variants would come spilling back into people. As for how COVID got into deer in the first place, study authors speculate that white-tailed deer were infected through contaminated water or another environmental pathway.
Previous studies have found that infections among cats and dogs have a link to human contact, contact with wildlife under human care, and encounters with free-ranging wildlife.
{snip}
Trump got vaccinated and BOOSTED. So did the jerks at FOX News. But every guest they have on their shows seems to spew the same post infection, herd immunity, and alternative treatment lunacy
Congratulations on your pandemic of butt hurt that Biden inflicted on your viewers Fox.
Fox won't even let you in their studio to spew anti-vax propaganda unless you are vaccinated. Mandates work.
Size the states in the map by Gross State Product.