Your answer to the question will depend on your expectations about the progression of the pandemic over the next year. My rough expectations are that many states will begin to relax stay at home orders somewhere between mid-May and the beginning of June, but that lots of social distancing will continue for months, and there will probably be at least some regional lockdowns from new outbreaks after we relax. One way or another, there will continue to be new cases/deaths for many months, just with longer stretches where the numbers of new cases/deaths per day is flat, punctuated by smaller outbreaks with exponential growth. The ongoing background effect of all this will be sluggish economic recovery, both because of reduced demand (people are still staying home) and job losses. It may also cause some additional restructuring of the economy away from service jobs that require close social interactions?

But, I'm not really sure what that means, politically, even if it's close to correct.

Re: the election

How should I balance "it's the economy" takes (Poor economy; Trump should lose) against "rally around the leader" takes? For already committed partisans, I'm sure assessments of Trump's handling of the crisis will mostly just reflect their prior commitments. But for less committed, lower information, more disconnected voters, what would seem to matter is not really how much better/worse the outcome could be, but just the prevailing perception of it. If we seem to be headed towards ~80-100k deaths, is that perceived as better or worse? I have no idea.

On paper, it seems like Biden should be a favorite, and that's reflected in early polling data, but I feel like Biden in reality is a worse candidate than he appears on paper, and the polling reminds me of 2016 in that regard. But then, there will probably not be an equivalent to Comey and the email scandal. There's only the question of the quality of Biden's public performances and health (but then, I'm somewhat persuaded by anatta's takes that some of the narrative there is overblown).

That's two paragraphs to say I have no idea. What do you think I should think?

Re: globalization and immigration

Seems likely that this is an area where policy preferences will be shaped by fears about viral outbreaks in a way that wasn't true before? Will we see more people adopt nationalistic views about industrial policy, justified by arguments that we need supply chain redundancy to avoid the kinds of shortages (PPE in particular) that occurred due to the outbreak? Basically, will economic efficiency arguments lose ground to arguments about local resiliency in the face of global crises? Some interesting takes on the economics here, and here.

Additionally, will people be more xenophobic in general, and less supportive of immigration, trade, and so on? I think this would be a bad outcome, but it seems possible. See for example the note on export bans on medical equipment.

Re: tech in government

Probably lumping too much together. It's interesting to read posts on various forums about Canadians getting stimulus money direct deposits within days while the IRS warns us that paper checks for filers without direct deposit information available will take months. Some of these realities are certainly a result of intentional efforts to defund the IRS over the years, but my impression is that the federal government (and some states?) struggle with adopting new technology in general. It seems like an opportunity to try to fix some of these problems. There are also issues with SBA loans, but those might be more bureaucratic than technological, I'm not sure.

In any case, lots of us are used to various tech systems that make things like payments trivial and fast, or which would otherwise enable more effective responses to the crisis (e.g. systems for tracing and isolating). The political fight over the tax system is maybe intractable to the extent that the hobbling of the IRS is directly related to ideological commitments against taxes. But if millions of Americans who need relief come to view the technological ineptness of government as a big issue, will it become a salient political issue in the fall?

What else?

CDN's opinion

Election

I thought the latest poll shows Biden tied. Biden is a horrible candidate and with Covid 19 I see less folks showing up to vote. No way Republicans let mail in voting or anything different. In fact I see them trying to reduce polling locations. We all know the Trump voter will drive an hour to vote for Trump
I see Trump winning again unless the DNC kicks Biden to the curb though a strong VP might help as that person will be running the country before his term is over. No way Biden can do two terms

Globalization

Nothing changes. I saw one republican when asked about companies making more in America and the government subsidizing it. It was 50/50 but you knew he was a no as that will hurt profits and it is all about those profits

Tech in Govt

Yes you are correct about Canada If you applied Monday you have your $2000 within 3 days. Canada also did it better by giving $2000 a month for 4 months but only to those effected by Covid. The USA bailout is just plain stupid. Why you give money to folks that never lost their job and the amount you give isn't enough to help the ones that did. Though in Canada you needed to have registered or had direct deposit in the past. Though checks will not take that long.

I also think the world economy gets crushed. Possible depression and the effects of that will be more deaths from depression, addiction and crime How China does not pay in some way baffles me.

Unfortunately due to our dependence on China to support our neoliberal economies (which is a feature, not a bug, of Chinese geopolitical strategy) China will bully, blackmail and coerce the Western neoliberal elite class into doing nothing.

It is more likely the neoliberal elite governments (including the US if/when leadership changes hands) formally apologize to China for any negative rhetoric directed against them, than they apologize, take any responsibility or pay any reparations.

Education: This is going to be a big push to make online courses a significant part of universities that normally stay away from this, particularly over the summer. It's not going to go well. We will get more stoopider.

Yeah, I think there will definitely be a stronger push towards online classes.

I take one class every semester, I much prefer in person. I suspect you're right that quality suffers online but I'm not sure exactly where the equilibrium is.

I haven't really been keeping up so I have no idea what the average would be. The last poll I saw, from CNN, had Biden up 11.

You can guarantee that China won't be held to account if Biden is President.

As long as we are on the education subject, the entire economic model of higher education might come into question.

I can't imagine a lot of parents are going to be lining up to pay $60K/yr for their kids to take online classes from home. Also, I can't imagine this isn't going to dramatically affect enrollment of international students, who contribute a lot more $$/student than domestic students.

another question is what will be the long term geopolitical consequences of Covid-19? I think China is likely to be the big winner in all of this. America is trying to print its way out of this which will not be sustainable in the long run.

Automation & tech gets another boost in it's remorseless rise.

Virus research will get a boost

Something massive geopolitical is almost inevitable. China looks to be the obvious winner but these things do not simply run an obvious course

USA - who knows.

The EU may be be made or destroyed by this crises.

UK - unfathomable.

The unexpected is just about guaranteed.

In each country so much will pivot on how well they think their government did compared to everyone else.

Trump will sell off blaming China to get a trade deal that's exactly what we had before

https://lnyti.ms/3ceNp5H

I expect most of the Western world will take this approach. No one wants to be the leader that caused another depression/delayed recovery because of a tough on China approach.

On the flip side, "knowledge economy" jobs are going up in relative value, and those all need degrees.

Rich will get an even bigger share of the pie and will eat most of it.

yeah no. only fox news poll as them tied.. everywhere else has biden somewhere between +5 -> +11 that i've seen.

Couple possibilities here for US politics:

--I think this will be a net positive for socialized health and socialism in general in the US. People are going to know people going bankrupt from medical bills and potentially out of jobs for a long time with limited support from the government. Who knows how they would have reacted to this 10-20 years ago, but now that leftist politics are more prominent than they used to be, I think more will find them appealing as a solution

--Wont be as big, but I think you might also see a rise of statism in the USA. This depends on what our path forward in terms of COVID deaths is, but in the future scenario of a 2nd wave with 500k dead in the US and barely any damage in South Korea, I think we'll see a contingent that takes a look at this and says "govt not tracking my phone, freedom of assembly, maybe even freedom of speech are cool, but maybe not worth it if it makes the state ineffective in saving human lives". I doubt this will catch on too heavy, but maybe being a statist in the US in 5 years will be something like being a socialist here in 1990.

--I saw an interesting tweet this morning that the reactions by local governments could spark an increased faith in federalism. Seems very plausible. I don't know what this looks like on a tactical level

--Anyone who says they know how this will affect the election at this moment is a liar, if I could get +150 on either side I would snap take it

Are these in some tension? I guess it depends on how you think about statism. It seems like the biggest problem involved in supporting larger government and federalism is that states have far less flexibility with monetary and fiscal policy than the federal government does.

Yes very much so.

Think of this as a list of things I might bet on, in the same way I might bet both the Saints and the Ravens to win the Super Bowl next year. They're def negatively correlated.

In the long term, probably not much. It is a serious pandemic, but we've managed to forget some of the worst pandemics the world has ever seen after only a few years (smallpox, polio) after vaccine.

Local leaders will blame external institutions, as they almost invariably do. So we'll likely enter a more nationalistic era, and thus see some uptick conflicts. That could be bad, the last years have been a bit like the early 80s, where we almost managed to stumble into large-scale war a few times before we realized it was all rather silly.

The US election effects is a toss-up. From where I'm sitting and the perspective I hold, US media is not very good at accountability and generally plays softball with people in power. There has been a slight shift in this the last month or so, where the the tone has become more critical, but it is probably too late. Regardless the voter participation is very low and actual public opinion outside the voting bloc usually plays second fiddle to money and campaign propaganda.

I'm sure that there will be political consequences, particularly with respect to privacy and particularly in countries with cultures that place less value on privacy. But I suspect that people are overestimating what the long term impact on human behavior will be.

The list of non-technological developments that have significantly and permanently altered human behavior is quite short. We are creatures of habit and regression of human behavior to the mean is a real thing.

I read somewhere that veterinary scientists have been trying to make coronavirus vaccines for years in livestock, with very poor results. And they can take risks that you can't in humans to expedite the process.

This also lines up with reality we have never been able to make coronavirus vaccines in humans previously, with a narrative that we haven't really tried that hard because endemic coronaviruses are so mild and SARS and MERS resolved so quickly.

We should probably be a lot more skeptical than we are of our ability to make an effective vaccine and roll it out in the next 1-2 years.

I think that people who actually work on vaccine development are skeptical of the timeline. That said, as you noted, there has never been a development push that approaches what we are seeing now.

Lol held to account for what? And how?

One thing I guarantee will NOT happen is that the USA won't direct the billions and billions of dollars it wastes each year on military spending towards pandemic research and preparedness. Because why focus on the thing that actually is killing your citizens instead of the cool toys?

Shaking hands will become a thing of the past in everyday life. Only for high profile events like signing of treaties or contracts there will be ceremonial handshakes, possibly after ceremonial usage of sanitary wipes by the shakers.