Register a SA Forums Account here!
JOINING THE SA FORUMS WILL REMOVE THIS BIG AD, THE ANNOYING UNDERLINED ADS, AND STUPID INTERSTITIAL ADS!!!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
 
  • Post
  • Reply
MiddleOne
Feb 17, 2011

thotsky posted:

It's flu.

It's not.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

BlankSystemDaemon
Mar 13, 2009




So one thing among the additional 40 billion kroner handout that I mentioned on the last page is that they're taking this proposal as an excuse to permanently get rid of the unemployment benefit (known as G-days) that companies are required to pay when they fire someone. No reason why, just that apparently they don't like paying it???

They're also expecting 90% of people people to draw out their saved up vacation days, which will add 55 billion kroner to the economy, according to their calculations.

PederP
Nov 20, 2009

D. Ebdrup posted:

So one thing among the additional 40 billion kroner handout that I mentioned on the last page is that they're taking this proposal as an excuse to permanently get rid of the unemployment benefit (known as G-days) that companies are required to pay when they fire someone. No reason why, just that apparently they don't like paying it???

They're also expecting 90% of people people to draw out their saved up vacation days, which will add 55 billion kroner to the economy, according to their calculations.

G-days are a hefty liquidity drain when doing mass layoffs. That's the entire point of this particular aspect of labor law. The idea is to prevent cynical firing of labor during times when demand is lower, and then re-hiring when demand picks up. It stabilizes the employment relationship by adding a tax on laying off someone.

Note that this only applies to blue collar jobs - white collar jobs (funktionærer) have different regulations, with long notice periods being used instead of a tax.

The government knows that there will be mass firings so they're removing the tax on firing, with the government taking on the expense. It's essentially a tax break for companies reducing their workforce. Strange considering the aid packages in general have been contingent on not laying off.

To be fair, G-days are kind of a relic, and are associated with a lot of paperwork and complicated rules. Simply removing them and compensating through direct taxation would be a net benefit for everyone. But I don't think right now is a good time. On the contrary.

There's also a special aspect regarding temp workers - they are entitled to 3 G-days. The temp agencies are all bleeding heavily right now, so thinking more about this, I think the removal of G-days is aimed at the temp agencies (Moment, Randstad, etc.)

PederP fucked around with this message at 17:53 on Apr 6, 2020

SplitSoul
Dec 31, 2000

Remember, we can't afford better welfare, where's the money going to come from, it should be financially worthwhile to get a job-- oh poo poo, here come dat corona whaddup, we just found a quarter of a trillion and worked out how to distribute it to the private sector and the banks in less than a week.

SplitSoul fucked around with this message at 18:44 on Apr 6, 2020

PederP
Nov 20, 2009

SplitSoul posted:

Remember, we can't afford better welfare, where's the money going to come from, it should be financially worthwhile to get a job-- oh poo poo, here come dat corona whaddup, we just found a quarter of a trillion and worked out how to distribute it to the private sector and the banks in less than a week.

What aid did the banks get? For once the aid hasn't been funneled through the financial system, but has given directly to small business owners. Also a lot of those quarter of a trillion are funny-money - posponement of tax deadlines, etc. The actual aid package is much smaller.

thotsky
Jun 7, 2005

hot to trot

Alright, it's a virus that, like flu, causes respiratory illness which, like flu, presents symptoms such as fever, coughing, shortness of breath, head and body aches and, like flu, can be mitigated by staying away from people who are sick, covering your mouth when coughing and sneezing and frequently washing your hands because, like flu, it can spread from person-to-person.

thotsky fucked around with this message at 20:11 on Apr 6, 2020

Potrzebie
Apr 6, 2010

I may not know what I'm talking about, but I sure love cops! ^^ Boy, but that boot is just yummy!
Lipstick Apathy

thotsky posted:

Alright, it's a virus that, like flu, causes repository illness

Yes, viral and bacterial infections of the upper and lower respiratory tract have symptoms and means of propagating in common. :bravo:

SplitSoul
Dec 31, 2000

Schools and daycares are opening on the 15th.

PederP posted:

What aid did the banks get?

Right, I glanced too quickly over the dividends thing, I'd assumed they were paying out aid money to shareholders. Oh well, give it a few months.

Zulily Zoetrope
Jun 1, 2011

Muldoon
It's wild to me that we have like a dozen different liberal think tanks all hemming and hawing about the value of a human life versus the economy, and not a single one of them will ever raise the obvious question of why we have an economic model built on human sacrifice, and whether it would be possible to have one that wasn't.

It's almost as if their stated function of presenting and exploring critical thoughts about economics does not represent their actual function, whatever that might be.

PederP
Nov 20, 2009

SplitSoul posted:

Schools and daycares are opening on the 15th.


Right, I glanced too quickly over the dividends thing, I'd assumed they were paying out aid money to shareholders. Oh well, give it a few months.

I don't think the banks are getting any aid money. The capital ratio requirements have been loosened, which can sort of be translated into money if they go out and buy their debt back, but that's a long-term investment, so I really doubt they'll do that.

I am actually somewhat worried that some banks are too exposed against corporate debt. Too many bankruptcies and it will be 2008 all over again - during a pandemic. That could mean a revert to a cash economy in the short term - not good for containing contagion. If Danske Bank crashes, the government would have no choice but to take it over and effectively run it as a state bank (pengeinstitut). That would have a rather interesting aftermath.

SplitSoul
Dec 31, 2000

Zulily Zoetrope posted:

It's wild to me that we have like a dozen different liberal think tanks all hemming and hawing about the value of a human life versus the economy, and not a single one of them will ever raise the obvious question of why we have an economic model built on human sacrifice, and whether it would be possible to have one that wasn't.

It's almost as if their stated function of presenting and exploring critical thoughts about economics does not represent their actual function, whatever that might be.

They are death cultists.

A Buttery Pastry
Sep 4, 2011

Delicious and Informative!
:3:

PederP posted:

Children are good at computers, I'm sure they'll do just fine operating industrial robots. They are also full of energy, so they can deliver packages and groceries. That should also help them blow off some steam, so they don't pester their parents so much about being bored.
Are children actually good at computers? My understanding is that they only know how to use iPads.

Azram Legion
Jan 23, 2005

Drunken Poet Glory

A Buttery Pastry posted:

Are children actually good at computers? My understanding is that they only know how to use iPads.

Well, if we are comparing them to adults in general, then yes, kids are very good at computers. Kids today grew up with them and have learned to use them for a variety of things, whereas a large part of the adult population have had to learn later in life, and usually for very specific purposes.

But really, for this Modest Proposal of putting the kids to work, the answer is to just design the control interfaces for the industrial robots to resemble online multiplayer games, and give them some social layers and leaderboards. Then they'll reach efficiency levels that no one above 20 could dream of.

THE BAR
Oct 20, 2011

You know what might look better on your nose?

Azram Legion posted:

Well, if we are comparing them to adults in general, then yes, kids are very good at computers. Kids today grew up with them and have learned to use them for a variety of things, whereas a large part of the adult population have had to learn later in life, and usually for very specific purposes.

But really, for this Modest Proposal of putting the kids to work, the answer is to just design the control interfaces for the industrial robots to resemble online multiplayer games, and give them some social layers and leaderboards. Then they'll reach efficiency levels that no one above 20 could dream of.

I read that as "no one above level 20", so intensive gamification must truly be the way.

Azram Legion
Jan 23, 2005

Drunken Poet Glory

THE BAR posted:

I read that as "no one above level 20", so intensive gamification must truly be the way.

This is all getting disturbingly close to describing a neo-liberal wet dream

BlankSystemDaemon
Mar 13, 2009




Azram Legion posted:

Well, if we are comparing them to adults in general, then yes, kids are very good at computers. Kids today grew up with them and have learned to use them for a variety of things, whereas a large part of the adult population have had to learn later in life, and usually for very specific purposes.

But really, for this Modest Proposal of putting the kids to work, the answer is to just design the control interfaces for the industrial robots to resemble online multiplayer games, and give them some social layers and leaderboards. Then they'll reach efficiency levels that no one above 20 could dream of.
That kids have basic intuition which lets them use an interface that's inherited most and thrown away some of its most intuitive parts doesn't make them good at computers.
Modern iOS is a lot less intuitive than Mac OS between 9 and 10.5, but has still borrowed some ideas while throwing away skeuomorphisms, depth, shadows, gradients, lines, and other things so that it is inherently less intuitive, as it now relies on some familiarity with the previous design.

Good at computers means you can troubleshoot your way to the root of a problem, which requires critical thinking - something that isn't taught in the vast majority of any type of school.

Azram Legion
Jan 23, 2005

Drunken Poet Glory

D. Ebdrup posted:

That kids have basic intuition which lets them use an interface that's inherited most and thrown away some of its most intuitive parts doesn't make them good at computers.
Modern iOS is a lot less intuitive than Mac OS between 9 and 10.5, but has still borrowed some ideas while throwing away skeuomorphisms, depth, shadows, gradients, lines, and other things so that it is inherently less intuitive, as it now relies on some familiarity with the previous design.

Good at computers means you can troubleshoot your way to the root of a problem, which requires critical thinking - something that isn't taught in the vast majority of any type of school.

You are talking about being an expert-or-above level user, while the sarcastic discussion I was responding to was talking about being a user level user. I get that the definition of being good at computers is something you are invested in, because you are good at computers, but that wasn't really what the point (of the joking back and forth) was.

More seriously though, if we are going to compare generations, then new generations are absolutely more generally technologically literate than previous generations because digital technologies are an integrated part of their lives. Sure, those of us that learned to use computers in the MS DOS days have a different understanding than someone who has "only" used modern OSes and applications, but there were incredibly few of us in those days, while almost every child now uses a computer for their schoolwork. You can say that they don't understand the systems they are interacting with in-depth, and that is absolutely true, but the generations we would be comparing them to didn't even interact with those systems. Every online gamer kid has an abstract understanding of what a server is, or what latency means, while a whole lot of their parents do not. Every kid heavily into Minecraft understands the interaction between a mod and the vanilla experience on an abstract level (and will talk about their favorite mods for hours if you let them).

Adding to that, at least in Denmark, a lot more kids learn about things like programming through school, because of national initiatives to teach kids computational thinking, or through organisations like Coding Pirates. I used to work with some of the researchers developing computational thinking curricula for Danish schools, and they specifically worked in both critical- and design-thinking learning, to address precisely what you are talking about. For my generation, we had one class, two hours a week for two years, in the school's antiquated computer room, where a teacher taught us WordPerfect while calling the Enter key the "Broken Arrow Key".

Edit: Sorry if it seems like I'm arguing from an overly invested position here, and coming in guns blazing. I've been taking care of my very wilful two-year-old daughter full-time and basically alone for the last three months, so I get a little intense when I finally get to interact with other adults over topics that I am interested in.

Azram Legion fucked around with this message at 00:14 on Apr 7, 2020

Mordaedil
Oct 25, 2007

Oh wow, cool. Good job.
So?
Grimey Drawer
This "kids today" was an argument used for my generation at 30 years old now. Kids during my growth had to learn how to program, while kids these days are just handed things that does everything for them and they need to look no deeper.

I'd argue it is harder for kids now then back then, but they have an advantage over the generation before mine.

MiddleOne
Feb 17, 2011

thotsky posted:

like flu, it can spread from person-to-person.

All viruses spread from person to person.

It's not a flu.



D. Ebdrup posted:

Good at computers means you can troubleshoot your way to the root of a problem, which requires critical thinking - something that isn't taught in the vast majority of any type of school.

I don't know about the rest of Scandinavia but in Sweden's case problem-solving is the core aspect of programming classes one to three.

MiddleOne fucked around with this message at 05:55 on Apr 7, 2020

A Buttery Pastry
Sep 4, 2011

Delicious and Informative!
:3:

Mordaedil posted:

This "kids today" was an argument used for my generation at 30 years old now. Kids during my growth had to learn how to program, while kids these days are just handed things that does everything for them and they need to look no deeper.

I'd argue it is harder for kids now then back then, but they have an advantage over the generation before mine.

Azram Legion posted:

You are talking about being an expert-or-above level user, while the sarcastic discussion I was responding to was talking about being a user level user. I get that the definition of being good at computers is something you are invested in, because you are good at computers, but that wasn't really what the point (of the joking back and forth) was.

More seriously though, if we are going to compare generations, then new generations are absolutely more generally technologically literate than previous generations because digital technologies are an integrated part of their lives. Sure, those of us that learned to use computers in the MS DOS days have a different understanding than someone who has "only" used modern OSes and applications, but there were incredibly few of us in those days, while almost every child now uses a computer for their schoolwork. You can say that they don't understand the systems they are interacting with in-depth, and that is absolutely true, but the generations we would be comparing them to didn't even interact with those systems. Every online gamer kid has an abstract understanding of what a server is, or what latency means, while a whole lot of their parents do not. Every kid heavily into Minecraft understands the interaction between a mod and the vanilla experience on an abstract level (and will talk about their favorite mods for hours if you let them).
I guess it might be a case of a widening of expertise, possibly at the cost of reducing the depth for the people who are really interested? Everyone gets introduced to sleek and easy to use modern OSes and applications, which give you an instinctual understanding of very basic computer poo poo, but don't encourage/allow you to really try to gently caress around and see what happens. This argument also seems to be heavily dependent on exactly how old you are. Like, you're probably in your late 30's, so you might have completely avoided the digitalization of education while growing up in a period where computers weren't ubiquitous enough that you'd expect kids to have a computer at home. For someone of Mordaedil's age on the other hand it would've been strange to not have one, and it would've been an expected part of how you did your schoolwork.

Azram Legion posted:

Well, if we are comparing them to adults in general, then yes, kids are very good at computers. Kids today grew up with them and have learned to use them for a variety of things, whereas a large part of the adult population have had to learn later in life, and usually for very specific purposes.

But really, for this Modest Proposal of putting the kids to work, the answer is to just design the control interfaces for the industrial robots to resemble online multiplayer games, and give them some social layers and leaderboards. Then they'll reach efficiency levels that no one above 20 could dream of.
Sure, if you're comparing them to adults in general, but I think people are more thinking the roughly-30 crowd who would've grown up with computers too, while being forced to troubleshoot all kinds of poo poo because computers hadn't yet been made quite as user friendly.

Cardiac
Aug 28, 2012

MiddleOne posted:

All viruses spread from person to person.

It's not a flu.




I don't know about the rest of Scandinavia but in Sweden's case problem-solving is the core aspect of programming classes one to three.

In actual good news:
https://twitter.com/OHaggstrom/status/1245793934447689729?s=20
People, from now on there is absolutely no excuse for not washing your hands, even after this pandemic have ended.

A Buttery Pastry posted:

I guess it might be a case of a widening of expertise, possibly at the cost of reducing the depth for the people who are really interested? Everyone gets introduced to sleek and easy to use modern OSes and applications, which give you an instinctual understanding of very basic computer poo poo, but don't encourage/allow you to really try to gently caress around and see what happens. This argument also seems to be heavily dependent on exactly how old you are. Like, you're probably in your late 30's, so you might have completely avoided the digitalization of education while growing up in a period where computers weren't ubiquitous enough that you'd expect kids to have a computer at home. For someone of Mordaedil's age on the other hand it would've been strange to not have one, and it would've been an expected part of how you did your schoolwork.

Sure, if you're comparing them to adults in general, but I think people are more thinking the roughly-30 crowd who would've grown up with computers too, while being forced to troubleshoot all kinds of poo poo because computers hadn't yet been made quite as user friendly.

Well, widening of expertise in one area, decrease in another area.
The number of younger people who can fix a car or build stuff is in all likelihood going down.
Also, the last 30 years if you were interested in a computer, there have been no issues getting access to one.
And while younger people are not afraid of computers, I question whether they actually know more about computers or want to know more.
It has never been easier, since a Raspberry costs 500 SEK and gives you enough of Linux experience to run away screaming to start with.

big scary monsters
Sep 2, 2011

-~Skullwave~-
If you want your kids to grow up to be computer janitors, Gentoo still exists and will run on most computers, games consoles and mobile devices. For a certain definition of "run".

Alternatively they might become Luddites who shudder in horror at the sight of a screen.

MiddleOne
Feb 17, 2011

Cardiac posted:

It has never been easier, since a Raspberry costs 500 SEK and gives you enough of Linux experience to run away screaming to start with.

Je suis Ubuntu

KozmoNaut
Apr 23, 2008

Happiness is a warm
Turbo Plasma Rifle


Modern distros are very easy to get into, but all of that ease of use also makes the underlying systems more opaque and obscure.

I run Ubuntu-based KDE Neon as my main OS, because it just works doesn't try to do weird fancy stuff, it's just there to provide a solid desktop OS.

But I am very well aware that I do not know the underlying nuts and bolts of it nearly as well as I did my old Debian and Gentoo installs.

big scary monsters posted:

If you want your kids to grow up to be computer janitors, Gentoo still exists and will run on most computers, games consoles and mobile devices. For a certain definition of "run".

"Here's an old 486 PC, a Linux From Scratch book and as many floppies as you need. You'll be let out again when you have working sound. Best of luck."

quote:

Alternatively they might become Luddites who shudder in horror at the sight of a screen.

Also acceptable.

KozmoNaut fucked around with this message at 08:19 on Apr 7, 2020

Alhazred
Feb 16, 2011




En virus-sikker åpning innebærer utstrakt bruk av smittevernsutstyr som masker og hansker, samt obligatoriske rutiner for renhold av offentlige rom. Både økonomiske og helsemessige tiltak må iverksettes slik at eldre og andre utsatte grupper skjermes. Barnehager og skoler bør kunne åpnes tidlig; de samfunnsøkonomiske kostnadene ved stengte barnehager og skoler er enorme, både fordi tiltakene er direkte skadelige for barna våre, men også fordi foreldre ikke kan jobbe. Dette forutsetter naturligvis at Helsemyndighetene kan tilby godt og sikkert beskyttelsesutstyr.
I'm sure wearing a loving hazmat suit won't impede my work at all. How about we wait until it's actually safe to reopen schools and kindergartens?

Azram Legion
Jan 23, 2005

Drunken Poet Glory

In Denmark, the message from our PM about opening up institutions next week is to ensure that the kids keep a safe distance from each other and their carers/teachers. You know, the thing that comes natural to almost no kids, and is emotionally damaging to smaller kids. It is unbelievably stupid.

My wife and I have already decided to keep our daughter home for a while longer, even if its wearing down my sanity and patience. It feels incredibly disrespectful to the people in her daycare (who are, after all, people that we trust a whole lot) to do otherwise, because of some economic calculations.

Azram Legion
Jan 23, 2005

Drunken Poet Glory

A Buttery Pastry posted:

Sure, if you're comparing them to adults in general, but I think people are more thinking the roughly-30 crowd who would've grown up with computers too, while being forced to troubleshoot all kinds of poo poo because computers hadn't yet been made quite as user friendly.

I think you've isolated the reason for the disagreement here, and I can absolutely understand that point of view better if we are comparing kids to millennials. I do think that some of the initiatives in Denmark will change this though, since they focus heavily on computational thinking and associated necessary skills, but it is still too early to really tell. And I guess my perspective on it is biased because I heard the idealistic visions of my colleagues, but haven't seen the actual outcomes in practice.

SplitSoul
Dec 31, 2000

Azram Legion posted:

In Denmark, the message from our PM about opening up institutions next week is to ensure that the kids keep a safe distance from each other and their carers/teachers. You know, the thing that comes natural to almost no kids, and is emotionally damaging to smaller kids. It is unbelievably stupid.

My wife and I have already decided to keep our daughter home for a while longer, even if its wearing down my sanity and patience. It feels incredibly disrespectful to the people in her daycare (who are, after all, people that we trust a whole lot) to do otherwise, because of some economic calculations.

My ex is pregnant and works in a nursery. The lack of personnel was already an appreciable threat to the children's safety before the pandemic, to the point where she was planning to change careers due to several close calls. I'm sure it will do absolute wonders that they now also have to set aside considerable time to cleaning toys and surfaces.

Alhazred
Feb 16, 2011




SplitSoul posted:

I'm sure it will do absolute wonders that they now also have to set aside considerable time to cleaning toys and surfaces.

We did that up until the lockdown and it is manageable. But I can't use social distancing with kids, I can talk to them about the importance of handwashing (we even have a handwashing song that drove me slowly insane because the every single kid that washed their hands wanted to sing it with me) but they will slip up, I can't use masks because that would freak them out and I will get in contact with bodily fluids no matter what I do. My work is already vulnerable to diseases, I don't need another risk factor. It is something that would affect me, if not physically then certainly mentally.

SplitSoul
Dec 31, 2000

Alhazred posted:

We did that up until the lockdown and it is manageable.

Danish nurseries and daycares are severely understaffed as a matter of policy. You can only encounter so many toddlers who narrowly avoided choking on their own vomit during naptime before it starts taking its toll. They simply cannot be expected to thoroughly clean poo poo while at the same time providing care, they could barely provide care as it was.

Fartbox
Apr 27, 2017
What's happening? Dri fu an only two? what is this?
Is this an avatar? I don't know rm dunk

As economies tank and people start losing jobs more and more, governments will not really have much choice but to attempt a return to "normal"

Azram Legion
Jan 23, 2005

Drunken Poet Glory

SplitSoul posted:

Danish nurseries and daycares are severely understaffed as a matter of policy. You can only encounter so many toddlers who narrowly avoided choking on their own vomit during naptime before it starts taking its toll. They simply cannot be expected to thoroughly clean poo poo while at the same time providing care, they could barely provide care as it was.

It is very important that kids get used to underfunded and understaffed institutions early in life, so they don't experience culture shock for every other stage of their lives!

A Buttery Pastry
Sep 4, 2011

Delicious and Informative!
:3:

SplitSoul posted:

My ex is pregnant and works in a nursery. The lack of personnel was already an appreciable threat to the children's safety before the pandemic, to the point where she was planning to change careers due to several close calls. I'm sure it will do absolute wonders that they now also have to set aside considerable time to cleaning toys and surfaces.

Alhazred posted:

We did that up until the lockdown and it is manageable. But I can't use social distancing with kids, I can talk to them about the importance of handwashing (we even have a handwashing song that drove me slowly insane because the every single kid that washed their hands wanted to sing it with me) but they will slip up, I can't use masks because that would freak them out and I will get in contact with bodily fluids no matter what I do. My work is already vulnerable to diseases, I don't need another risk factor. It is something that would affect me, if not physically then certainly mentally.
I think the answer to both these problems is to issue child-size PPE. No need to worry about kids spreading germs if they're hermetically sealed from the environment.

Azram Legion posted:

I think you've isolated the reason for the disagreement here, and I can absolutely understand that point of view better if we are comparing kids to millennials. I do think that some of the initiatives in Denmark will change this though, since they focus heavily on computational thinking and associated necessary skills, but it is still too early to really tell. And I guess my perspective on it is biased because I heard the idealistic visions of my colleagues, but haven't seen the actual outcomes in practice.
Yeah, if they're actually teaching the basics of computing then I could see the average kid having a significant leg up compared to any generation before them. Hopefully it won't end up becoming such a dominant approach to teaching problems that kids start thinking you have to formulate the problem/process/solution in such a way that a computer understands it though.

Fartbox posted:

As economies tank and people start losing jobs more and more, governments will not really have much choice but to attempt a return to "normal"
Only if their thinking is completely ossified around "market solutions" and poo poo. If you aren't afraid of intervention, investment, and paying people to just stay home, then you have a lot more levers to fiddle with before returning to normal. Like someone mentioned earlier, schools and public institutions being closed down makes for a perfect opportunity to do the kind of renovations that a lot those buildings need. Same for infrastructure - with fewer people commuting you might now have a chance to get work done in areas that would otherwise cause major disruption.

Obviously the above goes against a complete lockdown, but that kind of work does not exactly seem like the riskiest in terms of spreading disease, since you usually have way less people around than you would normally in these areas, plus masks and gloves aren't exactly unheard of in the first place. It's not a hairdresser or a clothes shop, where there's direct contact between multiple people or between multiple people through objects.

PederP
Nov 20, 2009

Fartbox posted:

As economies tank and people start losing jobs more and more, governments will not really have much choice but to attempt a return to "normal"

I disagree. Governments will have no choice but to starting adapting society to cope with the virus. That means fundamental changes to work life, healthcare, eldercare, childcare, education, social life, etc. Until we have an effective treatment there is no return to normal. Well-documented cases of virus "reaction/reinfection" in healthy individuals who were sick, recovered and tested negative. I expected this based on how China was reacting to the outbreak.

https://en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN20200406006751320?section=national/national

SplitSoul
Dec 31, 2000

A Buttery Pastry posted:

Obviously the above goes against a complete lockdown, but that kind of work does not exactly seem like the riskiest in terms of spreading disease, since you usually have way less people around than you would normally in these areas, plus masks and gloves aren't exactly unheard of in the first place.

Construction workers have been working in large numbers throughout the lockdown, as I understand it, but yeah.

teen witch
Oct 9, 2012

SplitSoul posted:

Construction workers have been working in large numbers throughout the lockdown, as I understand it, but yeah.

My boyfriend is a welder and l o l no shutdown for him at all.

PederP
Nov 20, 2009

SplitSoul posted:

Construction workers have been working in large numbers throughout the lockdown, as I understand it, but yeah.

The biggest infection risk for construction workers is lunch areas and sanitary facilities. Some of the latter are cauldron of pestilence during normal times, so authorities being slow on fixing this, is a big problem. Second problem is lunch - most construction workers don't give a gently caress about social distance rules, and if they do, their employer sure don't - if it costs any money at all. So they're often crowding together for lunch, sometimes passing through the unhygienic toilet and bath facilities beforehand. Many sites have a large number of resident EU workers who travel between countries on a weekly or bi-weekly basis (ie going back to Austria, France, Italy, Spain, etc for weekends and holidays).

They're by far the most ignored and exposed group in society at the moment. In general this pandemic is the most extreme example of health inequality since the industrial revolution - the working class is being exposed on a daily basis with little to no protection, while the middle and upper class are working from home or simply spending vacation days. Construction workers, agricultural workers, meat plant workers, retail staff, transport sector workers -

The working class are collectively scratching their their heads as media is filled with cries of "REOPENING WHEN!?!? I WANT HAIR DRESSERS, BROTHELS, THEATRES AND COCKTAIL BARS BACK!". The economy sure didn't shut down their labor supply. That's what makes this whole "think of the economy!" so laughable. Apart from a small and specific subset of the economy, the downturn isn't caused by the 'lockdown' - it's the result of asset bubbles bursting, export collapsing, tourism collapsing, advertisement collapsing and consumer confidence hitting rock bottom.

As mentioned before - reopening isn't the solution to keeping the economy afloat. Public investments are what we need. Focused efforts to establish public and/or private production of critical medical supplies, sanitary supplies and (healthcare) drugs. That's where export markets are going to be for a while anyway, along with machinery, agriculture, electronics, software and digital entertainment.

What we do not need is a disorganized and haphazard attempt at partial normalization and subsidies to corporations in sectors that might be gone for a long time. Help the workers laid off, help the self-employed businesses/cultural freelancers. But the corporations? The ones that are 'legal persons? Let them die if they're in the entertainment or tourism industries.

A Buttery Pastry
Sep 4, 2011

Delicious and Informative!
:3:

SplitSoul posted:

Construction workers have been working in large numbers throughout the lockdown, as I understand it, but yeah.
Yeah, it becomes more relevant as existing projects are finished while new construction is put on hold in an uncertain economy. The public sector has enough work that could be done that it could probably maintain employment on its own during a prolonged lockdown, in that sector of the economy at least, and the investments could end up paying for themselves in the medium and long term.

Basically, the idea would be to divide jobs according to two categories; importance and risk. Essential work obviously has to continue, so the risk factor is used to determine how much of an effort has to be put into keeping workers (and thus society) safe, while useful work (as in infrastructure and educational investment for example) can be opened up or closed down depending on the risk factors involved and the current status of the outbreak, while high-risk pure luxury work like hairdressers would just remain closed down. And that's working within the confines of essentially normal economics a few decades ago, hell you probably could do some stupid neoliberal bullshit version too if you absolutely had to. What absolutely won't work is throwing your hands in the air and saying "we tried" because our society hasn't faced a real challenge in decades.

PederP
Nov 20, 2009

A Buttery Pastry posted:

What absolutely won't work is throwing your hands in the air and saying "we tried" because our society hasn't faced a real challenge in decades.

Or even worse - doing like the crowd spearheaded by Lars Løkke are asking - returning to normal and pretending that casualties will be manageable. An increasing number of political and technocratic has-beens are adopting a "flubro" stance, demanding a return to normalcy. They're delusional beyond belief. A social democrat PM is lecturing them on how export-dependent our economy is.

It's not simply capitalist ruthlessness or social-liberal arrogance. They're in full denial about their ability to save the economy. The right side of parliament is disintegrating ideologically and morally. Only Søren Pape is clinging on to a semblance of sane behavior. The Azmongold clone they're passing off as Venstre's leader seems busy being constipated, and DF is flailing about trying and failing to find an immigrant angle on this.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

SplitSoul
Dec 31, 2000

I tried arguing with a guy who claims to be a doctor and is convinced that it's much less dangerous than the flu. Kind of relieved I don't live in Aalborg.

Edit:

Okay then.

https://www.sst.dk/-/media/Udgivels...3AB39A5960ED53A

quote:

Hvis man bor i husstand med en person med påvist COVID-19 må man gerne komme i skole eller på arbejde. Der opfordres dog til, at man i sådanne tilfælde er særligt opmærksom på at efterleve Sundhedsstyrelsens anbefalinger for adfærd samt være særligt opmærksom på symptomer på sygdom og bliver hjemme, hvis man får symptomer. Personer, der forlader husstanden, skal vaske hænder lige inden hjemmet forlades.

SplitSoul fucked around with this message at 18:31 on Apr 7, 2020

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
  • Post
  • Reply