The U.S. economy never would have entered a recession at all this year if we’d only adopted what he calls the “25-cent solution,” says Brian Bethune, a teacher of economics at Tufts University and Boston College who won the Forecaster of the Month contest for September.
The U.S. is a different story. The country still can’t control the epidemic because some people and some government officials and agencies have been resistant to the proven measures: masks, social distancing, testing, tracking and isolation. The macroeconomy is the big-picture, top-down look, focused on economywide measures, such as gross domestic product, aggregate incomes, aggregate demand, and aggregate supply. Viewed through that lens, the economy seems to be in a classic V-shaped recovery, with the sharp decline of March and April followed by the sharp rebound of the summer and fall.
A K-shape describes this bifurcated economy, with one stroke of the K reaching for the sky while the other cannot seem to get off the ground. New systems had to be invented from scratch to provide grants and loans to millions of small businesses. Some of the existing infrastructure, such as the unemployment insurance system, was overwhelmed by sheer number of applications, like a 10-foot sea wall inundated by a 100-foot tsunami.
In the September contest, Bethune finished ahead of 44 competing forecasting teams. Bethune’s forecasts were among the 10 most accurate on five of the 10 indicators we track: housing starts, consumer price index, new home sales, the ISM manufacturing index, and the consumer confidence index.
‘Coulda, woulda, shoulda’. Everyone has 20/20 hindsight knob head.
AndreaT07472059 President Trump must arrest ALL science and economic eggheads, along with all teechers! That’ll show em who gets to make up what’s real!
I'm with him in theory but in March and April you could barely find a mask let alone for 25c, nor rubbing alcohol, or hand sanitizer. So I'm with him theoretically, but it doesn't track with what resources were actually easily available.
Pablum. CDC study said 70 percent of cases occurred in people who always or almost always wore masks