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So that would need tax increases of around 70% just to balance the books with regard to covid.



Only if you disregard job losses. It would really be a lot higher than 70%. If, say, 25% of the tax take was lost due to job losses, then add on the more benefits that would need to be paid to those newly unemployed (as I can't be arsed checking for the real numbers, I'll assume another 10% of the original tax take - though I may be well out there) that would mean a rise of about 46% just to balance the books on redundancies, then add on the covid debt, which would equate to about 100% of the 75% left of the original tax take and you end up with a rise of about 140-150%. That's obviously if you want to balance things as quickly as possible. They would, no doubt, spread it over many many years and pay lots of interest on it (increasing the bill) and have everyone paying it for the next 50-100 years or so. Of course, by that time, everyone will be used to higher taxes and they would just continue at that rate.

It's not even taking into account that the average wage (and hence tax take at the current rate) will probably fall due to it being an employer's market.

Obviously, they numbers are just a guesstimate (I hate that word but I know others will too, so I used it [emoji38] ) but I would assume a low of 100% to a high of 200%.

Or maybe I'm totally wrong. I'll wait for Baz to give his opinion so I know what the facts are. [emoji38]
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The latest predictions from Imperial College.
I'm just drying out from last months prediction of 50,000 cases a day by October.
This shows areas that will become hotspots.......................although I'm ok as I'm not in any of these areas. [emoji38]
GIFRUY Covid.
1bff4130-0a40-11eb-bf7d-d244db43c18c&key=f1e0cb83956068edd8e9683c9cd1b589c63e216c14e4ba64d38b38784d0062e8


Yes you are, Killin is included in the maps [emoji6]
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21 hours ago, bazil85 said:

We don't make decisions to kill big volumes of the vulnerable population at this point. We continue work on a possible vaccination and the younger, fitter people suck it up and accept life isn't going to be so normal for the foreseeable.

We take the economic hit and spend money in the best way we can to sustain and support our communities including those impacted with other conditions both physically and mentally. We continue with give and take measures such as some pain in the hospitality sector (with them being supported) so that we can take some reasonable normalised steps with schools, education, children etc. 

If it comes to it in a year/ two years or so that a vaccine isn't forthcoming, then we have conversations as a population on the long-term approach we want to take.

Jesus the first cases were barely recorded by Valentines day and you're wanting death warrants signed before Halloween! We have more time before we nuclear option a large chunk of people in the world. 😪

OK ill bite. So far there have already been 3.5 million people left with no income or support due to covid and job losses. It may be a political decision, and maybe it shouldn't be that way but the reality is, that's what's happening. 

"some pain" in hospitality. I'm guessing you don't work in hospitality. There's currently more than some pain in the industry and it's getting worse by the day. 

Any gains the industry has made in working conditions over the past years will be absolutely gone when any normality comes back as people will be absolutely desperate for work and will work for peanuts just to pay a gas bill. 

 

People are being shafted already and the peak of unemployment and businesses closing hasn't hit yet. The set back will take years to fix in a best case scenario

Edited by slapsalmon
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Oh yes Fox news , the calamity of it . .. . . . .
 
But millions of people are going to die and you can catch bat plague from a counter or your friends and relatives :death
 
You would rather have something from British telliesvision, the BBC l fancy?
I would certainly like something from a more reliably independent source than Fox News but hey you believe whatever you want.
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2 hours ago, Bud the Baker said:

Up until now I've been broadly in support of the cautious strategy taken by the Scottish government but it hasn't worked and now I'm not so sure. My main worry is what happens if the current "mini circuit breaker" doesn't help - is there a Plan B?

At this stage uncertainty is certainly widespread.

Looking at numbers worldwide there's such a dramatic range it's hard to see where this could go.

There's certainly more countries managing this better than us, but a small amount of countries that are still producing massive numbers in deaths with South American countries having a hard time. 

The Belgians are pretty rubbish at controlling this, getting on for 50% more deaths per million than the UK. 

As for us, Scotland/UK, like you I can't see where this could go in the next few weeks/months as all the restrictions have only seen the cases continue to rise at an unbelievable rate. 

The UK, by some considerable margin, have tested MORE then any other European country, bar Russia. 

Could be a reason we are seeing the "cases" rising while the hospitals and mortuaries are still experiencing comparably low numbers? 

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3 hours ago, Bud the Baker said:

Up until now I've been broadly in support of the cautious strategy taken by the Scottish government but it hasn't worked and now I'm not so sure. My main worry is what happens if the current "mini circuit breaker" doesn't help - is there a Plan B?

It won't work, so the only way they will go is tougher restrictions - even though it still won't work, it is a strategy they are committed to.  

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6 hours ago, Bud the Baker said:

Up until now I've been broadly in support of the cautious strategy taken by the Scottish government but it hasn't worked and now I'm not so sure. My main worry is what happens if the current "mini circuit breaker" doesn't help - is there a Plan B?

Plan B has to be to acknowledge that there's nothing we can do to stop this virus doing what it wants, when it wants.

We've had lockdowns, mask wearing, businesses closed, people locked at home, social distancing and yet cases still rise the second this thing gets into it's "season".

It's nothing to do with "selfish bastards not obeying the rules" either IMO. It's just a VERY contagious virus. The reason for the low deaths is that the lowest hanging fruit (80+) has already been hit (approx. 1.5% fatality rate) and almost nobody from the remaining population is now dying or needing hospital treatment. Where people are still dying or requiring intensive care, you'll still be seeing those with underlying conditions.

The big problem is the mentality. We are so used to being able to fix almost every problem which comes our way that we are struggling with the idea that this virus may be unfixable. I'm not including the genuine scientists who are trying to find a vaccine or to understand how the virus works. I'm talking about the fake scientists who simply f**k about with "human behaviours", the politicians who get moist just listening to them and the general population who don't know about any of this. We haven't found an effective curefor the common cold or the flu so what on earth makes people believe we're going to unearth a magical cure for this new flu virus overnight?

At some stage it'll sink in to them that you can have all the safety measures you like but the second you enter a supermarket or go indoors where other people are, you are going to see it come back.

We can't live in fear of this thing. IMO we need to just get on with life. People will die. It's inevitable and all the denial in the world won't stop it.

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41 minutes ago, oaksoft said:

Plan B has to be to acknowledge that there's nothing we can do to stop this virus doing what it wants, when it wants.

We've had lockdowns, mask wearing, businesses closed, people locked at home, social distancing and yet cases still rise the second this thing gets into it's "season".

It's nothing to do with "selfish bastards not obeying the rules" either IMO. It's just a VERY contagious virus. The reason for the low deaths is that the lowest hanging fruit (80+) has already been hit (approx. 1.5% fatality rate) and almost nobody from the remaining population is now dying or needing hospital treatment. Where people are still dying or requiring intensive care, you'll still be seeing those with underlying conditions.

The big problem is the mentality. We are so used to being able to fix almost every problem which comes our way that we are struggling with the idea that this virus may be unfixable. I'm not including the genuine scientists who are trying to find a vaccine or to understand how the virus works. I'm talking about the fake scientists who simply f**k about with "human behaviours", the politicians who get moist just listening to them and the general population who don't know about any of this. We haven't found an effective curefor the common cold or the flu so what on earth makes people believe we're going to unearth a magical cure for this new flu virus overnight?

At some stage it'll sink in to them that you can have all the safety measures you like but the second you enter a supermarket or go indoors where other people are, you are going to see it come back.

We can't live in fear of this thing. IMO we need to just get on with life. People will die. It's inevitable and all the denial in the world won't stop it.

Well that's a long one and I certainly don't agree with all of it.

  • This is a new, singular. and relatively virulent virus unlike the common cold or flu which are catch all terms to include hundreds of strains.
  • "Selfish bastards not obeying the rules" like the Bolton pub crawler in particular have been shown cause the spread of the virus, it'd be naive to think that the cavalier attitude of the government, It's chief Spad in particular and the hordes who rushed to the beaches or congregated outside pubs haven't contributed to the current resurgence. 
  • I certainly don't see the logic in allowing cafes to open but not restaurants licensed to serve alcohol, as for bars I'd probably not have let them reopen back in the summer but the genie is out of the bottle now and it has an effect on the night-time economy in general. 
  • How do you tell a genuine scientist from a fake one?
  • Do you have proof that the current upsurge in deaths is confined to those with underlying conditions - last week you said "Cases are obviously rising but UK deaths are at about 50-60 per day and flat-lining over the last week." but that proved to be a bit optimistic. if deaths are not following the same exponential trend as the spring it's probably down to us having better treatments and as for those claims that there was no bed shortage that's not what the NHS is reporting in areas like the NE of England this week.

I think you're right we have to get on with life but that doesn't mean we should abandon those policies like social distancing, mask wearing & hand washing that are known to cut down the spread of the virus. I don't think we should close the NHS down a second but we need a better strategy to cope with the pandemic. Sadly the current are unlikely to be generous with enhanced sick pay to keep ill people off work. If only they paid the same attention to party donors getting lucrative covid contracts as they do to those at the margins of society.

 

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