Today I made some calls to cancel memberships that I can no longer use afford (gym, etc). 3 distinct places rolled straight to voicemail and stated that they were closed until April 1, 2020.
(Separate rant, but naturally billing isn’t suspended, just access to the services).
Where are all the businesses getting this April 1 talking point from? I know Trump is, per usual, on Twitter spouting some word salad that might be interpreted as a 15 day window. But I’m not aware of any official publication hinting at any “reopening date”, or what that date is, or, most critically, under what authority Trump believes he can compel private businesses or non-federal governments to force people to work in a pandemic situation.
Where’s the April 1 date coming from? Is it April Fool’s?
The late March dates that many stores have given aren’t worth the electrons they’re printed on when there are shelter-in-place or stay-home orders until at least the first week of April, never mind any extensions.
When the government first started getting serious about the emergency the announcements of changes were for the next two weeks (with the understanding it would be lengthened if necessary). The idea was to reduce public fear by keeping it to two weeks rather than announcing indeterminate or long term restrictions/shutdowns. My guess is 04-01-20 is two (or four) weeks from one of those announcements.
I agree that it’s bullshit. Around here the network of beer stores, which has long been equipped to take back empty beer bottles, was given the exclusive monopoly to take back empty wine and liquor bottles, refunding the deposits, and recycling them. They claim to have suspended the service “until March 31”. I very much doubt that will happen. Definite dates about anything in the context of COVID-19 is more of a political gimmick.
I think of it more as not being willing to plan any further ahead than that. That is, not promising to stay closed any longer than that based on today’s information.
You might look at the announcements of your governor and mayor–there have been many announcements of two-three-four week coronavirus fighting policies from them.
From what I recall, the shit really hit the fan the weekend of Mar. 14-15 and it seemed that for a lot of jurisdictions mandatory shutdowns took effect on Tuesday, 3/17, I assume so businesses could use Monday 3/16 to tie up loose ends. April 1 would be the 2 week point (yes, technically 2 weeks+1 day) which seems to be the minimum duration for most shutdowns.
State & County: 10 days ago, issued school closure “until the end of the month”
State - today issued “shelter in place for more vulnerable groups”
County - today issued “shelter in place for everyone except for essential activities”
The local level directives are progressively dire, but the Business People (including Chief Business Person Donald Trump) are acting like business as usual is about to crank up again.
The sad thing is, the red-state governors will probably toe the line, putting millions more at risk. White-collar workers will keep humming along in safety, everyone else will put their lives on the line in an effort to juice Trump’s political prospects by November. Maybe it won’t happen but it’s so incredibly sad to even be having this conversation.
“Given the exlusive monopoly to take back empty wine bottles”? It was my impression that it was more or less forced on them and they’re perfectly happy to have a break from it.
I agree. It was, in fact, forced on them, but they do have a monopoly as the only ones entitled to do it. It’s a damn nuisance for them as the whole system was geared to taking back empty beer cases and cans, not random-sized loose wine and liquor bottles.
It’s not “business as usual”, but many businesses have adopted “remote work” and other policies to try and maintain operations. Which is a good thing. Yes, it sucks that many people are temporarily out of work. But it would suck more if EVERYONE was out of work and there was no one to distribute food and supplies (including medical), maintain infrastructure like the Internet, deliver goods, and other stuff that society needs to, you know, not collapse.
What you’ve described above is the status quo, which (IMO) is about the most appropriate thing we can do. Those things are already happening.
Trump wants to change the status quo, because it’s “worse than the disease”. And he wants to end it in a matter of weeks. He’s unwisely made the stock market his only metric for success, and it’s cratering. The stock market isn’t entirely his fault, but he’s staked his whole presidency on it.
That’s how I understand his speech (though he keeps it deliberately vague in case there’s a need to walkback). Did you understand it differently?
Not sure if this is the best of the myriad threads in which to post this, but I caught this NYT oped by David Katz, in which he proposes more targeted “vertical” quarantines, after a set period of general quarantine. Says 2 weeks basically “reboots” the general population, after which we can consider protections aimed at the most vulnerable, and most likely transmissions.
Haven’t studied it enough to ascertain whether he is a crank, but this sort of approach does make considerable sense to me. I admit that I might find it attractive because it jibes w/ my predisposition.
Pretty sure the statements should not be parsed “We will reopen April 1st,” which seems to be how the OP takes them, but rather “We will definitely not be reopening before April 1st; that’s what we know for certain right now.” If/When local authorities extend the shutdown for those businesses, I betcha the outgoing voicemails will change.
And for what it’s worth, Governor Shithead announced on 3/16 that all school districts would be closed.
So I guess in our state, it’s clear that everyone is keying off Governor Shithead, but it’s curious that Trump and Governnor Shithead and everyone else is working off the same 15-day timeline established around 3/16. I’m wondering where that came from.
