jamesmadison

My point is that the trend line is clearly improving in the US and that there is no hospital crisis, notwithstanding the panic porn doomsayers' claims to the contrary.

Here's some more of Gato's stupid analysis. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EbDBdetU0AEITRc?format=png&name=medium https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EbDBstcUwAEa8N7?format=jpg&name=medium Useless. He's the worst.

It's not possible that you have your causation backwards? Physdude makes an excellent point. Almost nobody is talking about Vietnam. A country with 90MM people and 0 Covid deaths. Europe and the Americas failed to control the virus. And they paid the price with heavy lockdowns, deaths, and staggering economic and social costs. How many times do I need to make the following point. I am NOT arguing FOR causation. Therefore I cannot have something "backwards". I am arguing that there is a LACK of [demonstrated] causation. Big difference. I am not particularly familiar with Vietnam or the mitigation efforts they pursued. You might want to consider two more basic attributes, however: 1. Demographics - Vietnam has a much much younger population than all western countries; and 2. Weather - Hanoi is 21 degrees north vs NYC 41 degrees north You know who else avoided Covid: Eritrea, Syria and Zimbabwe. These are barely functioning countries. I doubt there was much of a well coordinated lockdown strategy. It's something else. Yup, I am willing to admit demographics and climate might impact death rates and transmission. Which is one of the many reasons why I think Gato’s analysis is pointless and stupid — he doesn’t control for any confounding factors. There is zero possibility of proving any evidence for or against lockdowns using his methodology. I don’t trust China’s data. I also don’t trust Italy, Spain, NY, Or Florida. Reason #971 why Gato’s analysis is stupid. All the data is messy and inconsistent. In light of your comments, how would you attempt to prove or support an argument for lockdowns? The economic costs have been staggering - trillions of dollars. The social costs have been terrible as well. And what for us - rich people in a rich country might count as inconvenience, is for poor people in poor countries devastating. A compelling must be made by those who argue for them. Agreed, that much of the data is messy and inconsistent and as I previously pointed out, likely getting worse here in the USA. We should all be in favor of wanting it to be as clean and consistent as possible. In the absence of that, we either have to (a) ignore or (b) adjust it. In the case of China, I would argue that "ignore" is the right strategy. What's your suggestion?

I think you need to add contact tracing too. Largely, the places that have done well have done that. Is this part of the crack contact tracing strategy you advocate? https://nypost.com/2020/06/15/coronavirus-contact-tracers-wont-ask-if-new-yorkers-attended-protests/ More garbage data being created. We must be living in a simulation. What else would explain the insanity?

It's not possible that you have your causation backwards? Physdude makes an excellent point. Almost nobody is talking about Vietnam. A country with 90MM people and 0 Covid deaths. Europe and the Americas failed to control the virus. And they paid the price with heavy lockdowns, deaths, and staggering economic and social costs. How many times do I need to make the following point. I am NOT arguing FOR causation. Therefore I cannot have something "backwards". I am arguing that there is a LACK of [demonstrated] causation. Big difference. I am not particularly familiar with Vietnam or the mitigation efforts they pursued. You might want to consider two more basic attributes, however: 1. Demographics - Vietnam has a much much younger population than all western countries; and 2. Weather - Hanoi is 21 degrees north vs NYC 41 degrees north You know who else avoided Covid: Eritrea, Syria and Zimbabwe. These are barely functioning countries. I doubt there was much of a well coordinated lockdown strategy. It's something else.

Yeah, let's just ignore the potential for millions of deaths on the other side of the scale. Snarky and pointless comment. You are not making a case for lockdowns with it. If the health impact from Covid could be mitigated without plunging us into the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, wouldn't you want to?

James, the virus is driving the level of Covid mortality! Some guy who's taken an intro stats class doing crappy regression analysis without understanding anything about virology or epidemiology isn't going to be able to provide you any evidence. But it is interesting that you and Gato are excluding China from your analysis. "the virus is driving the level of Covid Mortality" - Agreed. What's your point? It certainly has little to nothing to do with the efficacy of lockdowns. Do you seriously believe that China has 4,632 total deaths from Covid and that 2 people have died since April 17th - which is what they claim per Worldometer? The reason any intelligent person excludes China from analysis is that their data is unadulterated garbage.

What’s funny is that you fail to see that the convergence is only happening in places that failed to control this early on. S Korea, Japan, much of EU and even Italy and Spain now are doing well due to less new cases thanks to aggressive lockdowns and measures nationwide. The countries that are “converging” to your (brutal) strategy of essentially herd immunity are the ones that failed to control this when they had a chance thanks to laissez faire attitude—USA, Sweden, etc. And let me tell you—even without lockdown, and with “isolating the elderly”, many will perish and the economy will suffer for very long time with this strategy. Equivalent to the Grandma Rule: eating your carrots before you move onto dessert, USA didn’t eat its carrots so there will be no dessert. There are places in USA that did strap down like NY and NJ and so their new cases have plummeted, but that effort may now be in vain due to a surge in southern states. Other countries, particularly in EU will be able to move one from here because they ate their carrots. They will be in dessert phase while US muddies along with “seniors isolated” and months, maybe years of reduced economic output while you try to achieve that herd immunity... Thanks to pretty much no central (federal) leadership, USA will now learn what happens when you go from pandemic to endemic... You are listing NY and NJ as examples of places in the US that "ate their veggies". I find it astonishing that you would list the two states with the worst per capita covid death rates (4x the national average!!) as positive examples. You mention Spain and Italy as now doing well and call out Sweden, ignoring the simple fact that Sweden's per capita Covid death rate is lower than Italy and Spain. I am sorry, but this is not a persuasive argument. The evidence simply does not support that argument that Lockdowns (or Social Mobility) are what's driving the level of Covid mortality. I can’t help you. Good luck with that regression. Ditto

And to be clear, given the staggering economic and social costs of the lockdowns, those arguing for them must demonstrate their worth, not the other way around.

What’s funny is that you fail to see that the convergence is only happening in places that failed to control this early on. S Korea, Japan, much of EU and even Italy and Spain now are doing well due to less new cases thanks to aggressive lockdowns and measures nationwide. The countries that are “converging” to your (brutal) strategy of essentially herd immunity are the ones that failed to control this when they had a chance thanks to laissez faire attitude—USA, Sweden, etc. And let me tell you—even without lockdown, and with “isolating the elderly”, many will perish and the economy will suffer for very long time with this strategy. Equivalent to the Grandma Rule: eating your carrots before you move onto dessert, USA didn’t eat its carrots so there will be no dessert. There are places in USA that did strap down like NY and NJ and so their new cases have plummeted, but that effort may now be in vain due to a surge in southern states. Other countries, particularly in EU will be able to move one from here because they ate their carrots. They will be in dessert phase while US muddies along with “seniors isolated” and months, maybe years of reduced economic output while you try to achieve that herd immunity... Thanks to pretty much no central (federal) leadership, USA will now learn what happens when you go from pandemic to endemic... You are listing NY and NJ as examples of places in the US that "ate their veggies". I find it astonishing that you would list the two states with the worst per capita covid death rates (4x the national average!!) as positive examples. You mention Spain and Italy as now doing well and call out Sweden, ignoring the simple fact that Sweden's per capita Covid death rate is lower than Italy and Spain. I am sorry, but this is not a persuasive argument. The evidence simply does not support that argument that Lockdowns (or Social Mobility) are what's driving the level of Covid mortality.

Fair enough. But there is a good reason why every regression analysis comes with a "correlation is not causation" disclaimer. And this guy has violated this in a very blatant way. But let me be explicit on my priors here: Uncontrolled community spread causes lockdowns Uncontrolled community spread decreases mobility Uncontrolled community spread decreases economic activity So he is looking at all these correlations backwards. Denmark doesn't have low infection rates despite high mobility. They have high mobility due to low infection rates. With all due respect, I think you are (a) not accurately reading what he's arguing and (b) helping to prove my point. He looks at the data and finds that there is NO positive correlation between increased social distancing and decreased infection/mortality. He then notes that while correlation does not equal correlation, the reverse is quite unusual (impossible?). The absence of correlation should call into question the existence of causation. In fact, to the effect there is a correlation, it's the reverse. Please explain to me how social distancing can lead to reduced infection/mortality when the reverse is observed? As to the specific example of Denmark that you give, El Gato isn't arguing what you think he is nor does he need to. His point isn't that Denmark has low infection rates despite high mobility, it's that mobility had little to no bearing on their infection rates and that's what his various analyses appear to demonstrate. For example, here's Sweden vs. Denmark. I bet you wouldn't be able to tell which is which without labels https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Ea-O6oNUEAEX3g6?format=jpg&name=medium Yet, here's how they did (per Worldometer): Sweden's cases/million; death/million: 5550/500 Denmark's cases/million; death/million: 2139/104 Hmmm, seems that something else may be driving the different outcomes. And to be clear, it's NOT incumbent on me or El Gato to explain what that something else is. How about looking at it another way. Let's compare two countries with vastly different social mobility behavior during the Covid crisis: https://twitter.com/boriquagato/status/1264203820831137792 How do they compare (per Worldometer)? Sweden's cases/million; death/million: 5550/500 UK cases/million; death/million: 4446/627 Hmmm, seems like they have had pretty similar outcomes DESPITE vastly different approaches to social distancing/mobility. Extra credit: So what's going on with Sweden. To harken back to a prior post I made, it's the nursing homes (again)... https://www.wsj.com/articles/coronavirus-is-taking-a-high-toll-on-swedens-elderly-families-blame-the-government-11592479430 However, given the fact that the average length of stay in a nursing home is less than one year (and most people don't leave because they get better), the disparate impact is likely accelerating average deaths by a matter of months. Is there any evidence of that? Perhaps El Gato can shed some light? https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EaZ9_nhU4AEPgf9?format=png&name=medium Why yes. Yes he can. Does anyone else have anything to add? https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Eao1HHKWsAQqFfH?format=png&name=small Could this be happening more broadly? https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Eao8HH0XQAAeNLv?format=jpg&name=medium Hmmmm. Fascinating. Covid - the worst own goal in the last 100 years.

Aren't they planning a large political rally tomorrow? I think protesting police brutality and corruption and racism may be a cause worth taking risks for, but getting on stage to get some narcissistic supply may not rise to that level... Arizona and Florida are starting to look bad. But has anyone taken a look at Oklahoma? They printed 450 cases which is a 74% increase over the previous all time high. Which was... the day before. Of course! We all know the biggest protests in the U.S took place in Oklahoma/AZ/FL, not in places seeing decline like NY! CHAZ is contributing to cases in OK, FL, AZ too! This fits neatly into my impervious political narrative of shunting blame onto leftist ANTIFA or Cuomo or whoever else away from my precious POTUS! And now we need a massive, maskless indoor rally to celebrate! That's the point. If we aren't seeing increases where the protests took place, that calls into question the benefits of the enforced lockdowns, no? The EU and rest of world would like to have a word with you. I know, lockdowns (after all the precaution was botched from January thru March) only work outside the U.S. for some reason... The benefit of locking some states down over others may now fade away because some states went their own way and we have no rational federal/centralized leadership that could have led a coordinated response. It’s a hoax like the Flu anyway so it doesn’t matter. Also so strange that it is surging in places like FL and AZ now when I was told this has been widespread since January. Maybe none of the millions who had it back in January made it to those states till now... Actually, there appears to be no correlation between actual social isolation and covid deaths. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EYJsd8iUcAEsSCS?format=jpg&name=medium https://twitter.com/boriquagato/status/1264596818429505537 El Gato Malo has done some really interesting analysis that I would suggest people check out. There is steep competition, but this might be the stupidest thing* posted on this thread. You've heard "correlation != causation"? Ignoring the fairly week correlation, wouldn't the simplest explanation be that countries with the most deaths are likely to lockdown the hardest? The clear outliers on this chart are the countries who were hit hard and DID NOT lockdown (US, UK, Sweden). IMHO, "lockdowns" are somewhat counter-productive because they lock people inside where the virus spread most easily. But closing bars, churches, meat-packing plants, and other indoor sources of super-spread, will definitely reduce the spread. Anyone who has read the contract tracing reports out of Asia knows how and where this virus spreads. Spoiler: it is not outside! * Not saying you, James, are stupid for posting it. I think you raise reasonable points. But the original analysis is stupid. Seems similar to the catastrophic "7 countries study" by Ancel Keys. El Gato Mato seems to have a clear agenda and is trying to fit the data to his narrative. ** Edit to Add: IMHO, the obvious explanation for the recent spikes in the Southern states is weather. These states were spared early in the outbreak because weather kept them outdoors where the virus doesn't spread easily. As things heat up, they are spending more time in doors. I am pretty sure that there have been quite a number of stupider things posted on this thread. I would not discount what El Gato writes simply because you suspect he has an agenda. I would posit that almost every single person posting here has an agenda and is trying to convince others that their views are correct - even you, I dare say. In my opinion, he has been doing some very interesting work and as far as I can tell his analyses call into question many of the "common wisdom" assumptions made. In fact, you seem to acknowledge in your own words that lockdowns were "somewhat counter-productive", no? The analysis, based on google mobility data (which shows actual behaviors) strongly calls into question the efficacy of social distancing. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Ea9_fzOUMAER2ZT?format=jpg&name=large The fact that the media has fixated on the last couple of days is an actual and obvious example of someone with an agenda. The fact that the media (and some on this board as well) want to blame opening up (which has been slowly happening for two months) and not the massive protests (which occurred 2-3 weeks ago) for the recent uptick is another example of an agenda. Want to know what also takes 2-3 weeks - the time from infection to hospitalization with Covid. Funny coincidence that. That all said, the recent slight uptrend in positivity rate is definitely something worth watching, but I suspect your guess about people spending time indoors has little to do with it. Instead, could this have something to do with it? https://twitter.com/boriquagato/status/1274432160682831872 Hmmmm. Talk about an agenda and talk about turning the data into useless trash. This is just on example of the data salting going on. Anyone who is serious about wanting to really understand what's really going on should be disgusted by this. Here's a handy chart to keep track of all the ways the data's being distorted https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Ea6Zx4cX0AMAscx?format=png&name=medium

Oh boy, regression analysis to hunt for correlations. Where could we go wrong? Let’s ignore basic physics of respiratory droplet spread and trust regression analysis! Please ignore Sweden and Italy/Spain/NY/NJ post lockdown. Some will never learn, dragging the U.S. through a never ending pandemic quagmire... "Basic physics of respiratory droplet spread"? What does that have to do with my point? More importantly, perhaps you didn't capture the point being made in his analyses. He notes that not only is there NO positive correlation between physical distancing and reduced covid mortality but that in fact there appears to be a negative correlation! While we all know that correlation does not prove causation, the absence of correlation - indeed the presence of a negative correlation - very strongly calls into question the argument that social distancing reduced covid mortality. He notices this in BOTH comparisons of countries and US states. Given the unquestionable massive social costs of such policies, it is incumbent on governments to demonstrate they work. This has not been done. The fact that essentially useless models from Imperial College and IHME are being invoked is beyond perverse. They argue that since the dire predictions did not occur, social distancing worked. This is laughable at best. If you really want to know where Covid wreaked havoc, focus on states and countries that did a poor job of protecting the aged and infirm. NY, NJ, CT, and MA all forced nursing homes to take back Covid+ patients - the four states with the highest per capital deaths in the USA. You know who else forced nursing homes to take back Covid+ patients? Italy.

Aren't they planning a large political rally tomorrow? I think protesting police brutality and corruption and racism may be a cause worth taking risks for, but getting on stage to get some narcissistic supply may not rise to that level... Arizona and Florida are starting to look bad. But has anyone taken a look at Oklahoma? They printed 450 cases which is a 74% increase over the previous all time high. Which was... the day before. Of course! We all know the biggest protests in the U.S took place in Oklahoma/AZ/FL, not in places seeing decline like NY! CHAZ is contributing to cases in OK, FL, AZ too! This fits neatly into my impervious political narrative of shunting blame onto leftist ANTIFA or Cuomo or whoever else away from my precious POTUS! And now we need a massive, maskless indoor rally to celebrate! That's the point. If we aren't seeing increases where the protests took place, that calls into question the benefits of the enforced lockdowns, no? The EU and rest of world would like to have a word with you. I know, lockdowns (after all the precaution was botched from January thru March) only work outside the U.S. for some reason... The benefit of locking some states down over others may now fade away because some states went their own way and we have no rational federal/centralized leadership that could have led a coordinated response. It’s a hoax like the Flu anyway so it doesn’t matter. Also so strange that it is surging in places like FL and AZ now when I was told this has been widespread since January. Maybe none of the millions who had it back in January made it to those states till now... Actually, there appears to be no correlation between actual social isolation and covid deaths. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EYJsd8iUcAEsSCS?format=jpg&name=medium https://twitter.com/boriquagato/status/1264596818429505537 El Gato Malo has done some really interesting analysis that I would suggest people check out.

Aren't they planning a large political rally tomorrow? I think protesting police brutality and corruption and racism may be a cause worth taking risks for, but getting on stage to get some narcissistic supply may not rise to that level... Arizona and Florida are starting to look bad. But has anyone taken a look at Oklahoma? They printed 450 cases which is a 74% increase over the previous all time high. Which was... the day before. Of course! We all know the biggest protests in the U.S took place in Oklahoma/AZ/FL, not in places seeing decline like NY! CHAZ is contributing to cases in OK, FL, AZ too! This fits neatly into my impervious political narrative of shunting blame onto leftist ANTIFA or Cuomo or whoever else away from my precious POTUS! And now we need a massive, maskless indoor rally to celebrate! That's the point. If we aren't seeing increases where the protests took place, that calls into question the benefits of the enforced lockdowns, no? Separately, Oklahoma, Arizona and Florida have a loooong way to go until they can boast the performance of Andrew Cuomo, who has presided over the worst, by far, outcome of any state in the Union. His policy of forcing nursing homes to take back Covid+ patients turned those Nursing Homes into killing fields. This disease hates the elderly and infirm. While I can give a pass to the bad decisions made in March and April given lack of information and a belief in the precautionary principle, it is somewhere between madness and sheer stupidity in June not to realize our mistakes and adjust accordingly.

That's why enforcing a lockdown and keeping as many people inside as possible was so important and such a great idea!

It's worse (or perhaps simply more ironic) than that. If you take these feckless politicians at their word, they are (a) encouraging the protests, which according to their own logic will result in additional deaths from Covid but (b) decrying the rioting which has resulted in massive property damage primarily. Think about it. What they are saying is that the cause (social justice, ending racism, etc.) trumps lives but not property!! These morons couldn't logic their way out of a paper bag. They are human mobius strips.

^^^ Yup. Covid (and the riots) have really brought this to the fore.

Surgisphere, whose employees appear to include a sci-fi writer and adult content model, provided database behind Lancet and New England Journal of Medicine hydroxychloroquine studies Some more details: Make sure to turn volume up to hear the appropriate sound effects. Lancet and NEJM covering themselves in glory. It's almost like they wanted the results to be true so much that they didn't want to actually check the source out too carefully.

The cognitive dissonance occurring now that millions have decided to say "screw the lockdowns" but for the politically correct reasons is mind blowing. https://www.nationalreview.com/news/not-the-same-question-de-blasio-says-businesses-churches-to-remain-closed-even-as-demonstrators-flout-lockdowns/?utm_source=recirc-desktop&utm_medium=homepage&utm_campaign=river&utm_content=featured-content-trending&utm_term=first And of course, they don't even realize their own massive hypocrisy. The lockdowns are either needed to prevent a massive pandemic or not. In what insane alternate universe is there an exception for massive gatherings for just causes???

All true except the comment about Lancet being a prestigious medical journal. They lost that title many years ago when they published that garbage about Vaccines causing Autism, which they had to retract and which caused untold misery

I think you missed the mark on realtors. The problems are: 1. The higher the potential commission the greater the gap between commissions paid and value-add 2. Misalignment of incentives for BOTH buyer and selling realtors 3. System that is protected by massive lobbying and blackballing of outsiders All three points you make are true but I believe that they are all "in addition to" my prior observation, not "instead of".

I think a frequent commonality in what constitutes a "leech" is a business/profession in which the costs are not (fully) borne by the user or the cost is somehow "hidden" or incredibly diffused: Seemless: User is the person ordering; restaurants pay Real estate brokers: Seller ostensibly pays, so buyers may think it doesn't matter if a broker is involved. Obviously the cost is borne by both parties Government: All taxpayers pay, diffusing the cost Healthcare: Massive disconnect between payers and users

So, what you are saying is that every investment banker and PE executive that uses EBITDA all the time don't know what they are doing??? :o The reason they use EBITDA is that it is a useful figure that serves as a proxy for the cash flow power of the business before the impact of capital structure and tax rates. Since it is part and parcel of the way professionals in the financial services industry speak, they know what EBITDA is and isn't. And as to the adjustment the CD&R guys were making, I assume that as part of their credit agreement, they needed to maintain certain leverage ratios as measured by "Adjusted EBITDA". If you worked for this company, presumably you'd prefer that they did NOT trip their debt convenants? :) Bull$hit is still bull$hit, no matter how many people speak BS language. I too have worked for and with PE / PE run companies and I'd argue that the "private" in PE is the big reason why so much BS goes on. As for those that work for the company, I'll say a prayer for them. Too bad the owners sold them out to the vultures. I'm not saying they don't know what they are doing, I think they know exactly what they are doing which is providing a manipulative measure of a company's earnings power. EBITDA is not a good proxy for cash flow. A good proxy for cash flow is.... cash flow. On a seperate note, I Luckily found a new role at a Company that actually makes money. Cheers EBITDA is not bull$hit, notwithstanding WEB's claims to the contrary. Contrary to what you say, its widespread usage speaks directly to its usefulness. In contrast, Cash Flow can swing wildly from year to year for a host of reasons that do NOT speak to the underlying earnings power of the business. Feel free to take exception to the adjustments, but I would certainly want to know about various costs/benefits that are not likely to be recurring. I do agree with you that prayers should be said for the employees as PE people are amongst the greediest people on the planet and will $crew over the employees without a second thought. Therefore, I am glad to hear that you've found a better place to work.

So, what you are saying is that every investment banker and PE executive that uses EBITDA all the time don't know what they are doing??? :o The reason they use EBITDA is that it is a useful figure that serves as a proxy for the cash flow power of the business before the impact of capital structure and tax rates. Since it is part and parcel of the way professionals in the financial services industry speak, they know what EBITDA is and isn't. If one doesn't like it, go ahead and use Net Income, Cash Flow from Operations or whatever other metric you'd prefer. As to the "insane" adjustments that you refer to, I would argue that I would much rather know what all of these individual line items are and decide for myself if they should or should not be backed out as I conduct my analysis. Hard to argue that you are hurt by knowing what these expenses are. And as to the adjustment the CD&R guys were making, I assume that as part of their credit agreement, they needed to maintain certain leverage ratios as measured by "Adjusted EBITDA". If you worked for this company, presumably you'd prefer that they did NOT trip their debt convenants? :)