Making it through: It’s about the beds, stupid!

We’re in the middle of another cataclysmic event for America and the world — but America always learns precipitously and leaps to solutions — sometimes good, sometimes bad. The last cataclysmic event was 9/11. Within a week of that event corporations changed from risk-takers to decisions by committee in an effort to at least feel stability could be returned. In the process, much of the greatest individualism traits of American business were swept aside in favor of corporate think instead of entrepreneurial think. Boeing senior staff moved away from a hands-on managerial style and established one-step-up-only management systems like the military, thinking that would bring stability and risk-avoidance. The most senior management left the plant in Washington and moved to Chicago, losing contact with the very engineering feedback that made the company great. Result? We’re seeing it with the 737 Max.

GE made a decision along similar lines and told NBC, overnight, to disregard any proposal for less than $25 million and (I was on the receiving end) dropped projects they had green-lighted already. Result? Profits fell and NBC was shuffled off to Universal who, in turn, sold itself to Comcast. Hospital groups, airlines (Continental, Northwest, Aloha, America West, US Airways), Pratt-Whitney, Chrysler, GM, Random House, Harper Collins and a host of others sought a group-think managerial style — all of which resulted in depressed profits, horrible product mistakes and, never least, a rush to Wall Street to shore up their business and, thereby, they squeezed the best assets they had out the door: their trained workers.

In fact, things were so tenuous in late 2008 for much of America’s workforce that when Bush/Cheney ran us into debt and the mortgage crisis, the only sensible plan was to invest government money into those businesses with the largest workforces to keep any semblance of the economy working. America was built on its workers, not Wall Street. Wall Street is a tool to be used only by the most skilled, to ensure the people have work, generate business, revenue (GDP) and keep America strong. The best investors know this. Think Warren Buffett.

And now we have a pandemic. It was lauded as “fake news,” which was just plain stupid. There was ample proof, medical proof, bodies piling up, that showed it was not a hoax. So, instead of preventative measures, we’re now trying to shut the barn door long after the horses have left, been back, left again and so on. OK, you say, people will get sick; it’s like the flu, right? No. Every expert medical evaluation shows the death rate is at least 10 times higher than death by flu. Influenza kills one in 1,000 people who get sick — 34,200 last year. This COVID-19 kills one in 100. Look around you, do you know, see 100 people? One of the ones near you may well die. Do the math for total possible deaths and illnesses and you can see this pandemic is cataclysmic.

And for each person getting sick, two people will be required to look after them, at least two. And the company that person works for? And the pay that person is not earning while sick? And the expenses and leisure time for the people looking after the sick? In short, one person getting that sick, let alone dying, can cripple the economy quickly as numbers explode.

McDonald’s sells less hamburgers, paper from China for printing and toilet paper gets in short supply, sick truck drivers can’t deliver food… the chains here are all in danger of being broken.

And to make matters worse, there are only 100,000 critical care beds in our country. Assuming no nurse, doctor, hospital administrator, hospital cook, cleaner or testing lab tech ever gets sick, means that the government’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy
(CIDRAP) estimate that up to 3% of the people who get sick will need a bed in hospital. Going by current Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates, we’re looking at possibly 1 million sick by the end of April; 2 million by May 7; 14 million by June 14… doubling every six days until it begins to fade in late July. If 3% of those cases need hospitalization and hospital treatment, then by late May we’ll be out of all hospital critical care facilities, and critical care nurses, and critical care doctors, and critical care cleaners, equipment, administrators… the list goes on.

Buckle up and prepare. Everything in America is about to change once again; it’s like 9/11 all over again.

 

Peter Riva is a former resident of Amenia Union; he now resides in New Mexico.

Latest News

Picasso’s American debut was a financial flop
Picasso’s American debut was a financial flop
Penguin Random House

‘Picasso’s War” by Foreign Affairs senior editor Hugh Eakin, who has written about the art world for publications like The New York Review of Books, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker and The New York Times, is not about Pablo Picasso’s time in Nazi-occupied Paris and being harassed by the Gestapo, nor about his 1937 oil painting “Guernica,” in response to the aerial bombing of civilians in the Basque town during the Spanish Civil War.

Instead, the Penguin Random House book’s subtitle makes a clearer statement of intent: “How Modern Art Came To America.” This war was not between military forces but a cultural war combating America’s distaste for the emerging modernism that had flourished in Europe in the early decades of the 20th century.

Keep ReadingShow less
StepCrew stomps Norfolk Library for St. Patrick’s Day

As legend has it, St. Patrick was brought to the Emerald Isle when he was kidnapped by pirates and enslaved.

Though he eventually escaped, he returned and advanced Christianity throughout the island, according to his short biography, the “Confessio.”

Keep ReadingShow less
World War II drama on the stage in Copake

Constance Lopez, left, and Karissa Payson in "A Shayna Maidel," onstage through Sunday, March 24, at the Copake Grange.

Stephen Sanborn

There are three opportunities coming up in March — the 22nd, 23rd and 24th — to be transported through time and memory when The Two of Us Productions presents “A Shayna Maidel” at the Copake Grange.

Director Stephen Sanborn brings to life Barbara Lebow’s award-winning drama, weaving together the poignant reunion of two sisters after World War II through the haunting echoes of their past.

Keep ReadingShow less