Austin vs NYC Covid-19 Edition

[ashbeeigh]

Originally Posted by chicagovsnyc

Why do all the druggies hang on the east side?

Do some research on the history of Austin and disparities. Then you’ll understand.

[riaelise]

Well for a vocal number of people Austin wasn't all that free for quite a while and fairly restrictive.

As a New Yorker (Bronx born), I'd deal with Cuomo rather than Abbott. We're still No. 2 for Covid, whereas NYC has gone down and stayed down. NYC is a super dense city, prime ground for COVID. Something had to be done. We botched things down here too (i.e. reopening too early).

I don't want to live in NYC again, but I'm no refugee. NYC will recover after COVID and nothing is quite like it as far as I'm concerned.

I do agree that my dollar goes farther down here. I have a nice sized home on a nice sized lot. Can't imagine returning to apartments or shared walls anytime soon.

Carrying a gun means nothing to me tbh.

[Austin97]

Originally Posted by riaelise

Well for a vocal number of people Austin wasn't all that free for quite a while and fairly restrictive.

As a New Yorker (Bronx born), I'd deal with Cuomo rather than Abbott. We're still No. 2 for Covid, whereas NYC has gone down and stayed down. NYC is a super dense city, prime ground for COVID. Something had to be done. We botched things down here too (i.e. reopening too early).

I don't want to live in NYC again, but I'm no refugee. NYC will recover after COVID and nothing is quite like it as far as I'm concerned.

I do agree that my dollar goes farther down here. I have a nice sized home on a nice sized lot. Can't imagine returning to apartments or shared walls anytime soon.

Carrying a gun means nothing to me tbh.

You say we botched things, but new york city's unemployment was 19% and is 15%. New York state's unemployment is 12%.

Texas made a choice to keep things closed enough to flatten the curve, but open enough to keep our unemployment lower at 6.8%

You call that botched, but I consider that successfully walking the fine line in balancing economy and life.

California, illinois, new york, new jersey all have > 10% unemployment as they are just starting to open.

[ScoPro]

Originally Posted by chicagovsnyc

Why do all the druggies hang on the east side?

Never heard of West Campus?

[riaelise]

Originally Posted by Austin97

You say we botched things, but new york city's unemployment was 19% and is 15%. New York state's unemployment is 12%.

Texas made a choice to keep things closed enough to flatten the curve, but open enough to keep our unemployment lower at 6.8%

You call that botched, but I consider that successfully walking the fine line in balancing economy and life.

California, illinois, new york, new jersey all have > 10% unemployment as they are just starting to open.

I'm talking about lives not employment rates. Texas should never have reopened in May when the data wasn't truly supporting that.

I've been financially impacted by COVID 19 and I've watched several of my favorite businesses go under (couldn't support them all)...so I'd have a vested interest in reopening but back then, we needed to take better measures to protect human capital. I have no issues with reopening now (phased of course) but May was too soon.

New York, Cali, and the rest will recover in due time, we know that. But COVID needs to be controlled.

[Austin97]

Originally Posted by riaelise

I'm talking about lives not employment rates. Texas should never have reopened in May when the data wasn't truly supporting that.

I've been financially impacted by COVID 19 and I've watched several of my favorite businesses go under (couldn't support them all)...so I'd have a vested interest in reopening but back then, we needed to take better measures to protect human capital. I have no issues with reopening now (phased of course) but May was too soon.

New York, Cali, and the rest will recover in due time, we know that. But COVID needs to be controlled.

I look at it more as texas pushed the limit of how fast you could reopen. I agree it was too fast. But unless someone goes too fast you dont know how fast you can go.

Other states can now look at us and use our protocols for reopening. Texas having a higher death rate will mean other states can open with a lower death rate while minimizing economic damage.

If we had a federal response we might have minimized deaths, but maximized economic damage. We also wouldnt know what the minimum amount of opening is ok.

I look at california, NY etc and think they are opening way too slowly.

[Need4Camaro]

Originally Posted by Austin97

I look at it more as texas pushed the limit of how fast you could reopen. I agree it was too fast. But unless someone goes too fast you dont know how fast you can go.

Other states can now look at us and use our protocols for reopening. Texas having a higher death rate will mean other states can open with a lower death rate while minimizing economic damage.

If we had a federal response we might have minimized deaths, but maximized economic damage. We also wouldnt know what the minimum amount of opening is ok.

I look at california, NY etc and think they are opening way too slowly.

Well.. ..in terms of too fast I personally don’t think limits were on Abbott’s mind. I believe Abbott got cold feet due to all of the corporate backlash he may have received during the shutdowns and it was probably atkin to having a gun to his face given Texas is one of the most business friendly states in the nation and its lenient policies towards them is a huge incentive for them to come here. That plus he probably didn’t want to enter a recession. I don’t know a great deal about Abbott but I wouldn’t be surprised if much of his political campaign is based on the prosperity and success of business in this state... He probably knew it was too soon but hoped he could pull it off while in some way keeping the public outcry at bay.

[riaelise]

Originally Posted by Austin97

I look at it more as texas pushed the limit of how fast you could reopen. I agree it was too fast. But unless someone goes too fast you dont know how fast you can go.

Other states can now look at us and use our protocols for reopening. Texas having a higher death rate will mean other states can open with a lower death rate while minimizing economic damage.

If we had a federal response we might have minimized deaths, but maximized economic damage. We also wouldnt know what the minimum amount of opening is ok.

I look at california, NY etc and think they are opening way too slowly.

I agree, I think Cali is being overly cautious, but then again, they're almost to a million cases...that's a lot. NYC is very densely packed with people...perhaps that caution is because of that.

Unfortunately that misstep in May cost lives but I will admit that some of the blame falls on people. I never bought into the reopening and electively chose to stay home. I wasn't looking at any public official to give me the blessing and even now, I follow my own timetable.

While I think states should handle responses for their own populations, the Federal government's response should have been better than what it was. The economy was going to go into the tanker the moment Corona evolved into a pandemic vs an epidemic. COVID attacked many things that generated the economy (large events, conferences, anything that involved groups)...the downturn was unavoidable and the ramifications I expect to be severe...though I admit that I've never received a pay reduction before or witnessed so many businesses going belly up. I was in the WTC area during 9/11 and while that event shook things up for many years to come, it was different than this. Time will tell.

[VAF84]

I think we got it right, maybe reopened a little too slow. To me, the people will decide what they're willing to do regardless of what the State says assuming they are provided enough info. Government always takes ages to adapt to the ground after the initial part of a major event, this thing will be over well before the regulations catch up to reality. IE the mask mandate will probably be removed after you start seeing large numbers of people dropping the mask. That's just me though. Before the governor made any decisions, my client had already been making it's own adjustments to work from home without needing to intervention from the government. I can't believe there are some places still shut down, in fact, I keep forgetting we're technically in a shut down around here.

I don't see how one could even compare between the two cities during COVID. Aside from the night and day differences between Austin and NYC, as a traveled person, NYC didn't appeal to me much, and haven't felt the need to go back as I have other places (even though my wife loves NYC). My experience was that folks seemed less friendly in general, there's terrible traffic, taxes are high, unions, leadership no good (particularly de Blasio), unable to protect yourself (no CHL), architecturally it wasn't attractive, expensive (cost of living). I mean I'm sure the city is fine as far as cities go, but don't see the allure unless you're in finance and want to go where the action is. If I had to put up with that kind of environment and cost, I'd rather live in a place with more culture/history (Insert major European city here), or a more orderly and clean place like Singapore. Everyone has their preference though.
(Edit) I forgot one pro for NYC. If you like to travel internationally, the proximity probably allows easier and less expensive travel to European/W.Africa countries; not to mention extensive routes to other places.