Back in March, I wrote a post about Bastiat, Hazlitt, and the coronavirus. I wrote about the unseen consequences of the lockdowns.  I wrote about a cost/benefit analysis.

Frederic Bastiat and Henry Hazlitt wrote about unseen consequences in their respective days. Hazlitt said that the ability to see the longer and indirect consequences of an action is what distinguishes a good economist from a bad economist.  A bad economist only looks at the direct consequences of an action.

In 2020, I have figured out that there are a lot of bad economists.  Maybe more accurately, there are people who just don’t think about economic consequences at all.  Maybe even more accurately, there are many people who just don’t think about consequences at all.

When someone says we need government lockdowns and mask mandates, you may challenge it on the economic consequences.  The common response is that you are selfish to just care about the economy. You should care about human life.

They think that economics is watching the stock market go up.  They think that economics is how much money is in your bank account. Of course, I would be quick to point out that having some money in your bank account that actually buys something is rather important.  If you advocate policies where people will have trouble buying basic necessities, how much do you care about human life?

I don’t think most people are thinking through the many consequences of the hysteria over the coronavirus.  I want to make clear that it would be possible to have hysteria without government intervention, which would have detrimental effects.  But at least these would be voluntary, and they would tend to be minimized.  People who weren’t living in fear could go about their lives and associate with others who also weren’t living in fear.  Maybe concerts and big sporting events would get cancelled, but at least you could go to a restaurant and dine, or anywhere else that remained open.

I’ll also point out that the state and its media lapdogs have largely caused this hysteria with their fake models and bogus statistics.  If there were no CDC and no FDA, would anyone even be talking about a coronavirus right now?

Living Life

I have continued to make libertarian arguments against government lockdowns and mask mandates and every other form of coercion that has come with the coronavirus hysteria. I have also talked about the bad statistics and the propaganda.

But for now, let’s forget all of that.  Forget the bad statistics and the propaganda.  Even forget about libertarianism for now.  Just concentrate on good economics and you can see the foolishness of lockdowns and mask mandates.

There are massive economic consequences, but there are also the psychological consequences. Think about kids living in fear, missing sports and activities, and not playing with friends.

I am thankful that my kids are not fearful about the virus.  They have missed many activities and suffer consequences from the fear in our society, but at least they are not living in fear themselves.  I don’t think I can say the same about many other kids.

I walk through the grocery store and I see little kids wearing masks.  What do their parents tell them?  “You have to wear this mask or you could get a virus and die.”  Or are they more subtle with, “You have to be socially responsible towards your fellow human beings.”?

How much psychological damage is this doing to kids?  And what do the parents of these kids say when asked why not everyone else is wearing a mask?  I wonder what names I am being called by the mask-wearing parents.

What about the hopes and dreams of these kids?  What about the hopes and dreams of young adults?

I am a big basketball fan, although I hate the politics that enter into the NBA and other sports. But I couldn’t help but think of the college kids in March.  This was supposed to be March Madness.  This is the big event in NCAA basketball, and it was cancelled due to fear.  Imagine being a senior in college and this was the first year you were going to make it to the big dance.  At the time, this is your whole life.  For the rest of your life, you can say that you played in the NCAA basketball tournament.  Then, in the matter of days, it gets all taken away from you.  You’ll never have another chance again.  You won’t get to show your future kids video of you playing on national television in the biggest college tournament.

What about someone who worked and saved hard for 20 years to start up a business of his dreams? Then it all gets ripped away. The revenue has stopped, but the expenses keep coming.  You can only last so long without customers, especially when you aren’t even allowed to open your doors, and when they finally do open, you have hundreds of new regulations to follow.

What happens to the landlords who are no longer able to collect rent?  Most landlords aren’t rich.  It typically takes a long time to get wealthy through rental real estate.  It is the long game for most.  It isn’t as easy as shown on HGTV.  Now there are tens of millions of people who don’t have jobs.  Some of them can’t pay the rent.  There are also some who can pay rent but don’t because they were essentially told by the government that they don’t have to.

It is becoming a bad business for landlords.  So there may be fewer landlords in the future.  This will likely lead to more homelessness.  There is already an epidemic of homelessness in places like Los Angeles and San Francisco.  Do all of these people advocating lockdowns count homelessness as an economic effect?

You don’t have to be a libertarian to understand the utter insanity of the world we live in right now.  The human race is collectively shooting itself in the foot, or worse.

I hope the kids of today grow up and look back and 2020 and say, “What a bunch of idiots.” Because that is really what we are dealing with today.  I am just wondering how life can ever go back to something resembling normal.

The lockdown lunatics and mask Nazis have really dug in deep.  The mask wearing has become a farce.  I see people wearing them incorrectly, but that may sometimes be a sign of slight defiance.  I also see people touching and adjusting their masks.  If you are really worried about a virus, you shouldn’t be touching your face.

How can the mask Nazis ever return to life without wearing a mask?  After all, there is always some flu bug floating around out there, and they could potentially have it without showing symptoms yet, and they could conceivably spread it to some elderly person in poor health.

Wearing a mask has just become the politically correct thing to do.  But don’t worry about the millions of children having nightmares about catching a virus and dying, even though there is almost no possibility of that actually happening.

Since so many kids are missing out on the psychological abuse experienced in government schools, I guess they need to make up for it by scaring kids about viruses and making them wear masks.