What changes to you foresee post-Covid? Both good and bad.

[TheGoldStandard]

While the pandemic is not over based on case numbers, taking the view of an optimist, hopefully cases numbers will trend down and this will become more endemic.

Obviously Covid has a large impact on all of us, and even once we get out of the pandemic, I think a lot of things will change. Here is my initial list, I'd appreciate others thoughts, as it may help all of us anticipate and prepare for long-term "new normal" trends:

1. I think a much larger portion of the work force will continue to work from home. I have an office of one, so my situation hasn't changed, but I anticipate for many this will create isolation. I also think this will continue to push prices up in rural areas as people discover they can afford much more by moving to a lower cost area. I think video calls will become much more regular, and we'll see shrinkage in office footprint size. This will continue to push people to rural areas, as they will want nicer/bigger houses if they are going to be in them during the workday too. I also think cruise ships, large hotels, and other large events will see a small but significant portion of their customer base move towards outdoor adventures and Airbnb.

2. While I think we'll return to having crowds, I think the total number of people going to restaurants, movies, etc., will continue to be lower than they were pre-pandemic for a while. It will probably take 5 years to get back to regular #s.

3. I think downtown businesses will continue to crumble. With the lack of workforce concentrated in the city, there are far too many restaurants, dry cleaners, day cares, etc. I think we'll continue to see cities suffer for a number of years.

4. I think seeing masks in public will continue for some. It won't be unique to see a number of people wearing masks on planes or crowded areas. I also think people are going to demand cleaner conditions, and perhaps actually wash their hands after going the bathroom (can't believe how many people didn't before the pandemic, and still may not).

5. I think pandemic spending, with no plan to repay, will continue to spike inflation for a while. I also think we'll see a reduction in a lot of manufacturing. I think it will be at least a year before supply gets back to normal.

6. With a relatively "mild" virus, we saw how fragile our infrastructure is. I think this will cause many more people to distrust the "system". Not sure how that will actually affect things, but may cause a shift in political voting.

7. Delivery services will continue to boom, including Amazon, food delivery, Walmart Plus, etc. Restaurants prices will increase due to the lack of people eating at the restaurant and buying drinks (soda, alcohol, etc.) which tend to have the highest profit margins. Retail/malls will continue a downward trend. This will have a dramatic negative effect on small business. Online services like telehealth will continue to see a boost.

8. Hard currency will continue to decline, and digital transactions will take over. This trend had already begun, but like movement to suburbs, the pandemic accelerated this at a high level. Eventually your phone will be your wallet/ID.

9. More us vs them mentality. When your circle shrinks, unfortunately so does your ability to be open-minded. I think we'll have more political unrest and dismissive viewpoints of those outside our circles. This will be very damaging to our country. Hopefully I'm wrong, and people will see the importance of strong social connections, and how vulnerable some of our population is.

Interested to hear what others think.

 

[Rubashov]

Not bad takes

 

[Rubashov]

Social isolation will continue to get worse for some people especially if working from home is here to stay, which i think it is.

There may be a new economic nationalism around required industries in some smarter better run countries. (Won't happen here)

 

[TheGoldStandard]

Hopefully we'll have a lot of good, and people will affect positive change from this. Normally tragedy brings us together (think 9/11), but the pandemic seema to have divided us even more.

 

[Keefe]

We obviously have a large part of the population who either believes the pandemic was a hoax or minimizes it as if it was the flu. They are concerned about their freedumbs which is another way of saying they’re selfish and too unwilling to do the right thing, God forbid they be inconvenienced, follow any modicum of decorum, or show any respect for their fellow man or the medical community. I mean, I too often listen to my mechanic when it comes to science but, well ya get my point.

So my fear is that this pandemic was just the tip of the iceberg. A 4/10 so far as what a pandemic could be. Like a 7.0 on the Richter scale…And that when the real one comes, we’ll be ****ed. One where the rate of transmission and fatality rate is infinitely worse than 19. And it’ll hit so hard, fast and wide that we’ll be ****ed. We won’t have the proper infrastructure in place to respond once we realize how devastating it is and by that time, 10-30% of the population is wiped out.

And why? Because as a country, we don’t learn from our mistakes. We won’t truly prepare. And as citizens, we learn even less. Upon first news, dumb ****s will do what dumb ****s do and ignore all scientific, logical and rational advice. They’ll look out for themselves and the rest will be history as some of us live and 30-100 million or so die.

Sure, it seems ludicrous. For now. So what changes do I see? Sadly, nothing. Nothing at all.

 

[JimLes]

Normally tragedy brings us together (think 9/11),

Maybe that's not such a good thing. Consider that the post 9/11 togetherness lead to both parties overwhelmingly supporting starting two wars that lasted decades and heaped untold misery on millions.

 

[Safetydan]

One thing I think you missed that I think might have the biggest long-term impact (hopefully) is the visible trend of increased class consciousness. It's small potatoes compared to the overall workforce but, we've had more unions created and joined in 2021 than in like 30 years or something.

A strengthened unity among the working class for collective bargaining is something badly needed in this country.

I'm not sure why the pandemic led to the increase but my theory is that Covid brought a break in the routine of many people's lives. I think this allowed a space for many people to just stop and think for a minute about why we all live the way we do.

 

[Al-O-Meter]

One thing I think you missed that I think might have the biggest long-term impact (hopefully) is the visible trend of increased class consciousness. It's small potatoes compared to the overall workforce but, we've had more unions created and joined in 2021 than in like 30 years or something.

That doesn't surprise. In an analysis I did for a local government agency there was an obvious spike in 2021 hiring. Government workers are the most unionized segment of the economy so it would follow that union membership in 2021 would rise in connection to that 2021 rise in government hiring. I don't think it is the class awakening you seem to believe but rather a quirk of the spending bills that had government agencies flush with cash in 2021. The pendulum is already swinging back and Biden even put out a tweet a few days ago proudly proclaiming how he had reduced year-over-year spending by $1 trillion dollars, more than any president in history.

 

[Gameface]

I wish there was a new version of unionization. The one time I worked at a union facility it was pretty standard for the company to simply refuse to do things for the benefit of the employees and just say "talk to your union, what you have is what your union agreed to." It gave them an easy out where in non-union companies the employees can put the pressure directly onto the employer and the employer didn't have a scape goat. Now the union at that place was weak and run by buffoons which was likely a big part of what sucked about it. So I don't really know, in my experience I'd rather have no union than an incompetent one.

 

[LogGrad98]

Hopefully we'll have a lot of good, and people will affect positive change from this. Normally tragedy brings us together (think 9/11), but the pandemic seema to have divided us even more.

It has, due to isolation. Isolation breeds fear, resentment, complacency, and even paranoia. There were studies done that showed that isolating babies from touch yielded horrible results. Actual research done on monkeys and then studying orphanages where there was very limited caregiver contact. I think we could see some of this repeated in people in isolation. Doesn't bode well.

These 1950s experiments showed us the trauma of parent-child separation. Now experts say they're too unethical to repeat—even on monkeys.

Harlow’s monkey experiments proved a pivotal turning point in animal research, scientific ethics, and our understanding of primate attachment.

www.popsci.com

Romanian orphanages established after the fall of the Soviet Union have served as such a study site. The facilities, which have been described as “slaughterhouses of the soul”, have historically had great disparities between the number of children and the number of caregivers (25 or more kids to one adult), meaning few if any children received the physical or emotional care they needed. Many of the children who were raised in these environments have exhibited mental health and behavioral disorders as a result. It’s even had a physical effect, with neurological research showing a dramatic reduction in the literal size of their brains and low levels of brain activity as measured by electroencephalography, or EEG, machines.

Similarly, epidemiological research has tracked the trajectories of children in the foster care system in the United States and parts of Europe to see how they differ, on average, from youths in a more traditional home environment. They’ve shown that the risk of mental disorders, suicidal ideation and attempts, and obesity are elevated among these children. Many of these health outcomes appear to be even worse among children in an institutional setting, like a Romanian orphanage, than children placed in foster care, which typically offers kids more individualized attention.

I don't think this is exactly what will happen. Like you I hope people work out a positive way to spin all this. But without a concerted effort, we could see some of these kinds of results. We kind of already do see it in the increasingly hostile and paranoid social media space. Hopefully we at least return to normal in some way.

 

[Avery]

I'll offer a few different positions, but would caution us all that everything moves in cycles. It's why kids now are dressing like they're from the 80's/90's as what's old is new again. "To everything turn, turn, turn. There is a season turn, turn, turn..." to put it another way.

- Car dealerships will reduce their overhead and physical property sizes as they carry less inventory going forward. Cars will become more 'made to order' with greater relevance now for those who wish to wait, but some physical inventory will remain albeit it in limited color/trim options
- Automation will continue to eat away and accelerate at an alarming rate. Physical workers in places such as warehouses, customer service, etc. will see pronounced retractions as machines take on what can be seen as mundane tasks. Go to school to fix the machines, don't be the machines.
- Depression and physical well-being will continue to deteriorate as human connections suffer breakage. With the move to a more digital and distant society, we will see a retraction in average life expectancies and increases in heart disease, obesity, etc. as we'll live behind electronic devices and limit physical activity/make unwise food choices for convenience

 

[TheGoldStandard]

I'll offer a few different positions, but would caution us all that everything moves in cycles. It's why kids now are dressing like they're from the 80's/90's as what's old is new again. "To everything turn, turn, turn. There is a season turn, turn, turn..." to put it another way.

- Car dealerships will reduce their overhead and physical property sizes as they carry less inventory going forward. Cars will become more 'made to order' with greater relevance now for those who wish to wait, but some physical inventory will remain albeit it in limited color/trim options
- Automation will continue to eat away and accelerate at an alarming rate. Physical workers in places such as warehouses, customer service, etc. will see pronounced retractions as machines take on what can be seen as mundane tasks. Go to school to fix the machines, don't be the machines.
- Depression and physical well-being will continue to deteriorate as human connections suffer breakage. With the move to a more digital and distant society, we will see a retraction in average life expectancies and increases in heart disease, obesity, etc. as we'll live behind electronic devices and limit physical activity/make unwise food choices for convenience

I think discounts on car will largely disappear, and will be slow to come back after inventory regulates.

 

[TheGoldStandard]

I wish there was a new version of unionization. The one time I worked at a union facility it was pretty standard for the company to simply refuse to do things for the benefit of the employees and just say "talk to your union, what you have is what your union agreed to." It gave them an easy out where in non-union companies the employees can put the pressure directly onto the employer and the employer didn't have a scape goat. Now the union at that place was weak and run by buffoons which was likely a big part of what sucked about it. So I don't really know, in my experience I'd rather have no union than an incompetent one.

That is the problem, you can't say being a union will be better. Like anything, you need a good union, that understands the company, and its restraints on ability to pay, along with the ability to look out for good employees (while being flexible to get rid of the bad ones).

My biggest issue with unions, is the protection afforded to employees who should be fired. This same methodology tends to make promotions more difficult as well, which keeps the best employees held back, and potentially paid less, so the poor performers get their negotiated wage and benefit. Similarly, seniority tends to influence benefits, so a rising star gets held back, and likely leaves. Not to mention the internal union politics. This is the crap that holds companies back.

I'm sure everyone has had horrible teachers with protection afforded by the teacher's union, schools basically can't get rid of them. And the police unions do the same thing.

I'm all for collective bargaining and negotiating fair wages (Hostess is an example of a union failing the employees in this regard), but I also think all employees should be accountable, and if you aren't good at what you do, promotions/raises should not be a given, and it should be easier for you to lose your job if you aren't meeting reasonable set standards. The union should ensure those steps are followed, not protect employees no matter what.

I don't want to work with people that have less accountability, and I wouldn't want to own a business where I have to keep people on like that.

There are definitely good unions out there, that have a good balance. There are also many unions that are awful, so I agree with @Gameface and his view, and expound on it.

A good union will enhance the best qualities of its workforce and take care of its employees, a bad union will do the opposite.

This isn't anything unique. There are many companies that are non-union that do an amazing job taking care of employees in all facets. Unfortunately, there are many that do not.

 

[Gameface]

There are some things that I'll be happy to see stay. The plexiglass barrier between me and cashiers and such is great and should stay, imho.

I'm a little bummed that curbside pick-up seems to be going away in most places. I think it's just labor intensive and not part of smooth workflow. Too bad, I liked that.

I wish that COVID had created a push for a better health care/health insurance system in the U.S. but it almost seems like it has pushed us further away from that. Our system is so dumb and there are several working examples of better systems in other countries.

 

[TheGoldStandard]

There are some things that I'll be happy to see stay. The plexiglass barrier between me and cashiers and such is great and should stay, imho.

I'm a little bummed that curbside pick-up seems to be going away in most places. I think it's just labor intensive and not part of smooth workflow. Too bad, I liked that.

I wish that COVID had created a push for a better health care/health insurance system in the U.S. but it almost seems like it has pushed us further away from that. Our system is so dumb and there are several working examples of better systems in other countries.

Curbside/to go/etc. are generally bad for stores/restaurants. They were a pandemic lifeline, but online ordering tends to make you spend less as you are less likely to pick up impulse buys at the grocery store and alcohol/drinks at restaurants.

I agree, I like both.

 

[Gameface]

Curbside/to go/etc. are generally bad for stores/restaurants. They were a pandemic lifeline, but online ordering tends to make you spend less as you are less likely to pick up impulse buys at the grocery store and alcohol/drinks at restaurants.

I agree, I like both.

I'm thinking more of take-out or fast food places. Like El Pollo Loco has curbside right now. Some sandwich shops that did have stopped. I think Cafe Rio has stopped doing it.

 

[TheGoldStandard]

I'm thinking more of take-out or fast food places. Like El Pollo Loco has curbside right now. Some sandwich shops that did have stopped. I think Cafe Rio has stopped doing it.

My Cafe Rio has a drive thru. So awesome. As part of all of the pandemic, we signed up for Target delivery and Walmart Plus. I never go into a Wal-Mart store, but I'm happy to have their stuff delivered. We get groceries delivered once a week. The $10 we tip is offset from the lower Wal-Mart prices compared to our other grocery options. I still make trips to Albertsons, Costco and a butcher for produce, meats, and a few other things. Amex Platinum gives you a credit for the monthly Walmart Plus fee, so it is totally worth it for me. I normally don't like talking to people in public, so if I can avoid a few stores, then I'm happy.

On a slight tangent, does anyone get bugged when Chick Fil A workers say "my pleasure" when you thank them? I know it is required, but it always bugs me. No one takes pleasure in handing you a bag of chicken, so it is disingenuous. And if it truly gives you pleasure to feed me chicken, that's a bit odd.

I've gotten to the point where I won't say "thank you" at Chick Fil A. Instead, I'll say, "have a nice day" or "have a good one", and over half the time, they still respond with "my pleasure." Ugh.

And yes, I know the saying "my pleasure" is akin to "you're welcome", it just sounds odd. -Add another thought to the pet peeve thread.

 

[Gameface]

My Cafe Rio has a drive thru. So awesome. As part of all of the pandemic, we signed up for Target delivery and Walmart Plus. I never go into a Wal-Mart store, but I'm happy to have their stuff delivered. We get groceries delivered once a week. The $10 we tip is offset from the lower Wal-Mart prices compared to our other grocery options. I still make trips to Albertsons, Costco and a butcher for produce, meats, and a few other things. Amex Platinum gives you a credit for the monthly Walmart Plus fee, so it is totally worth it for me. I normally don't like talking to people in public, so if I can avoid a few stores, then I'm happy.

On a slight tangent, does anyone get bugged when Chick Fil A workers say "my pleasure" when you thank them? I know it is required, but it always bugs me. No one takes pleasure in handing you a bag of chicken, so it is disingenuous. And if it truly gives you pleasure to feed me chicken, that's a bit odd.

I've gotten to the point where I won't say "thank you" at Chick Fil A. Instead, I'll say, "have a nice day" or "have a good one", and over half the time, they still respond with "my pleasure." Ugh.

And yes, I know the saying "my pleasure" is akin to "you're welcome", it just sounds odd. -Add another thought to the pet peeve thread.

People really like Chick-Fil-A but I've been supper unimpressed the 2 times I've gone there in the last 14 years and I live less than a mile from one. It's one of those places that isn't even an option for me even when I'm tired of everything else I normally get.

I haven't done any grocery delivery. I couldn't have someone else pick my produce and I go shopping 2-3 times a week because I often go buy recipe specific stuff the day I make it. We're a 3 person household so Costco isn't an option for produce typically.

 

[TheGoldStandard]

People really like Chick-Fil-A but I've been supper unimpressed the 2 times I've gone there in the last 14 years and I live less than a mile from one. It's one of those places that isn't even an option for me even when I'm tired of everything else I normally get.

I haven't done any grocery delivery. I couldn't have someone else pick my produce and I go shopping 2-3 times a week because I often go buy recipe specific stuff the day I make it. We're a 3 person household so Costco isn't an option for produce typically.

Yeah, as far as meat or produce, I do Albertsons or Costco (steaks and ribs).

Walmart for all the other essentials. Their chicken is ok.

I like chick fil a nuggets and fruit cups.

 

[One Brow]

No one takes pleasure in handing you a bag of chicken, so it is disingenuous. And if it truly gives you pleasure to feed me chicken, that's a bit odd.

I worked at a Burger for over three years while I was post-graduate, and most days I took pleasure from dealing with pleasant customers and serving good food. What's wrong with you that you take take pleasure in demanding work done well?