https://mises.org/wire/covid-19-experts-have-no-crystal-ball
COVID-19: The “Experts” Have No Crystal Ball
...Skepticism is the proper tool to use with any holder of
any crystal ball. That is true, regardless of the complexity
of the algorithm that they claim shows irrefutable proof of
what the future will bring one day from now, one year from
now, or one century from now.
The future is unknown to us and investing all of a society’s
options in one path is detrimental to a successful outcome.
One way that free societies have long prospered is by
allowing individuals to produce many varying paths, some of
which work, some of which fail. That is the risk mitigation
method of freedom and individual choice. A single, unified
path that no one may oppose removes a great deal of risk
mitigation and forces many to make a single bet on a single
path. That is a truly foolish idea given the fact that no
one has a crystal ball.
To believe in the utility of central planning you must be
able to fall for the idea that someone somewhere has a
crystal ball. Individual freedom is not only moral, it
provides utility and risk mitigation in moments of crisis,
precisely like the one we now face.
American federalism provides for fifty experiments.
Individual freedom in America provides for 330 million
experiments. Some win, some lose. That’s life.
Authoritarianism that drags everyone down a common path
merely ensures that all will eventually lose...
More at the link...
Also interesting:
The US’s COVID-19 Death Rate Is Far Below the Rates in Italy and Spain
https://mises.org/wire/uss-covid-19-death-rate-far-below-rates-italy-and-spain
...We frequently encounter a problem similar to this with
COVID-19 reporting. News stories frequently focus on
COVID-19 cases rather than death rates in their reporting.
Consider this Reuters headline today: “United States could
become coronavirus epicenter: WHO”
The casual readers who skims headlines is likely to take
away from this the idea that the United States is following
the same trajectory as countries like Spain and Italy when
it comes to the COVID-19 outbreak. We have heard that death
rates in Italy are alarming in much of Western Europe, and
some have claimed the US will soon experience the same fate
as Italy. While it is true the United States will soon pass
up Italy in terms of total cases, the US is far, far below
Italy in terms of its COVID-19 death rate, even if we
account for the differences in the timeline.
To see these sizable differences, let’s measure COVID-19
deaths the same way we measure homicides: in terms of deaths
per 100,000 population: ...
See link for much more if interested. Charts compare after
(It looks like we’re still 0.2 to 0.24 in the US, versus 9.4
deaths per 100K population in Italy, even accounting for
timeline differences.)
I will add those charts to my next post, though.