Deaths everywhere, yet we are still going to work this morning. Why?

[TwirpingBird]

I am sitting here watching BBC breakfast with another harrowing video of ITU nurses at breaking point, ambulances lined up outside, 1800 dead yesterday, and headlines of 'lockdown isnt working', 'people arent complying' blah blah blah. Its all 'you need to follow the rules, you need to stay at home. I am seething.

My husband is leaving for work in an hour where he will enter 5 houses today to do completely non essential work because the government deem him a 'key worker'. My best friend will go to work in her office in a interior design company because she is a 'key worker'. Her husband will go to work giving quotes for kitchens in people's houses because his boss deems him a 'key worker'. None of my friends are on furlough. We are all seeing nobody outside of work. We are all sticking to the 'rules'. But how could we possibly expect the rules to work when everyone is still getting in their cars this morning?

I am raging angry. I am SICK and TIRED of being told 'follow the rules'. WE ARE!!! The rules make no bloody sense. And people are still dropping like flies, and experts are saying the lockdown isnt working, and the public are still being tarred as 'lacking empathy' because we are killing people. We are going to work! Kids are still in school! And then we come home and we do what we can but its never going to be enough. I am starting to wonder why I am bothering to hide myself away, managing a 2 year old and a newborn alone 5 days a week, naively thinking I am helping to manage transmission, when in reality its not helping at all because people are still at work.

I'm sure people did think about it during WW2 - and remember the recesssion after the War, rationing continued for years, it was a very bleak time (my parents, still alive, have often talked about it) - yes, of course the economy did turn around eventually.

It's a very middle class view to think that 'most' jobs can be done from home - many, many people work in the retail and hospitality sector and those industries have been brutally savaged.

because the WiFi is much faster than my home broadband.

This can be an issue. I, on the other hand, find our broadband is way better than the office. If we were uploading time sensitive tender documents, the entire office had to stop using Internet as the system couldn’t cope. If everyone was in, the systems were much slower.

I think one thing that might come out of it is better home connections being offered at competitive prices. My husbands company is paying to upgrade the home broadband and for anyone who needs it. They are able to do that because their travelling expenses costs are reduced to pretty much zero.

The economy thrived in WW2 though. So not comparable.

I wonder whether anyone asked this during WW2

🤦🏼‍♀️ Bingo'

people comparing this to ww2 need to get a grip and realise how damn lucky we are to have never lived it

I doubt they are comparing it in the sense of asserting that the risks and suffering are exactly the same, more from the perspective of "last time we as a nation faced an enormous crisis which required the spending of a great deal of money to get through, how did we think about the funding of it?"

@AmoElCafe

It’s funny, on here everyone seems to be loving working from home, whereas in real life all the people I know (mainly from corporate, finance type roles) are really missing the office. Maybe there’s a correlation between people who tend to spend a lot of time on online forums and those who prefer home working. I hate working from home. I just feel like I live at work. I can see why flexibility is desirable, but I would be extremely hesitant to take any role that was full time home working.

I agree with this. My ideal personally would be to be in the office a few days a week and at home the rest.

I, like you, feel like my home is my workplace. I feel like I don't see the outside of my 4 walls the entire week. It's stopped me from being able to relax properly in the evening because I no longer have that 'ahh I'm finally home' type feeling you know?

I also miss my colleagues and actually talking face to face to people. We have group chats and meetings and whatever but it's not the same.

And a big thing for me is just not feeling like I have anything to properly get up and dressed for. I miss my work outfits and getting up and putting on a bit of makeup and doing my hair! It all just seems pointless when you're sat in your house though so I've practically lived in lounge wear for a year. I can't wait to have an excuse to wear a nice skirt again tbh!

I'd hate it if my work turned around and said WFH was here to stay.

@Mothersruin123

People being forced into the office when they can perform their role satisfactorily from home is ridiculous and something needs to be done about it.

Could schools have a staggered approach in terms of how pupils are admitted so that they can manage class numbers? E.g. both parents key workers and vulnerable kids allowed in and then only if there's room are the kids with one key worker parent allowed in?

Childcare bubbles is another one that annoys me....I know someone who has formed a childcare bubble with another family when neither actually need childcare....it's just so the kids can play and to make the parents life a bit easier. In the meantime my only DD hasn't seen another kid face to face since we went into lockdown and it's really affecting her.

It annoys you that me and countless others have childcare bubbles so we can work and keep a roof over our kids heads?!

There is nothing in the guidance that says a childcare bubble can or should only be used when a parent is working.

I for one am not going to judge anyone who's child is suffering, having that bit of time to spend with another person, usually family i.e. grandparents (providing the person in the bubble is happy with the arrangement).

@gongsr

I did make a suggestion later in my post, perhaps you missed it.

Nope I just didn't realise that was a solution.

I struggle to comprehend why someone wants a problem they have to be solved but thinks that any impact from that is not that problem. Very self absorbed.

I'm sorry about your struggles with comprehension.

It isn't me who's self absorbed.

@DecemberSun self awareness is another strong point I see, congrats!

Childcare bubbles is another one that annoys me....I know someone who has formed a childcare bubble with another family when neither actually need childcare....

It annoys you that me and countless others have childcare bubbles so we can work and keep a roof over our kids heads?

No, she said when neither actually need childcare". A childcare bubble which exists to enable work would be one that is needed^. That's the difference.

People want everyone to stay at home until they need whatever tat they’ve ordered delivered.
Until their dog needs a vet or their boiler breaks or they need to hear the news or read a book or drink some water or use the internet or get a will, or...

An easier lockdown than March 2020 is not going to be able to combat a 50% more contagious virus. He needs to follow sturgeon and say if you were working at home in March 2020, work from home now. The problem is, when it’s left in an employers hands, they’ll deem their employees as essential, even when they aren’t.

People want everyone to stay at home until they need whatever tat they’ve ordered delivered.

Yep

I wish people would shut up about the number of cars on the road.

Yep, and the strange cognitive dissonance that when they are out driving & see all the other cars, or people in the shops, park somehow their trip is justified but others can't possibly be.

I’m sure people did think about it during WW2 - and remember the recesssion after the War, rationing continued for years, it was a very bleak time (my parents, still alive, have often talked about it) - yes, of course the economy did turn around eventually.

I don’t believe people were counting the cost of getting rid of a fascist dictator. The rationing after the war wasn’t because of recession, it was because of problems with supply. The economy did suffer but it is important to recognise that the world had never had time to recover from the Great Depression after the Wall Street crash in 1929 so many of the effects on the economy were rooted in that. The nation was able to implement the NHS in 1948, that wouldn’t have happened if the government wasn’t confident in the trajectory. And rightly so, because the post war boom was one of the strongest we’ve seen. But even with the problems afterwards, nobody would suggest we never should have carried on with the war, because the impact on the nation would be far worse. As is the case with Covid.

It's a very middle class view to think that 'most' jobs can be done from home - many, many people work in the retail and hospitality sector and those industries have been brutally savaged.
I never said most jobs could be done at home. What I said was, not everybody is suffering financially because of this. There is still a fair amount of money flowing in the economy, it is just being spent in a different way.

There is still a fair amount of money flowing in the economy, it is just being spent in a different way.

I think it's creating a wider gap in society.

The economy thrived in WW2 though. So not comparable.

No it didn’t. We had a debt of 21 billion, exceeded GDP by 200%. We had to borrow a whole lot of money from the US. We finally paid it off in 2006.

[quote gongsr]@DecemberSun self awareness is another strong point I see, congrats! [/quote]
Yes, dear, of course.

Carry on quoting everyone, you don't look at all silly.

Carry on quoting everyone, you don't look at all silly.

Any more helpful contributions to the debate?

I think it's creating a wider gap in society.

It is shoring up the economy until we can open up closed industry. A gap will always persist but any widening is temporary.

My ideal personally would be to be in the office a few days a week and at home the rest.

I agree & really like my colleagues plus the separation of work/home although I have a short commute. Lots of my friends hate their commute.

A gap will always persist but any widening is temporary.

This degree of naivety is staggering. What is being put in place to ensure this?

A gap will always persist but any widening is temporary.

I'm not sure, although I would like to hope so. I see it particularly in regards to education. I also think when it comes to paying for everything it will hit the have nots the most.

I wish people would shut up about the number of cars on the road.
To be fair, it is a pretty good indicator of people movements. I do wonder why, if we have supposedly moved to the same level of lockdown as we had in March, why vehicle movements are much higher this time round. If you could work from home then, why not now?

Yep, and the strange cognitive dissonance that when they are out driving & see all the other cars, or people in the shops, park somehow their trip is justified but others can't possibly be
You don’t have to be out in your car to know how busy the roads are. There are traffic cameras everywhere. I can see a road from my home office window. I see other roads when I’m out on my daily walks. My friends husband is an HGV driver and has lots to say about it. That’s how I know there are more cars on the road.

@gongsr

There is still a fair amount of money flowing in the economy, it is just being spent in a different way.

I think it's creating a wider gap in society.

Yes to this, it’s hard to mitigate when the very top can keep buying low value assets compared with the very bottom who might lose all

And any other elements I haven’t thought of