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[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

The paid leave to stay home because a child's school is closed requirement thrust upon all employers (except for those with over 500 employees because...?) in that bill is dangerous. I don't expect Mnuchin to grasp that, as he's an idiot, but one of Pelosi's people should have.

My wife owns a small business. To be prudent, we'll drain the cash, draw down on the lines a bit and try to stay open as long as responsibly possible. It's HC, so it has to stay open to a certain extent.

A lot of small businesses are not so nimble and don't have a pile of receivables on which to feast during the trough that's coming. By compelling businesses to pay ANY form of mandate they haven't planned for will imperil those businesses' ability to stay current on leases, mortgages, etc. These businesses will be compelled to drain out all of their cash. Nationally, this is a drain on banks' balance sheets at the time they really don't need that sort of thing.

Now, of course, the govt says it will reimburse businesses for these outlays. But that's down the road. The time the businesses need to hold cash to survive is now. Not ten months from now.

And the govt says it will grant exemptions to businesses who will fail if compelled to pay this mandate. That'll take weeks to determine. Many small businesses won't have that kind of time.

There's also the fact that one cannot squeeze blood from a stone. Business owners are simply not going to pay this in many instances as they can't afford it, and the govt will not be able to enforce it. Which comes to my last observation on this bill...

It seems a stealth way of dictating all businesses shut down. No responsible business owner would take the risk of incurring these costs. It's smarter to simply close up shop for a bit and tell your employees to collect unemployment compensation.

I feel terrible for bar and restaurant owners. This situation has got to be insanely scary.

I don't disagree with you that there is going to be a lot of economic pain. I said I didn't see how we could avoid a recession weeks ago. We really do need businesses to shut down, if they rely on physical presence. A lot of people are going to die because our hospitals are going to be overwhelmed. If businesses have to close to slow the spread of the disease and save lives, that needs to happen.

I really marvel at how slowly some people seem to be grasping the severity of the situation. Hospitals in California are canceling elective surgeries -- think about why. eta: Seattle is worse. And this is just starting.