This argument can also be supplied to all the $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ invested in schools' security both on a one-time basis and on an ongoing basis. The probabilities of any child getting killed by a mass shooter are extremely low yet what are the total $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ that have been spent on mitigation?tomfoolery wrote: ↑Tue Dec 01, 2020 4:18 pm Suppose mask-wearing does prevent a marginal amount of COVID spreading which prevents a marginal amount of COVID deaths.
From a risk mitigation standpoint, the cost has to be lower than the negative outcome we're avoiding. What are the costs of mask wearing?
It's a hassle that takes time and effort. It's perhaps marginal on the individual level but adds up considerably. 300 Million Americans. Conservatively, 10 seconds to put on or take off a mask 10 times a day. 100 seconds per American per day. That's 0.03 Hours per person. That's about 8 million hours per day spent screwing around with masks.
8 million hours per day. That seems enormous. From a percentage of the total day, it's small, but 8 million hours per day. Jeez!
And I am being conservative on 10 seconds per application and 10 times per day.
Now about the cost of the masks themselves. I won't bother estimating that, I'm still blown away by 8 million hours per day spent on this.
On average people work 8 hours a day. That keeps the math really simple. So 8 million hours is the equivalent of 1 million people not doing productive work each day.
Apple Computer has 150k employees. So rounding down even, that's like 6 Apple companies.
The opportunity cost of mask wearing in the US is the destruction of 6 Apple companies.
Okay cool, there's no way to put a price on life. Well, why don't we all agree to stop driving cars? About 40k Americans die each year from car accidents. If we all stopped driving cars, we'd save the lives of 40k people. And arguably, this would have a bigger impact than mask wearing because the people who die in car accidents are disproportionately young and unlikely to die in any given year. Whereas the deaths from COVID are disproproportionately old and very likely to die from someone else if not from COVID, since the average age of COVID death is older than the average age people die.
But no one is talking about ending cars, because it would hurt our productivity too much.
Mask wearing sucks up the equivalent productivity of 1 million people per day. How's that for productivity losses?
I was equally upset when TSA became a bigger thing after 9/11. Sure, maybe we've prevented some terrorist-related deaths, but at the cost of billions of hours of lost productivity per year, standing in lines at the airport.
Do you support the security hardening of all these schools?
Vinny
It’s always that charge of collaboration with the enemy, stabbing the righteous natives in the back that excuses the pogroms and torture of those rootless people, eh, Murph?
