As noted earlier today, Tyler Cowen posted about my critiques of his views on lockdowns.
I don’t have time to answer thoroughly but I do think I did him an injustice on one issue.
Cowen writes:
And my remark about “It just doesn’t seem worth it”, cited by David as me dismissing school reopenings? Here is what I actually wrote:
Indoor restaurant dining and drinking, for example, is probably not a good idea in most parts of the U.S. right now.
Yes, many of the Covid cases spread by such activity would be among the lower-risk young, rather than the higher-risk elderly. Still, practically speaking, given America’s current response capabilities, those cases will further paralyze schools and workplaces and entertainment venues. It just doesn’t seem worth it.
I am worried about reopening indoor bars and restaurants because I want to keep schools (and other venues) open. At my own school, GMU, I very much argued for keeping it open, which indeed we have done with success but also with great effort. My whole point is one about trade-offs.
The above three paragraphs are from Tyler.
Now the following is David R. Henderson:
I did misinterpret him. I thought he was throwing in schools with bars and restaurants and I see now that he wasn’t.
My apologies to Tyler Cowen and to my readers.
This post is titled “One of Tyler Cowen’s Points is Right.” That doesn’t mean there aren’t others. If I find them, I will post on them. But it won’t be today. I have deadlines.
READER COMMENTS
Kevin Dick
Oct 27 2020 at 6:28pm
Again, I think you have the better of this discussion. I’m actually quite confused by what general points of yours he disagrees with. Allying with “a few eccentric thinkers” and ” failing the ideological Turing test badly and repeatedly,” are not really a productive line of argument.
It seems to me you simply want a proper CBA and he wants to make an epicycical meta argument that some second order, vaguely assessed costs/benefits somehow obviously outweigh the more concrete ones you raise. They may well, but that would be a “show your work” situation.
Now, I do think you made an apples-oranges mistake on comparing case rates in your Oster database post. But resolving the values of specific variables in a CBA is a straightforward discussion.
David Henderson
Oct 27 2020 at 6:39pm
Thanks, Kevin. I think so too and I appreciate that.
Re apples-oranges mistake, you might be right. I was comparing a flow with a stock, right?
Kevin Dick
Oct 27 2020 at 6:46pm
Yes, the Oster database was a daily case rate (presumably smoothed in some way) and I think you compared it to a _cumulative_ case rate.
I can totally see how this might happen as “rate” usually implies flow. And often times, sources aren’t particularly clear over what time period a case rate is computed. I recently stepped in this particular puddle myself in a Facebook post.
Kevin Dick
Oct 27 2020 at 6:49pm
Particularly confusing was a paper I read while skimming through medrxiv with a graph that said “case rate” in the title and then had weeks on the x-axis. But they really meant the average daily case rate for the week!
David Henderson
Oct 27 2020 at 6:58pm
Thanks.
raja_r
Oct 28 2020 at 10:50am
…and he wants to make an epicycical meta argument that some second order, vaguely assessed costs/benefits somehow…
He only does that with policies that he disagrees with, not with the ones he likes.
Kevin Dick
Oct 28 2020 at 2:38pm
Good point!
RPLong
Oct 28 2020 at 9:14am
Cowen’s was technically a point about trade-offs here, but the paragraph taken in total is very much susceptible to your overall criticism. Cowen writes, “those cases will further paralyze…” He writes as though this is a certainty, but it’s not certain at all. He’s not analyzing the trade-offs between slight increases in low-risk case rates, the odds of any possible “paralysis,” and the potential good that might come of opening anyway.
Think how much stronger his argument would have been if he had put it that way. In that case, the argument would now be about what, exactly, the odds of each of these things are, and how much bad we could tolerate to get the good. He sometimes finishes his blog posts with the phrase “show your work.” It would be nice to see him show his work on covid restrictions.
zeke5123
Oct 28 2020 at 11:59am
All the more so given that current “cases” are based largely on PCR testing which is picking up on COVID-19 so small that (i) it doesn’t really hurt the person and (ii) isn’t contagious. The NYT reported that upwards of 90% of PCR positive tests fit that description.
Thus, perhaps if TC is concerned about the population’s reaction, maybe he should be advocating changing how cases are reported (i.e., reject PCR testing).
David Henderson
Oct 28 2020 at 12:03pm
Good points, RPLong and zeke5123.
KevinDC
Oct 28 2020 at 10:12am
I can see how you were confused about what he meant – truth be told, I’m still confused about his clarification even after re-reading it several times. Specifically when he said “Still, practically speaking, given America’s current response capabilities, those cases will further paralyze schools and workplaces and entertainment venues“, I took “entertainment venues” to be a reference to bars and restaurants, which he had specifically mentioned only a couple of sentences earlier. This made it really easy to think he was, as you said, “throwing in schools with bars and restaurants”.
If Tyler says he didn’t mean that, then to me that’s the final word on that topic – I’m not inclined to accuse people of misunderstanding their own opinions. But I think Tyler’s charge about “willful misreading” is wildly unfair. When a number of people who are ideologically and intellectually sympathetic to you are all “misreading” you to more or less the same effect, you should at least consider the possibility that you didn’t communicate your views as well or as clearly as you thought you did before leveling that kind of accusation.
J Mann
Oct 29 2020 at 2:15pm
Here’s the two Cowen paragraphs in question.
It’s not clear what other prohibitions Cowen advocates beyond indoor restaurant activity, but presumably some. (Including, perhaps but not necessarily, school activity that doesn’t meet standards for contact tracing and the other safeguards Cowen advocates).
In any case, you can synchronize it with “further paralyze … entertainment venues” if you read Cowen to mean either (a) allowing indoor restaurant activity leads to case spread that paralyzes outdoor restaurant and other entertainment activity or (b) allowing indoor restaurant activity leads to case levels that cause patrons to voluntarily avoid restaurants. (Cowen makes the second point some place in his two pieces.)
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