In the startup world we sometimes talk about the difference between being a peacetime CEO and a wartime CEO (cf this famous essay by Ben Horowitz). While some people may be turned off by this martial metaphor, it is profoundly relevant to the government’s failure to properly deal with the COVID crisis. We must take a close look at this, if we want to stand a real chance of fighting the climate crisis, which is substantially more difficult to address. I am writing this in late in 2021, essenti...

There is so much to be learned from the entirely botched handling of the COVID-19 crisis. There are lessons about markets compared to command-and-control, wartime versus peacetime institutions, decision making under uncertainty, scientific progress and much more. I am likely to write a post about each of these, starting with today’s installment: the cost of half measures. Let’s start with the observation that most people still don’t seem to understand exponential growth (another lesson right ...

Towards the end of 2019, which feels a decade ago, I wrote a post on growth. It was an attempt to get away from the blanket term “growth” and its counterpart “degrowth,” which have become stand-ins for entire philosophies and move the discussion to specific categories such as knowledge (need more) and consumption (can do with less). The COVID19 crisis, while causing immense pain, also provides a unique opportunity to reflect on what we need in our lives and what we can do without. And that ex...

One key lesson from COVID19 is that we need a lot more decentralization. This is especially true when the center is as inept at managing the crisis as the US federal government has proven to be. For example, the power of agencies such as the CDC and the FDA has turned out to be problematic, e.g. in giving guidance on mask wearing or trying to increase the availability of testing (both central to the road back). This is not just a critique of current leadership but rather of the accretion of e...

Since I wrote my post on “The Road Back from COVID19″ we have made lots of progress on two out of the three pillars: masks and tracing. Masks went from a discussion of their merits to being mandatory to wear in public in several states, including New York. Tracing went from a hodgepodge of approaches to an API supported by both Google and Apple. On the third pillar of testing, however, we are massively behind. It is by now well understood that the virus is transmissable for several days befor...

The lockdown measures put in place have started to flatten the curve, but they are hugely disruptive and even if we were better about freezing the economy than we are, we cannot possibly maintain them until we have a vaccine (which is many months off at a minimum). So how do we get back from here? There are three essential ingredients that need to be in place: masks, tests and tracing for all. How do we get these at the time of a dysfunctional federal government? Well here are some possibilit...

Something that consistently surprises me is how many people have a fundamentally static worldview. Their motto appears to be: Things are as they are and nothing will change. Never mind that history is full of massive change. And even more surprising: once a huge change has occurred the new situation becomes the new accepted normal. The COVID19 crisis is case in point. The force of change, in the form of a virus that can be spread asymptomatically, was already clearly visible in January. The m...

There has been a lot of discussion of whether or not startups qualify for forgivable loans under the Paycheck Protection Program administered by the SBA (part of the CARES Act). I don’t want to rehash the arcana of affiliation rules here but make a totally different point instead: there is a money grab going on right now by some venture backed startups that this program absolutely should exclude. Let me start by writing about the kind of business that I believe this is spot on for: the local ...

Private property has become so prevalent in the world that we rarely think about the commons. Most people consider the subway as a public good, it is part of “public transport” after all. But they are unlikely to recognize the space on the subway as a common, the way a community would previously have thought about a shared pasture. The COVID19 crisis is a stark reminder that commons are all around us: A single infected subway rider not wearing a mask could infect dozens of people. How is that...

Now that we are finally going on lockdown here in the US in order to flatten the curve of the COVID19 crisis, we also need to take drastic measures to put the economy on suspended animation. In particular, I propose the following for the duration of the lockdown:Suspend all interest, mortgage, rent and similar payments Permit companies in non-essential industries to suspend wage payments. Pay everyone a Universal Basic Income of $600/month Federally back all health insurers and in return forc...