What Industries/Jobs Will be Hardest Hit by the Shut-down, and Which Ones might not Recover?
Mates,
In just about 2 hours our beautiful state officially goes to 'Stay-at-Home' status by order of the Governor. It is scheduled to last 3 weeks. If it goes too much longer every occupation and employer, with the possible exception of the government, is going to be caving in. However, even in the short term some industries or occupations are probably at much greater risk of significant injury and/or job loss.
Tonight's questions are:
1. What industries or occupations are likely to take the biggest hit in the short term?
2. Do you foresee any types of employment that might be permanently changed by this, or in fact, might never recover or come back?
Keep safe everybody,
XM
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:07 PM ^
Short term? Service workers. Their stores are closed. Upstream of that, factories are idle, and that's a problem.
Small businesses in general are going to hurt, bad. Won't take much to put a fair number out of business. I think we'll see the end of lots of mom & pop restaurants and a few whole chains.
I don't know about types of employment. There's no particular industry that is at fault. I do wonder if certain types of restaurants might have a hard time when things come back if Covid-19 is still around, though.
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:43 PM ^
If anything it will be businesses and individuals carrying too much debt and can't survive a short-term dip. That's why Dave Ramsey is the best. Cash is King!
March 23rd, 2020 at 11:06 PM ^
No politics?
Except for the left wing kind, but that is ignored because the mods and likely a majority of the posters on here just label it common sense.
To the best of my knowledge, Dave Ramsey is apolitical. He offers financial advice.
Now if you want to discuss the wisdom of his financial advice, I think it is very good for young / very early career folks. If you have good spending discipline, you need to establish excellent credit and so you get and responsibly use a good credit card. And now I'm really off topic.
Except nobody wants phyiscal cash right now. Contactless payment only!
I would be very happy to take your physical cash off your hands!
Barbershops are closing up everywhere, and rightly so.
Wearing gloves is easy, but if a mask won't keep me safe, I'm not sure how I can do my job without putting myself or my clients at risk.
Taking a wait and see approach for now, but I'm not optimist for my industry.
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:09 PM ^
"Certain aspects of show business...and our thing." As Silvio might say, Ive been thinkng of this quote a lot the last few days
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:13 PM ^
Airlines and the travel industry in general is toast. You gotta think cruise lines, especially those aimed at the elderly, will go under.
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:18 PM ^
I mean, there are always gonna be airplanes. Lots of mom and pop stores are done. Going to be a lot of empty real estate in many towns the next couple years.
Industries to recover? Pharma, biotech etc.
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:18 PM ^
Airlines will be ok because theyre gonna get that sweet free government money. The American government wouldnt let them fail anyway
March 23rd, 2020 at 11:07 PM ^
And then they'll hit us with a pandemic fee when we're back.
March 23rd, 2020 at 11:30 PM ^
Expect checked baggage to go from $50 to $100 per bag.
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:39 PM ^
Airlines are not toast one bit. Too big to fail, unfortunately. Just like banks in '08. It's economic infrastructure. They may consolidate as banks did during the great recession.
Ameritedelta Airlines
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:42 PM ^
They pocketed billions the last few years. They will be fine.
March 23rd, 2020 at 11:50 PM ^
Even worse they bought back billions in stock at the highs
They used corporate profit to buyback stocks at all time highs, thus inflating the stock price and then sold their own options and stock rewards.
Now they will get bailed out for their failures.
As Jblaze said, the airlines used profit to buy back their own stocks. They have no cash piled up to weather this storm - which is why they want a bailout. I was in favor of letting the banks go in 2008, and I'm in favor of letting the airlines go now. If they can't survive, fuck 'em. Plenty of business' and individuals that will buy the HW and start a new airline with a better business plan. Fuck 'em.
The banks were bailed out largely without strings, and the guys running them are still billionaires that essentially stole money from us. It was our money they lost, but they were made whole while we got stuck with the losses.
The auto industry (GM and Chrysler, specifically) were also bailed out. But their money came with shitloads of strings attached, and was eventually paid back, with the Gov't getting a slight profit. The result is that the entire industry is far better positioned to get through this without any trouble.
If there are going to be bailouts for airline and cruise companies, they better come with a mega-shitload of strings attached.
Except for the American taxpayer (gov't) losing about $11 billion on the GM bailout.
I agree with all of this, except bailing out the cruise lines. Let Liberia bail them out, since that's where their ships are flagged to avoid our laws and regulations.
Airlines are going absolutely nowhere. At least not your major airlines like Delta, United, Southwest and American. They're at the point where they're too big to fail, and you can't afford to have them go under. Life eventually will return to normal, and people are going to need a way to easily get across the globe. There is no other alternative to plane travel right now. They're going to get bailed out big time by the government. That being said, you may have some smaller airlines that go belly-up, those low-cost airlines that only hit secondary markets, like Sun Country.
Cruise lines, I don't know enough about. Never been on a cruise, and unless you tell me its an Alaskan or Mediterranean cruise, I have next to no desire to go on one, either. Even in normal times.
The larger cruise lines Carnival, Royal Caribbean, and Norwegian will be fine. They have printed money the few years. They can cancel their refurbishments(costs are over $100 million per ship) and port enhancements to save money.
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:16 PM ^
Any small business operating on the fringe of survival during the good times will not survive this. Many start ups are going to fail before they ever get a chance to succeed. Even giants like GE are starting to take major hits.
Stupid. Fucking. Virus.
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:19 PM ^
Small businesses have got to be getting hammered. Imagine your business income just going to $0 on an already tight budget.
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:25 PM ^
College and Pro sporting events :(
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:38 PM ^
Performing arts organizations will be toast. They already operate on very thin margins, were the first to close and will be the last to be able to open for business, due to their model thriving on people being near each other. Pro sports will take a hit, but they have a digital distribution model that theaters, orchestras, and operas simply don’t.
Even a week of two before the required closures, I was at the concerts of a major symphony orchestra that likely were at 30% capacity. The programming wasn’t the type that would typically induce a sellout (even though it was a terrific concert), but under normal circumstances I’d expect to be 75%+ full.
I also expect a TON of nursing home bankruptcies. Many have been stripped to the bone by private equity/hedge funds in recent years, and lawsuits for deaths due to this are going to be widely prevalent barring legislation that indemnifies them.
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:52 PM ^
I'm not sure if you will check this thread again, but the phrase "the programming wasn't the type that would typically induce a sellout" always made me scratch my head. Why do you think symphonies stick to Beethoven no.5 when they could print money doing John Williams pop concerts and Star Wars movie play alongs all season. Is it just to stay "true" to the arts, or do the musicians really hate that shit?
March 23rd, 2020 at 11:24 PM ^
We don’t hate it: we know what pays the bills. And I’ve performed with John Williams — he’s a delightful person who’s way more talented than I could ever hope to be. But we also know there’s a bit of saturation. Most attendees of those shows aren’t going to sign up for a subscription and attend several times in a season. (We know this because we do several of those type of shows a year and don’t get a ton of repeat customers within a year. They normally come 1-2x a year).
Whereas for the other rep, you have people who buy subscriptions, so you give them variety. Some Beethoven (most of his symphonies will reliably fill 90-100% of the house), and some lesser-known pieces. But even on the classical side, the pieces that completely fill the hall also tend to cost the most to put on, so from a financial perspective you’re sometimes better doing some smaller works that don’t sell out. Yo-Yo Ma always sells out, but he gets handsomely compensated. When Dudamel guest conducts, its the same. It’s also true of major opera stars if you wish to perform one of those in concert, and there you have multiple soloists. Mahler’s a good sell, but you need many additional members of the orchestra, and often a vocal soloist or two. The program I was referring to had a guest conductor (of whom I think highly, but he’s simply not a draw) and a program of 20th and 21st century music. It was never going to sell out, but it cost less to put on, so in normal circumstances it would have a similar net financially to other classical performances.
March 24th, 2020 at 12:17 AM ^
Yeah I'm guessing it's going to be a while before my gigs start picking back up
March 24th, 2020 at 12:23 AM ^
user name checking out
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:41 PM ^
Hopefully the media because they suck
March 23rd, 2020 at 11:08 PM ^
Hate to break it to ya but this is feeding right into what the media is selling.
March 23rd, 2020 at 11:13 PM ^
It's not the media I watch and read that sucks, it's all that other media!
March 24th, 2020 at 10:15 AM ^
Suck is actually factual. Big Bro at his best.
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:41 PM ^
Some researchers at Cornell already figured this one out: LINK
Good link!
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:41 PM ^
My industry - clinical trials. Rough time to be a vendor in this space. Lots of big pharma are shutting down their clinical operations. I do think the financial pressures from this ordeal will grease the rusty ass wheels and push us faster towards decentralized clinical trials that don't rely on 100% on-site patient visits. The biggest hold up will still be the lack of clinically validated assessments to map all the boundless data we can capture from wearables to meaningful measures of disease progression/improvement.
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:43 PM ^
Zero-interest (or entirely forgivable) bridge loans are going to be handed out like Pez by the SBA and others pretty soon, probably starting next week. If it is limited to 3 weeks, they'll survive, but it's going to hurt.
By comparison, many businesses in Europe close their shops for a full month (or more) every summer and don't go out of business because it's baked into the planning. The problem here is the suddenness, but with this much liquidity being pumped into the system, they'll survive as long as they can get workers back (hopefully at least a few of them will be familiar faces).
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:49 PM ^
Demand for gas station pump operators skyrockets.
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:51 PM ^
Fast casual dining will be crushed. We will see chains like Olive Garden, Red Robin and maybe places like Buffalo Wild Wings go under. Many local bars and restaurants. Movie theatres - and possibly entire chains. Bowling alleys. All of these places were doing bad before the shut down. Now they are going to wilt. we may see the end of the remaining Family Video stores as the holdouts begin to stream.
Places that no longer appeal as brick and mortar such as GameStop, Vitamin Stores and other industries that are strong online. Book store may suffer - again
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:56 PM ^
The question is whether these businesses can weather the storm. Once everyone is comfortable to socially resume everyday life, there will be an interest to go back to the neighborhood bar, movie theater, and bowling alley. My city alone has 4 bowling alleys and so many independent bars and restaurants. It won’t be until maybe late 2020 at the earliest until people feel comfortable, but If this storm can be weathered they will be okay.
March 23rd, 2020 at 11:07 PM ^
How long is it going to take people to be comfortable though? People are already terrified of going near someone, it's going to take a long time for that fear to subside.
March 23rd, 2020 at 11:12 PM ^
I don’t know. There was a crowd of people swarming for the last available cart at Meijer today after the worker finished wiping the cart down after sneezing half a dozen times
March 23rd, 2020 at 11:15 PM ^
That's hilarious and terrifying. It was more like a dirge at Costco.
I've been saying that going to the market is like a scene out of Handmaid's Tale. Everyone is walking around quietly and looking at each other warily.
If you don't mind a little bit of a smaller selection and paying a bit more for what you get, higher-end independent markets like Plum and Papa Joe's are much less crowded and seem to have a better stock of merchandise. Everyone thinks to run to Kroger or Meijer or Costco...so I'm sticking to the smaller markets.
I live about a mile away from a Costco, so I shop there regularly. I've been there twice in the last two weeks, and it has been eerily quiet.
March 23rd, 2020 at 10:59 PM ^
I suspect jobs in the Senate and the House will be hit hard if they can’t get past playing politics and loading agenda driven policy into a national emergency stimulus bill.
March 23rd, 2020 at 11:13 PM ^
Doubtful. Thanks Elbridge...