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When are things going back to normal?  Will they ever? (1 Viewer)

Otis

Footballguy
Every now and then I stop and think about how much every aspect of my life has changed since March, and I find it hard to wrap my head around it. 

Will I ever be commuting on public transit again into a major city?  Will there be much business travel?  Less?  Almost none?  Why would anyone pay for it after we’ve shown for months we can do without it?

When will restaurants reopen?  Will they go back to normal?  How many can even survive this? Friend who owns restaurants thinks that even after a vaccine we will be permanently changed.

Are schools going to be forever changed?

What are your thoughts on whether, or when, things may go back to “normal”—and whether it will even be the same normal as before?

 
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I think we will be permanently different. Some things will look mostly like they used to, but some things will be different.

For example - I suspect masks are mostly here to stay. At least for the next couple of years.

From everything I've read, there will be a 20-30% permanent reduction in the demand for office space. People are just going to work differently. Hotelling at offices will become a lot more popular - with people partially working from home. As a result - almost all homes built in the next few years will have a home office. Also - the open floor plans that had become so popular at offices - I think you'll see things move away from that. Back to more individual offices. (Sorry - I work in real estate).

A lot more will be done on zoom - so work travel will be reduced. For example, I know a lot of consultants and they are currently working remotely. If clients don't have to pay for travel and hotels? Very likely at least some of their work is done remotely in the future.

A recent study here in Austin said that 90% of the music venues will be permanently closed by October 31. And there's nothing unique about Austin - other than we have a lot of music venues. But some large percentage of restaurants and bars are likely going to fail. Now eventually things will pop up in their place - but that will take time.

Obviously there is more. But the point is - life will be changed because of this, no doubt.

 
Let's not pretend that those shuttered music venues and restaurants won't be bought up by entrepreneurs and reopened. 
 

Our taste for live entertainment and public dining hasn't gone away, our ability to safely attend is the issue. This will pass. It did a hundred years ago. It will again. 
 

IMO by late 2021 America will be getting back close to her old fighting weight. Concerts/Tours/Festivals will be back. We will likely have lasting safety precautions in place... but things are coming back.

 
Some of is going to depend on the vaccine.  There's the polio vaccine which can be almost 100% effective and there's the flu vaccine which some years can be as low as 25% effective.   

 
Let's not pretend that those shuttered music venues and restaurants won't be bought up by entrepreneurs and reopened. 
 
They definitely will. But unfortunately they will be largely bought up by chains/large corporations. If you were once lucky enough to live in a place with a lot of locally owned venues your dining/entertainment options are likely to become a lot more homogenized.

 
Some of is going to depend on the vaccine.  There's the polio vaccine which can be almost 100% effective and there's the flu vaccine which some years can be as low as 25% effective.   
Again, the Flu vaccine is ineffective because there are ####loads of strains. There is thus far zero evidence of this problem with COVID. The issue with COVID right now is the Suspected lack of any sort of antibody longevity. 

 
I suspect we're still, at a minimum, at least 12 months away from getting anywhere near normal.  Given the current state of things, I don't see how we're not fumbling our way through this all the way through winter and into next spring.  

Public transit has always been gross.  I've ridden buses and subways to work for years and always thought it was gross.  Anyone who's commuted in NYC has seen the occasional Asian person wearing a mask in the winter.  Always thought it was kind of funny.  Now I suspect that will be the norm for the foreseeable future.  Personally I've always had the flexibility to work from home as needed, and I'm expecting to make that a more permanent thing going forward - I'll wear a mask if I have to get on the subway again but I'd honestly prefer to just avoid it altogether.  So I don't think we ever get back to pre-COVID "normal" here, there will be a big shift towards more remote work now that we've demonstrated it can be done. 

A lot of restaurants won't make it through the next year or so of reduced business but that's an area I think will eventually return to normal.  You'll probably see some minor changes like hand sanitizer dispensers at the hostess stand or whatever but people will eventually be comfortable with this again.  I know I'm personally looking forward to going out to a nice restaurant at some point in the future, as a sign of our return to normalcy.  

Schools will eventually get back to normal because a lot of people need the daycare.  That's the reality for a ton of people, we don't have public schools because they want the state to educate their kids, we have public schools because capitalism demands they have somewhere to put their kids for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week.  Like restaurants there will probably be some changes around sanitation practices, etc. though I suspect a lot of that will just be theater.  For the most part schools will go back to normal, for better or worse, in fall 2021.  

 
Again, the Flu vaccine is ineffective because there are ####loads of strains. There is thus far zero evidence of this problem with COVID. The issue with COVID right now is the Suspected lack of any sort of antibody longevity. 
That's fair.   I should've said some of it depends on whether the virus mutates.   Is the antibody longevity  really that big of a problem?   Can't you just get a booster?  I know that just leads to another big problem which is getting enough people to get a vaccine or follow up boosters in the first place.   Maybe getting that booster every six months or year becomes the new norm.   

 
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Things won't get back to pre-covid normal anytime soon.   That's just a sad reality.  Much of it is due to a virus and much of it is due to one of the biggest failures in history in handling a situation by our government and leadership.  The strongest, smartest and wealthiest country with by far the most resources on the planet has handled ths virus with such stupidity and stubborness that over 4 months into this thing--the problem/virus is growing and not getting better.    Our government has been more concerned with restoring the effing stock market more than they have the livelihoods of the vast majority of the people.   One of the reasons why things won't get back to normal anytime soon is that the virus and our response to it will be one of the biggest redistributions of wealth in history.   The giant corporatations that make it through this thing will disproportionately own and control more wealth in this country moving forward.   The virus will probably grow or linger around until the time of the election--and once that happens people will get emotionally charged and there will be more protests.  I could see another wave hitting around Thanksgivng/Christmas.  I think it'll be at least a year before anything gets  remotely back to normal in regards to our livelihoods---but by then--the entire economic landscape of this country will have been completely transformed.  

 
Let's not pretend that those shuttered music venues and restaurants won't be bought up by entrepreneurs and reopened. 
 

Our taste for live entertainment and public dining hasn't gone away, our ability to safely attend is the issue. This will pass. It did a hundred years ago. It will again. 
 

IMO by late 2021 America will be getting back close to her old fighting weight. Concerts/Tours/Festivals will be back. We will likely have lasting safety precautions in place... but things are coming back.
Yep.  It's not like we've never had pandemics before.  Assuming we get an effective vaccine -- and that's looking very likely -- we'll go back to something resembling normal pretty quickly.

I do agree that WFH and Zoom are probably going to be here to stay.

 
I definitely agree there will be more WFH, but I think there is a significant amount of work that will still return to offices.  While you can manage through things like Zoom it is not as effective as face to face meetings in a lot of cases.  Likewise business travel will still be around, clients like to see people and you can't replicate the connection with people online that can be achieved in person.  I know first hand that so much can happen before and after a scheduled meeting just being in the room that people dialing in are never a part of.

 
Serious answer

I'll say spring 2021

Things kind of feel normal again where I live. Yeah we are wearing masks in stores and who knows about school and I am wfh still but youth sports are back in full swing, people are going to beaches, visiting family, having pool parties, summer camps are open, and our numbers are still very very low. So yeah it feels kind of normal which is nice.

The reason I said spring 2021 is I think the new outbreak states will figure things out by then, the dreaded second wave will have passed (with possibly more shutdown orders) and our #s across the country will be very low. Even without a vaccine I think kids need to go back to school fulltime and I don't think they can wait a whole year. As far as WFH, NYC may never be the same if everyone WFH after the pandemic. Instead of the tourist capital of the world, it may become a ghost town. Crazy.

 
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Good OP. We'll get through this thing. History tells us we can get through all kinds of calamities, not least of which was the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic. We have been here before.

To answer the question, it will be a long haul. Practically I think summer 2022. Sucks but there it is. We may get a vaccine as early as this fall, maybe winter of 2020-2021 or next spring, but it will come. And then fights and struggles over distribution of the vaccine will occur. But things will not be normal, really and truly normal, until almost all people are free of fear of contracting the virus, and that will take a long damned time.

 
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I suspect we're still, at a minimum, at least 12 months away from getting anywhere near normal.  Given the current state of things, I don't see how we're not fumbling our way through this all the way through winter and into next spring.  

Public transit has always been gross.  I've ridden buses and subways to work for years and always thought it was gross.  Anyone who's commuted in NYC has seen the occasional Asian person wearing a mask in the winter.  Always thought it was kind of funny.  Now I suspect that will be the norm for the foreseeable future.  Personally I've always had the flexibility to work from home as needed, and I'm expecting to make that a more permanent thing going forward - I'll wear a mask if I have to get on the subway again but I'd honestly prefer to just avoid it altogether.  So I don't think we ever get back to pre-COVID "normal" here, there will be a big shift towards more remote work now that we've demonstrated it can be done. 

A lot of restaurants won't make it through the next year or so of reduced business but that's an area I think will eventually return to normal.  You'll probably see some minor changes like hand sanitizer dispensers at the hostess stand or whatever but people will eventually be comfortable with this again.  I know I'm personally looking forward to going out to a nice restaurant at some point in the future, as a sign of our return to normalcy.  

Schools will eventually get back to normal because a lot of people need the daycare.  That's the reality for a ton of people, we don't have public schools because they want the state to educate their kids, we have public schools because capitalism demands they have somewhere to put their kids for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week.  Like restaurants there will probably be some changes around sanitation practices, etc. though I suspect a lot of that will just be theater.  For the most part schools will go back to normal, for better or worse, in fall 2021.  
As to the bolded, when I first started traveling to Japan for work years ago, I thought those Japanese folks were a bunch of nancies, so many walking around in the winter with a mask on, so terrified of germs and getting sick.  What a fool I was, such an American mentality.  It turns out, people in Japan don't wear masks to avoid getting sick -- they wear masks when they themselves are sick, so they don't transmit it to others.  It's funny that in my western mindset, that possibility didn't even dawn on my until it was explained.  Such a different way of approaching the world around you.

So I've found the American response to masks, especially in certain parts of the country, interesting.  It's very much a cultural thing.  Cultures like the Japanese very much focused on respect for those around you, and wearing a mask is a no brainer.

Anyway, this COVID thing maybe has opened up the eyes of many Americans to that way of viewing things -- let me wear a mask not to protect myself, but my neighbor.  And maybe we'll see more of that going forward, even after a vaccine.

 
As far as WFH, NYC may never be the same if everyone WFH after the pandemic. Instead of the tourist capital of the world, it may become a ghost town. Crazy.
I find this so interesting.  On the one hand, it makes total sense that this will be a fundamental white collar commute/WFH change, forever.  My company and many others won't pay for real estate they don't need to -- it's often one of the biggest expenses in a business.  Management pressed to increase profitability will see that as a new way to make up ground.  It makes sense.  But yet on the other hand, I just can't fathom that actually happening.  I mean, is the commercial real estate market in Manhattan really going to get crushed like that?  Are companies really going to vacate?  what about all the spillover? The local eateries that support the commuting workforce?  The corner bodega?  None of that can survive without the commuting workforce.  And those are just a few examples.  Are the powers that be really going to allow that all to go kaput?  I just have no idea.

 
I find this so interesting.  On the one hand, it makes total sense that this will be a fundamental white collar commute/WFH change, forever.  My company and many others won't pay for real estate they don't need to -- it's often one of the biggest expenses in a business.  Management pressed to increase profitability will see that as a new way to make up ground.  It makes sense.  But yet on the other hand, I just can't fathom that actually happening.  I mean, is the commercial real estate market in Manhattan really going to get crushed like that?  Are companies really going to vacate?  what about all the spillover? The local eateries that support the commuting workforce?  The corner bodega?  None of that can survive without the commuting workforce.  And those are just a few examples.  Are the powers that be really going to allow that all to go kaput?  I just have no idea.
Government will offer incentives to get business back into NYC IMO

 
I definitely agree there will be more WFH, but I think there is a significant amount of work that will still return to offices.  While you can manage through things like Zoom it is not as effective as face to face meetings in a lot of cases.  Likewise business travel will still be around, clients like to see people and you can't replicate the connection with people online that can be achieved in person.  I know first hand that so much can happen before and after a scheduled meeting just being in the room that people dialing in are never a part of.
But if clients don't want to pay for as much business travel, and other businesses don't to pay for as much business travel, it seems it may be dramatically limited?

I spoke to a guy the other day whose good friend is a travel industry consultant.  The consultant said that everyone in his industry is expecting a dramatic, long term change -- they think business travel will nearly disappear, and that the entire travel industry will revert to what it was back in the 50s and 60s--a very premium, high end industry, with far fewer travelers.

Who knows. :shrug:

I just find this entire topic so fascinating.  We're living through it.  50 or 100 years from now, I wonder, will academics be studying and writing papers about all of the changes that were sparked from this very moment in time, and the ripple effects they have across all industries and all ways of life?  Or will this just be a two year blip and come 2022, or 2023, life will be exactly as it was before?  Mindblowing stuff. 

 
Things are close here as well (for me),. I'm sure for some people there normal is not.

I don't have a burning desire to eat out other than some takeout.   School hasn't started and my kid missed camp this summer but for right now things feel close to old.   But slow work flow and working from home is definitely different. Not sure when that goes back to normal.  At least I'm still employed.

 
As to the bolded, when I first started traveling to Japan for work years ago, I thought those Japanese folks were a bunch of nancies, so many walking around in the winter with a mask on, so terrified of germs and getting sick.  What a fool I was, such an American mentality.  It turns out, people in Japan don't wear masks to avoid getting sick -- they wear masks when they themselves are sick, so they don't transmit it to others.  It's funny that in my western mindset, that possibility didn't even dawn on my until it was explained.  Such a different way of approaching the world around you.

So I've found the American response to masks, especially in certain parts of the country, interesting.  It's very much a cultural thing.  Cultures like the Japanese very much focused on respect for those around you, and wearing a mask is a no brainer.

Anyway, this COVID thing maybe has opened up the eyes of many Americans to that way of viewing things -- let me wear a mask not to protect myself, but my neighbor.  And maybe we'll see more of that going forward, even after a vaccine.
As another example of Western ignorance, I thought they wore masks in Asia because of pollution. They've been through pandemics before, we really haven't, and it shows in the difference in reactions, attitudes and statistics.

Some things seem like they will change pretty drastically like business travel, cruises and large festivals for example. COVID-19 is definitely the craziest life-altering thing that's happened in my lifetime.

 
WFH is here to stay; that will impact office space and how people work;

Things will get back to closer to normal in the summer of 2021 after we have a vaccine. 

 
I work for a large bank and was on a manager call with the head of tech and ops this week.   When asked when we will return to the office they said it could be up to 2 years before we return. I was hoping for Spring ‘21 but it was sobering to hear that. 
It’s going to be a long road before we see normalcy return. 

 
I work for a large bank and was on a manager call with the head of tech and ops this week.   When asked when we will return to the office they said it could be up to 2 years before we return. I was hoping for Spring ‘21 but it was sobering to hear that. 
It’s going to be a long road before we see normalcy return. 
2022.

 
11/3/2020

;)
I'm not sure if you are joking or not, but that's mostly because I know people that believe this.  To them its all a political ploy for the election and as soon as thats passed and the riots are over, everything will go back to normal.

To me, that's why we arent in better shape and its going to be at least 2021 and probably spring 2021 before anything gets back to "normal", whatever that may turn out to be.  

 
I think once a vaccine is in place and proven to be effective the overall public view will start to go out of site out of mind.  Similar to how people react to the flu now.  I know I was amazed at the number of deaths associated to the flu each year.  I never knew it was that deadly in this day and age.  I expect that once a vaccine is in place people's views will slowly get back to how the flu is treated.

As far as WFH, that is here to stay.  It saves businesses a lot of cost in real estate as they can probably cut down their footprint in half or less and just have hot desk spaces for the work force to share and rotate.  So i think some of those lessons learned will be incorporated because it makes sense and is more efficient. 

 
Otis said:
But if clients don't want to pay for as much business travel, and other businesses don't to pay for as much business travel, it seems it may be dramatically limited?
I think the guy pitching his patent services over a steak dinner with a glass of wine or on the golf course is much more likely to get my business than Zoom meeting nerd attorney.

 
jvdesigns2002 said:
Things won't get back to pre-covid normal anytime soon.   That's just a sad reality.  Much of it is due to a virus and much of it is due to one of the biggest failures in history in handling a situation by our government and leadership.  The strongest, smartest and wealthiest country with by far the most resources on the planet has handled ths virus with such stupidity and stubborness that over 4 months into this thing--the problem/virus is growing and not getting better.    Our government has been more concerned with restoring the effing stock market more than they have the livelihoods of the vast majority of the people.   One of the reasons why things won't get back to normal anytime soon is that the virus and our response to it will be one of the biggest redistributions of wealth in history.   The giant corporatations that make it through this thing will disproportionately own and control more wealth in this country moving forward.   The virus will probably grow or linger around until the time of the election--and once that happens people will get emotionally charged and there will be more protests.  I could see another wave hitting around Thanksgivng/Christmas.  I think it'll be at least a year before anything gets  remotely back to normal in regards to our livelihoods---but by then--the entire economic landscape of this country will have been completely transformed.  
This is a horribly incorrect take.  Please take it to the psf cesspool.

 
Restaurants will never be the same. Dine-in places will have to significantly raise rates, so only the strongest of the strong will survive. Going out to eat will become an occasional luxury, not a daily occurrence. The ones that fail will be replaced with better take-out options. Right now we have a ton of dine-in restaurants offering takout based on menus that were originally designed for in-house dining. Many/most are struggling. I think there's a great market out there right now for really good "family-style takeout" where you order from a menu and pick everything up from a place that designed from the ground-up specifically for takeout. If everything from the menu, to the location, to the ordering, to the logistics, to the facility, to the plates/utensils/etc were specifically designed for takeout, it could be so much better and more profitable.

 
Summer 2022.   From the doctors I work with that seems like the timeline for everything to return back to "normal."  I hope they are all wrong.  I hate it for my boys who will be juniors in HS this year.  I hate that sports have been ruined for my kids as well as spectators.  I hate not being to go see a movie, go out to dinner with friends/family, having to wear a mask.  I hate the fear that patients have coming to the hospital.  I hate the contempt people have for people wearing and not wearing masks.  I hate all the conspiracy theories.  I do like that more people are able to work from home.  I like the time I get to spend with my immediate family. 

Summer 2022

 
NutterButter said:
Some of is going to depend on the vaccine.  There's the polio vaccine which can be almost 100% effective and there's the flu vaccine which some years can be as low as 10 25% effective.   

 
Interesting takes here kind of all over the map. That’s sort of where I am.  Both seem plausible; no idea what to believe. 

 
Still seems a bit much to me that the whole world changed due to something with an estimated 99.4% survival rate.

 
Still seems a bit much to me that the whole world changed due to something with an estimated 99.4% survival rate.
What percentage of the world passed away or had friends on 9-11?  A large majority of the world doesn't have to die for the world to change. Covid has already changed the world.   There are businesses that will never return.  There are jobs that won't be the same moving forward. There will be protocols in place the same way 9-11 resulted in protocols.   I absolutely think that in a year or two there will be some sort of a return to what we considered normalcy. However--that normalcy will have lots of differences than the normal before covid.    I think you could easily see a lot of temperature screening in a lot of countries at airports. I think lots of airlines could implement some sort of mask or safety protocols moving forward.   We will have a normal--but it will be a new normal.  

 
Foosball God said:
I definitely agree there will be more WFH, but I think there is a significant amount of work that will still return to offices.  While you can manage through things like Zoom it is not as effective as face to face meetings in a lot of cases.  Likewise business travel will still be around, clients like to see people and you can't replicate the connection with people online that can be achieved in person.  I know first hand that so much can happen before and after a scheduled meeting just being in the room that people dialing in are never a part of.
This is a good point regarding business travel. Right now, everyone is working under the same set of COVID rules. But in twelve months when one company is pitching Best Buy in person and one via Zoom, that Zoomer is going to lose out. Once competitors are back to meeting in person, everyone will. You can't make the same pitch on a tablet.

 
This is a good point regarding business travel. Right now, everyone is working under the same set of COVID rules. But in twelve months when one company is pitching Best Buy in person and one via Zoom, that Zoomer is going to lose out. Once competitors are back to meeting in person, everyone will. You can't make the same pitch on a tablet.
If you’re saying I have to go back to wining and dining and flying places I may put a fork in my eye. 

 
I think WFH is here to stay. While many businesses feared employees at home just screwing around all day, they learned what many successful companies learned long ago. WFH people tend to be MORE productive.

"The COVID-19 pandemic forcing those who could work from home to do so has led to a surprising result — improved productivity. U.S. workers were 47% more productive in March and April than in the same two months a year ago through cloud-based business tools, chat applications and email, according to an analysis of 100 million data points from 30,000 Americans by workplace-monitoring company Prodoscore."

Now that reality has hit them upside the head, it isn't ever going back to what it was. And it would be stupid for it to do so.

Full article...

 
This is here to stay until we have a vaccine.  
 

I am on the phone now cancelling our family trip to Maui scheduled for this October .  First time the kids would have been there.  
 

We were just discussing when we would we be able to realistically go and enjoy everything we wanted to do while there.  2022 seems realistic.  

 
I think maybe 50- 75% of the travel for business meetings is not really needed anymore.   When I went on a 3 day business trip..2 flights, 3 nights in a hotel, rental cars, meals,  it cost 2-3 K.   This was 10-15 times a year.

Been doing the same things from home for no expense.

I realize I will still need to do some travel eventually but 50-75% less for sure.

So airlines, hotels, rental cars, bars and restaurants around the hotels where business travelers stay will all suffer a letdown.

 
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I want to say late spring / early summer 2021, people will be sick of being cooped up all winter (at least in northern states) and will want to get out and do things, and by then I think a lot of the fear will have died down, especially if some sort of vaccine is in place

In reality I think Fall 2021, when kids go back to school under “normal” circumstances, is when things will really seem back to normal for us

i hope it’s much sooner but I don’t see it

 
I think WFH is here to stay. While many businesses feared employees at home just screwing around all day, they learned what many successful companies learned long ago. WFH people tend to be MORE productive.

"The COVID-19 pandemic forcing those who could work from home to do so has led to a surprising result — improved productivity. U.S. workers were 47% more productive in March and April than in the same two months a year ago through cloud-based business tools, chat applications and email, according to an analysis of 100 million data points from 30,000 Americans by workplace-monitoring company Prodoscore."

Now that reality has hit them upside the head, it isn't ever going back to what it was. And it would be stupid for it to do so.

Full article...
I wonder how much, if any, of the gains in productivity are due to the complete reversal in employee-employer relations in 12 months.

We went from a period in 2019 where employees had the most power, a new job was very easy to find and the prospect of being laid off was very low.

In 2020, employers gained a ton more standing, new jobs were almost impossible to find and the prospect of being laid off became a very real possibility.

Anecdotally, people I know worked harder because they felt like their jobs were at risk. People were more productive at home than in the office because they were working under the sword of Damocles.

 
I wonder how much, if any, of the gains in productivity are due to the complete reversal in employee-employer relations in 12 months.

We went from a period in 2019 where employees had the most power, a new job was very easy to find and the prospect of being laid off was very low.

In 2020, employers gained a ton more standing, new jobs were almost impossible to find and the prospect of being laid off became a very real possibility.

Anecdotally, people I know worked harder because they felt like their jobs were at risk. People were more productive at home than in the office because they were working under the sword of Damocles.
I've been work from home approaching four years now. There is zero doubt in my mind most people are more productive at home. No drive by chats, no office gossip at the water cooler, no Starbucks breaks or hour plus long lunch breaks. Distractions are just totally reduced to near zero. I haven't really seen any change since this outbreak other than the increase in the number of people working from home. I don't think my employer is looking to go back to the "old" ways.

 
I've been work from home approaching four years now. There is zero doubt in my mind most people are more productive at home. No drive by chats, no office gossip at the water cooler, no Starbucks breaks or hour plus long lunch breaks. Distractions are just totally reduced to near zero. I haven't really seen any change since this outbreak other than the increase in the number of people working from home. I don't think my employer is looking to go back to the "old" ways.
No kids at home?

 

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