I've been thinking about how narrow and limited my lived-experience view of “local pandemic life” is. I have so far been insulated from financial fallout, in fact we’re doing a bit better than normal thanks to reduced spending and the stimulus check. I rarely go out to buy anything anywhere other than the grocery store or the gas station, but those places appear as busy as they ever did, the main difference being that almost everyone has a mask on. It’s a huge contrast to the desolate abandoned Soviet-esque wasteland of mid-March.
And yet you know the unemployment numbers are still sky high, higher than they were at their worst in the last recession. Most of those people have had their income slashed by more than half with the expiration of the CARES act. Food shelf demand is extremely high. Mortgage delinquency has doubled. Federal eviction protections for many renters expired two days ago.