What Does A Quarantine Due To Coronavirus Mean For Truckers?

The way this helps drivers is to make sure that they know where their 401k's are headed.

It helps to have a broad base of knowledge regarding current events so we aren't caught off guard.

Knowing if there is a strong chance at a global recession/depression, making sure your job is secure, looking for other sources of income, making employment moves before other drivers.

These things all help drivers.

It appears that I offended some by my comment regarding needing to be dumb and uneducated to drive a truck. Offering my own personal experience wasn't enough. So to clear the air . . . I sincerely apologize if it came across that I was calling truck drivers dumb. That is not my belief nor is it what see in the real world.

Yep. MBA/CPA now truck driver. 27 years with a major financial services firm. Took an early retirement package and decided that I wanted to drive a truck for a few years.

One of my jobs was as a Business Contigency Risk Manager. We did several "War Games" over the years concerning pandemics and they played out pretty much like this one is. I was also deeply involved in configuring our systems and process to cope with the 9/11 week long market shutdown.

You mention the $5 trillion "liquidity guarantee", not a loan. Guess what? I used to manage the cash desk for a major part of our business. I made $500M+ repo purchases daily with Deutsche Bank. Repos are just overnight loans for liquidity purposes, they are not driving up the economy. I just checked the NY Fed repo operations numbers for this weekend and it's less then $24B. That $5 T is an over the top number to reassure the nation's CFO's.

Stimulus packages, I think they will help. Russia/Ukraine, not really sure I see a threat to the world's economy there. Chinese EMP. You mention a laser at a ship, pretty sure the US Navy can defend itself against anyone. If your are talking EMP attack on our countries infrastructure, that would require nukes and economics really won't matter anymore.

My opinion? I think we will be in a recession for 2 or 3 quarters. During that time the virus will either fade out like SARS did, be beaten by medical science or run it's course and infect just about everyone with most recovering and unfortunately many deaths. After that the bounce back will be swift. Many companies will surely go under but I think the global supply chain weakness exposed by this will bring more manufacturing back on shore.

The world is not ending, there is no grand conspiracy pulling the worlds puppet strings via a virus and don't believe everything you read on-line.

What does a single global currency have to do with this? Different countries have different types of economies with different monetary policy needs. If anything, the last global recession showed countries to be more hesitant to unify currencies. And why would countries like the U.S. and China give away their golden geese?

It would be great if manufacturing would return as a result of this. We are going to need the jobs BAD. There won’t be any restaurant jobs for the next hundred years probably.

Yep. MBA/CPA now truck driver. 27 years with a major financial services firm. Took an early retirement package and decided that I wanted to drive a truck for a few years.

One of my jobs was as a Business Contigency Risk Manager. We did several "War Games" over the years concerning pandemics and they played out pretty much like this one is. I was also deeply involved in configuring our systems and process to cope with the 9/11 week long market shutdown.

You mention the $5 trillion "liquidity guarantee", not a loan. Guess what? I used to manage the cash desk for a major part of our business. I made $500M+ repo purchases daily with Deutsche Bank. Repos are just overnight loans for liquidity purposes, they are not driving up the economy. I just checked the NY Fed repo operations numbers for this weekend and it's less then $24B. That $5 T is an over the top number to reassure the nation's CFO's.

Stimulus packages, I think they will help. Russia/Ukraine, not really sure I see a threat to the world's economy there. Chinese EMP. You mention a laser at a ship, pretty sure the US Navy can defend itself against anyone. If your are talking EMP attack on our countries infrastructure, that would require nukes and economics really won't matter anymore.

My opinion? I think we will be in a recession for 2 or 3 quarters. During that time the virus will either fade out like SARS did, be beaten by medical science or run it's course and infect just about everyone with most recovering and unfortunately many deaths. After that the bounce back will be swift. Many companies will surely go under but I think the global supply chain weakness exposed by this will bring more manufacturing back on shore.

The world is not ending, there is no grand conspiracy pulling the worlds puppet strings via a virus and don't believe everything you read on-line.

I'm not sure that a global currency is on anyone's radar. I had to look it up, but the essence of Modern Monetary Theory:

the theory suggests that countries with their own central banks need not worry about budget deficits and spending to spur economic growth because those central banks could just buy whatever debt the government issues.

In other words, the United States and some other major countries can print as much money as they want. Deficits make no difference to us. The major risk would be creating out-of-control inflation, which we won't have to worry about for quite some time.

We're about to find out how true that is. It will take multiple trillions of dollars to keep us from a massive depression at this point, and that's assuming we're back up and running within a few weeks. If it goes any longer than maybe mid-April, a massive global depression seems unavoidable.

They're still mulling over the first of what will be many stimulus bills, but whatever they approve will be far too little and too late. Here are some thoughts on the number of Americans living paycheck to paycheck:

Depending on the survey, [the number of people living paycheck to paycheck] runs from half of workers making under $50,000 (according to Nielsen data) to 74% of all employees (per recent reports from both the American Payroll Association and the National Endowment for Financial Education.) And almost three in 10 adults have no emergency savings at all, according to Bankrate’s latest Financial Security Index.

Even many in the upper class are seeing their six-figure incomes slip through their fingers. The Nielsen study found that one in four families making $150,000 a year or more are living paycheck-to-paycheck, while one in three earning between $50,000 and $100,000 also depend on their next check to keep their heads above water.

Nearly 80 percent of American workers (78 percent) say they’re living paycheck to paycheck, according to a 2017 report by employment website CareerBuilder.

I can't even begin to look up the numbers on the businesses that will go bankrupt from this. It could be hundreds of thousands in the U.S. alone.

They're predicting that the number of people who filed unemployment claims this week will top 2.25 million. The previous all-time record was under 700,000 in 1982. So more than 3 1/2 times the all-time record number, and this is only the beginning.

According to my quick google about USA's population in 1982 and now, we have 42.8% more people. 42.8% more of 700k is about a million so in my mind it's kind of like double the all time record. Unless my logic is wrong somehow

I find this conversation intriguing. Fear is something I've always found to be very misleading. I've spent most of my adult life trying to never let fear be my master. I enjoy the ability to look at things with my own perspective. That practice has served me well. Some of you probably thought I was nuts when I said this earlier...

I can't see this lasting long at all. It's a flash in the pan. The only real pandemic is an emotional one. It started with no basis in fact or science. It will end so quickly that we will be questioning our sanity as to why we reacted like we did as a society.

That's just based on logic. If this current situation does last long, we're all doomed. The world's financial markets and businesses can't endure that kind of stress. It's unimaginable. Total anarchy would ensue. It's merely a test at this point - a stress test, if you will.

I actually see these kind of "black swan" events as beneficial. They tend to be a vaccination for our society. Have we seen any major attacks on our soil since 9/11? No, we vaccinated ourselves in a sense. It changed our society. Not necessarily for the better, it brought us some everyday inconveniences that soon became acceptable to us, especially those who travel internationally. I've not flown since 9/11 ‐ I really haven't had the need to.

The longest lasting impact will be the ridiculous amount of money that our government wants to "stimulate" the economy with. I'm not a fan of huge insertions of cash into society. To me it brings us greater government oversight and control, both of which I believe to be greatly limited by our U.S. constitution. I'm generally for smaller government interference, but also recognize the need for it in certain situations and events.

Okay, now I'm gonna show you just how nutty I am in comparison to some of you. I see this time as the greatest financial opportunity to come along in my lifetime. There is going to be some serious money made in securities over the next three to five years. Opportunity is knocking hard. Don't let the sky is falling crowd's screams and panic keep you from recognizing the real curve that lies ahead.

You've all heard me talk about critical thinking and making a practice of not allowing "the tyranny of the urgent" to affect my decisions. Now is the time for some serious reflection. Now is the time to remain calm and objective. Don't let "Chicken Little" turn your head. This will pass shortly (in the grand scheme of life). The stress it put on financial markets will re-bound. The wise among us will have the opportunity to generate some serious value in the markets. It's a wild ride, that's expected. It's kind of like bull riding - investing and trucking both take a lot of Commitment.

I see this time as the greatest financial opportunity to come along in my lifetime. There is going to be some serious money made

No question. I've been thinking constantly about what opportunities will come of this. The stock market is the obvious one. But a ton of massive businesses were born during the 2008-2009 crisis. Some of the biggest companies in the nation ten years from now will be born this year and next.

I see this time as the greatest financial opportunity to come along in my lifetime. There is going to be some serious money made

No question. I've been thinking constantly about what opportunities will come of this. The stock market is the obvious one. But a ton of massive businesses were born during the 2008-2009 crisis. Some of the biggest companies in the nation ten years from now will be born this year and next.

Agreed.

On the subject of being born, I think there will be a baby boom this year, just in time for the Christmas holiday.

On the subject of being born, I think there will be a baby boom this year, just in time for the Christmas holiday.

Haha, "hunkering down" seems to always produce babies for some reason.