Read on Twitter
1/ @robleone said something earlier today I found interesting, basically (I am paraphrasing a bit): what is your counterfactual for the federal & provincial govts? What do you think an opposition party would have done differently? Useful tool for thinking about biases I thought.
2/ Anyway in the spirit of getting into it a bit, I thought I would do this myself (so others can see my biases, too). It's a bit tricky because some if it comes down to personalities/skills of individual Ministers and we don't know who those would be, but anyways here goes:
3/ I believe a CP fed govt. would've acted 1-2 wks earlier in restricting travel from China. This would have made no difference at all to the course of pandemic but they'd have done it.
I believe border policy since then would have been mildly stronger (but not vis a vis US)
I believe border policy since then would have been mildly stronger (but not vis a vis US)
4/ I absolutely believe a Conservative government would have cheaped out on things like CERB, which would have made the economic fall-out worse. CESB? Fuhgeddabout it.
5/ I believe a CP govt might have acted a bit faster on vaccines which would have put us in a slightly better position today. Also believe they might not have spread bets as widely on various vaccines which might have lead to problems later on. Not sure how to evaluate this.
6/ Provincially, here are the differences if Libs or NDP in control instead of @fordnation.
- absolutely sure we'd have had paid sick leave, which would have slowed virus spread.
- absolutely sure death toll in LTC homes would have been lower.
- absolutely sure we'd have had paid sick leave, which would have slowed virus spread.
- absolutely sure death toll in LTC homes would have been lower.
7/ - Pretty sure more would have been spent on safe re-opening of schools.
- Not convinced they would have made a different decisions on re-opening gyms, indoor bars etc. Somewhat likelier to have delayed this maybe but not certain at all.
- Not convinced they would have made a different decisions on re-opening gyms, indoor bars etc. Somewhat likelier to have delayed this maybe but not certain at all.
8/ In short: I believe a federal Conservative govt would have likely acted differently but not necessarily more effectively. I also believe that on sick leave and LTC an alternative prov gov would've acted differently in ways that would have substantially lowered COVID casualties
9/ For greater clarity on this last point: it takes a particular combination of stupidity, callousness and malevolence to permit this kind of shit to happen. @DrFullertonMPP has it in spades. Don't think anyone in either opposition party does. https://twitter.com/CBCLorenda/status/1357083068864073728?s=20
