 The Great Influenza by John M. Barry is 15-year old book that all-of-a-sudden skyrocketed back into Amazon's Top 100 for reasons that should be pretty obvious. The book tells the haunting story of the most deadly pandemic in world history; The Spanish Flu. By its higher estimates, that flu killed more people than World War I and II combined along with every person who's died in a war the United States has fought in on both sides! Estimates for the pandemic range from 50 to 100 million in all. The book is effectively broken into three parts. The first part deals with the development of medical science in the United States, which had previously lagged behind Europe. Indeed, medical science in general had lagged behind pretty much every other field of science and, by the mid-nineteenth century, still hadn't progressed much beyond Hippocrates. Doctors were even still bleeding people as a "cure" into the twentieth century! Indeed, as Nassim Nicholas Taleb noted in his excellent book AntiFragile, prior to the invention of antibiotics, it was usually more dangerous to go to a hospital than to just stay home with whatever illness you had acquired! Fortunately, medicine was finally starting to see dramatic improvements by the late nineteenth century. The first chapter starts with the opening of John Hopkins University where "They planned to change the way which Americans tried to understand and grapple with nature." The story then follows William Welch and his way up to the top of John Hopkins as well as many other American scientists at the dawn of American medical science; such as Paul Lewis, William Park, Anna Williams and Oswald Avery. The final section deals with the aftermath, including Oswald Avery's discoveries which became the key step toward Watson and Crick's discovery of DNA. It also notes that Alexander Fleming discovered Penicillin while working to verify what caused the Spanish Flu in the early 20's. In between these two sections of interesting history is a middle section whose genre could best be described as horror.  Unfortunately, those scientists the book spent its first 150 or so pages discussing could do little to stem the tide of this monster. Antibiotics hadn't been invented yet and few effective vaccines against diseases and none against the flu, especially this one. Some doctors tried to create and administer vaccines during the pandemic, but they were ineffective. Plasma serums had been invented, but given how difficult they are to produce (the plasma must be taken from someone who has recovered from the illness), they didn't help much overall.
The pandemic appears to have started about 350 miles from where I currently sit; in the small town of Haskell, Kansas. (There are other theories, including China and France, but Haskell is the leading one.) There it would have likely stayed had it not been for Woodrow Wilson's disastrous decision to bring the United States into the First World War. One newly drafted soldier left Haskell to Fort Riley and likely brought with him a novel virus that was about to set the world on fire. Shortly thereafter, a huge number of soldiers at Fort Riley got sick. But fortunately for them, this was during the relatively mild first wave in the Summer of 1918. Almost all of them survived. Unfortunately, the virus later mutated and came back with an unprecedented vengeance in September of 1918. It really got started in Camp Devens, where something like half of the troops stationed there got sick, soldiers died like flies and the camp commander ended up committing suicide. And unlike most influenza viruses, this one was most deadly to those between the ages of 25 and 35. The reason was that their immune systems were the strongest and by engaging their enemy with such force, their immune systems actually took the whole body down with the virus in what is known as a cytokine storm. Thus, the Spanish Flu had a W-shaped fatality curve. The very young and very old died the most (often from secondary, bacterial infections that lead to pneumonia), but the young were right behind them. About half of American troops who died in World War I were from the Spanish Flu. The disease went wild from military camp to military camp before spreading to the cities; most notably New York and Philadelphia. In a oft-given example, Philadelphia foolishly decided to hold its annual parade whereas St. Louis cancelled their's. St. Louis survived relatively unscathed. Philadelphia descended into chaos. "Someone was sick in every house," Barry notes. The death rate on a single day doubled the average death rate per week in the city. Hospitals were wildly overcrowded and had to turn away patients. They were also horribly short-staffed and it only became worse when the doctors and nurses got sick too and even worse still when many of those doctors and nurses died. The hospitals begged for volunteers, but few came. Everyone was frightened to leave their house. Some feared that "civilization itself was ending." The situation with the military was even worse and utterly unconscionable. While today, our government has, in my humble opinion, gone overboard with the lockdown and precautions, in 1918, the federal government did nothing. And by that, I mean they did very close to absolutely nothing. Wilson never made a single public statement on the matter. And the only known private discussion had to do with troop transports and whether or not to halt them. They decided to keep them going and these ships became floating coffins. On some, close to half the soldiers died. I should also note that this was in October and November of 1918. The war ended on November 11th, 1918. When this decision was made, the German military was collapsing and an Entente victory was inevitable. Wilson's decision was, for the second time, utterly indefensible. Wilson also appears to have gotten the Spanish Flu during its third wave at the beginning of 1919. Many have said it was a stroke, but it appears to have just been the flu. He survived, but strangely gave into the vicious demands of the British and French against the Germans that lead to the vindictive Treaty of Versailles and created the resentment the Nazis would later capitalize on. The contrast between then and now could not be more stark. It's amazing that our government today would shut down the economy and throw the country into a deep recession (and possibly depression) for a virus that has killed (as of this writing) 340,000 people worldwide. Whereas in 1918, the federal government did close to nothing for a virus that killed as many as 100 million. Then United States didn't even suffer a recession! It's as if these two responses, separated by over 100 years, make up the extremes for awful responses to a global pandemic. Reading the book, I was also reminded of the recent, excellently made Chernobyl miniseries. I would recommend the makers of that show pick up the rights to The Great Influenza and begin filming a similar miniseries right away. It would be great, topical and feel quite similar to Chernobyl. Indeed, it's all the more fitting as our government did about as well in 1918 as the Soviets did with Chernobyl. Furthermore, much of that show came off as a horror movie. A miniseries on The Great Influenza would feel the same. The book also made me feel better about the Coronavirus. Don't get me wrong, Covid-19 is still a serious issue and many have died. There also might be another wave. But from what I've seen so far, this pandemic isn't even close to what Barry describes. (Especially as there have been many stories of furloughed or laid off healthcare workers in the middle of this outbreak.) While the Coronavirus pandemic will be far worse than the Swine Flu pandemic, unless it drastically mutates, it won't come anywhere close to the Spanish Flu pandemic. The Great Influenza is highly engaging and I flew through it despite its considerable length of some 450 pages. My only complaint is that it focuses almost exclusively on the United States and only gives scant mention to what happened abroad. 50 to 100 million died worldwide, while "only" 650,000 of those deaths occurred in the United States. India, for example, was hit particularly bad. I would have preferred to hear more about what happened in many other parts of the world, particularly on the Western Front as the war came to a close. That being said, at 450 pages there was probably just no space for a further discussion of what happened elsewhere. That would the topic for another book. As for the topic of the Spanish Flu in the United States, The Great Influenza makes for a great read.
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My newest article for BiggerPockets is up and, I must say, I have a slight complaint with the editor. You see, contrary to popular wisdom, writers don't choose the titles. This one is titled "These States Will Be Hit Hardest by Covid-19 Recession" when the piece is mostly about where the 2008 Financial Crisis and subsequent recession hit hardest. Then the final section cites and ATTOM's study on which areas look the most susceptible this time around. Interestingly enough, they appear to be the same. As the article notes, In 2009, the economist Alan Reynolds pointed out that “The Foreclosure Five”—California, Nevada, Arizona, Florida, and Michigan—had by far the most foreclosures. As he noted: And again, the ATTOM's study shows those same areas (as well as the Northeast, particularly New York which was hit the hardest by Covid-19 and locked down the hardest too) will be hit the worst by whatever recession is to come.
Check the article out here.
This is from an interview I did with Jay Papasan (coauthor of The One Thing and The Millionaire Real Estate Investor) on scaling your business and "scaling yours" back in 2017 for an unfortunately now abandoned book project (I might pick it back up someday). So I thought I'd post it on my and my brother Phillip Syrios' Youtube Channel. Unfortunately the video isn't good and the audio doesn't quite sync. Even still, I think it's a great discussion and worth listening to (and maybe watching as well):
You can visit Jay's website here.
Trump is to blame for plenty regarding our lackluster Coronavirus response and indeed, I've said as much before. Evidence exists that he ignored the threat early on (other than suspending travel to China) and he clearly downplayed it for way too long. He has given conflicting and often just weird public comments while not taking responsibility for anything and not showing much leadership at all. That being said, the Left has blamed Donald Trump for a bunch of things that are not true regarding this whole thing in their typical, hyperbolic, slobbering-at-the-mouth style. Claim 1: Trump Called the Virus a "Hoax" So right off the bat, no, Trump did not call the Coronavirus "a hoax" despite this being endlessly repeated by liberals. The left-leaning fact-checker Snopes gave the claim "a mixture" before admitting that in fact, no, Trump didn't say the virus was a hoax. "Despite creating some confusion with his remarks, Trump did not call the coronavirus itself a hoax." Yes, the word "hoax" should never have been said anywhere close to a discussion on Covid-19, but it's still quite clear that Trump was calling the Democrats' claims he was ignoring the virus a "hoax." Here's exactly what he said, "Very dishonest people. Now the Democrats are politicizing the coronavirus, you know that right? Coronavirus, they’re politicizing it. We did one of the great jobs. You say, “How’s President Trump doing?” They go, “Oh, not good, not good.” They have no clue. They don’t have any clue. They can’t even count their votes in Iowa. They can’t even count. No, they can’t. They can’t count their votes. The context is obvious, although bragging about only having 15 cases at the time looks pretty stupid now. Claim 2: Trump and the Republicans Cut CDC Funding For this one, Trump and the Republicans deserve some blame. They recommended the CDC's budget be cut. But it never was. As the AP notes, "Trump’s budgets have proposed cuts to public health, only to be overruled by Congress, where there’s strong bipartisan support for agencies such as the CDC and NIH. Instead, financing has increased." So blame him for recommending cuts if you want, but nothing came of it. By the way, the requested cut for 2019 was 12 percent; big, but by no means not draconian. Claim 3: Trump Abolished the White House Pandemic Response Team This one gets floated around the most it seems. Even I believed it for a while before reading Tim Morrison's article in The Washington Post expressly denying the charge. And he was there when it happened. And so what was this "it" by chance? Well, here's how the very-unfriendly-to-Trump Washington Post explained "it" in a subsequent article trying to elucidate what happened, The office — as set up by Obama — was folded into another office. Thus, one could claim the office was eliminated. But the staff slots did not disappear and at least initially the key mission of team remained a priority. So one can also claim nothing changed and thus Biden’s criticism is overstated. The question that cannot be answered — at least perhaps until a congressionally mandated commission examines the U.S. preparation for this crisis — is whether a separate directorate would have had more clout to bring the issue immediately to the president’s attention…” Former National Security Advisor John Bolton thought there was too much redundancy and so he folded the pandemic response team together in with another unit on bioterrorism. This may seem like an odd choice to you. And it is. But John Bolton is a warmongering freak, so it makes perfect sense he would think that such a choice made sense. Was this odd choice a good idea? I sincerely doubt it. But it's a far cry from eliminating the office. Claim 4: Trump Turned Down WHO Test Kits In the end, the buck stops with Trump. So the incredibly slow rollout of Coronavirus test kits falls on his shoulders. The mistakes, however, were directly made at the fully-funded CDC. The first tests were contaminated and didn't work so they had to be scrapped, leading to a severe delay. Then came some really bad decisions Trump should have overruled. As Reason Magazine notes, ...officials at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) stymied private and academic development of diagnostic tests that might have provided an early warning and a head start on controlling the epidemic that is now spreading across the country. But what about those fully-functioning WHO test kits? Well, they didn't really exist. The test kits were actually German and the CDC decided to make its own instead of replicating the German one. Kits that the WHO did have were supposed to be for underdeveloped countries without such research and manufacturing capacity. From the Left-leaning Politifact, While it might seem odd that the Trump administration shunned the WHO’s coronavirus test protocol, it’s normal for countries with advanced research capabilities to want to develop a measure that they trust. None of this means Trump has done well, of course. Something just bugs me about self-righteous indignation over false or wildly exaggerated claims. After all, I'm plenty critical of Obama, but he never actually claimed entrepreneurs didn't build their own companies.
I guess truth is the first casualty in war, partisan politics and clickbait articles. And I guess I wish it just didn't have to be that way. New BiggerPockets Article: U.S. Homeowners Four Times as Likely to Be Equity Rich Than Underwater5/22/2020 My newest article for BiggerPockets is up. It's based on a new study from ATTOM Data Solutions that finds that US homeowners are four times more likely to be equity rich than underwater. The study defines those terms as follows, An equity-rich home was defined as one in which “the combined estimated amount of loans secured by those properties was 50% or less of their estimated market value.” On the other hand, seriously underwater properties were those “with a combined estimated balance of loans secured by the property at least 25% more than the property’s estimated market value.” So what does this mean for real estate investors? My answer is as follows, 1. The small decrease in the percentage of homes that are equity-rich prior to the Coronavirus pandemic and the substantial number of houses that were still seriously underwater provide further evidence the US was already heading toward a recession and thus, that Covid-19 will only exacerbate the economic turmoil. So it would be wise to expect a fairly serious recession and not a 'V-shaped' recovery. Of course, we are in the middle of a pandemic and recession of unknown size, so while opportunities still exist, real estate investors need to still be very careful and not overextend at a time like this.
Check the article out here. "Disruption" is the big word these days in technology and, to be honest, pretty much every industry there is out there. Indeed, this includes industries you wouldn't consider "tech firms" by any stretch of the imagination. What Uber and Lyft have done to the taxi industry is a good example. Well, it's taken its sweet time, but disruption has finally come to the real estate industry and this is the subject of my latest article for BiggerPockets. As I note, Real estate has been one of the last industries to get disrupted, but it is being disrupted. And even if it weren’t, as Steve Forbes put it, “You have to disrupt yourself or others will do it for you.” You may not want to change and become more technologically adept, but you are going to have to just to keep pace.
But on the bright side, there are huge opportunities to taking advantage of all of the new technology and platforms that real estate investors now have access to. It's time for real estate investors to take advantage! The piece is based heavily on the book Exponential Organizations by Salim Ismail. You can check out the article here.
On this episode of The Good Stewards Podcast we discuss how to develop or pivot your business strategy. The long and short of it is that you need to be very careful when switching or adding a new niche to your strategy. (You can see my BiggerPockets article on the same subject here).
Check it out!
Episode 25: Investing in a Pandemic
Episode 26: How Covid-19 is Similar and Different to 2008 Episode 27: Building a Business Episode 28: Are Real Estate Values Changing? Episode 29: How we Got April Rents to Match February Episode 30: How Has the Mortgage Industry Been Impacted By Covid-19 Episode 31: Are Airbnb's a Good Opportunity Now? Episode 32: Never Let Money Stop You Episode 33: Apartment Due Diligence Should be Done Episode 34: Why We Sold a Couple Properties Apple is considering moving a fifth of its production from China to India, a new report claims. One of the problems with all this China-bashing, particularly on the Right, is that it takes the focus off of US policy. It's not China's fault our manufacturing plants moved there. It's mostly American policymakers fault. Don't get me wrong, China has plenty to blamed for, but taking the eye off American policy by blaming China for everything is pointless. This should not be surprising. As The Times of India reported in February of this year regarding Trump's last trip to India, US President Donald Trump’s maiden visit to India will provide an opportunity to further strengthen the strategic partnership between the two countries, the ministry of external affairs said… As the White House's own statement says regarding India, ENHANCING OUR VIBRANT ECONOMIC TIES: The United States and India benefit from strong economic ties that advance prosperity, investment, and job creation in both countries. There's nothing wrong with India of course and trade is good to a certain extent at least. But what seems to be happening is nothing more than a shift in outsourcing manufacturing from China to India.
I mean, honestly, who cares? This does not bring back manufacturing nor does it secure our supply chain. It's just rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. And it's not what we asked to (and they said they would) bring manufacturing back to the United States.
With all the uncertainty going on in the economy and real estate market due to the Coronavirus and subsequent lockdown, we go into why we sold a few properties recently and what you can learn from that on this episode of The Good Stewards Podcast.
Check it out!
Episode 23: Myths of Real Estate
Episode 24: What the Pandemic Means Episode 25: Investing in a Pandemic Episode 26: How Covid-19 is Similar and Different to 2008 Episode 27: Building a Business Episode 28: Are Real Estate Values Changing? Episode 29: How we Got April Rents to Match February Episode 30: How Has the Mortgage Industry Been Impacted By Covid-19 Episode 31: Are Airbnb's a Good Opportunity Now? Episode 32: Never Let Money Stop You Episode 33: Apartment Due Diligence Should be Done |
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