Daily Briefing – 170

Post: Oct. 14, 2020

Cuomo Announces State Will Withhold Funds for Localities and Schools That Fail to Enforce Public Health Law

Governor Cuomo announced yesterday that the State will withhold funds for localities and schools in COVID-19 cluster zones that fail to enforce public health laws. The New York State Department of Health will send a letter warning local governments in cluster zones that they will lose state funding if they fail to enforce state limits on gatherings and the closure of schools. The letter will be sent to New York City, Orange County, Rockland County, the Town of Ramapo and the Village of Spring Valley.

Governor Cuomo also announced that DOH will send an additional letter warning public and private schools in cluster zones that they will lose state funding if they do not comply with state requirements on closure and testing.

Read the press release

NYS COVID-19 Numbers and Cluster Initiative Update

Governor Cuomo issued a press release yesterday providing an overview of New York’s COVID-19 tracking data from Sunday, October 12th. Within the “Red Zone” focus areas, 4,138 test results were reported yesterday, yielding 171 positives or a 4.13 percent positivity rate. In the remainder of the state, not counting these “Red Zone” focus areas, 94,932 test results were reported, yielding 1,222 positives or a 1.2 percent positivity rate. Tracking data for the hotspots as compared to the rest of the State is below.

Summary of positivity rates:

20 hotspot zip codes: 3.70%
Orange 10950: 3.51%
Statewide: 1.12%
Statewide excluding hotspots: 1.05%

Here are some useful links

Consumer Prices Rise

The consumer price index rose 0.2% last month, after gaining 0.4% in August, the Labor Department reported Tuesday. Prices for used cars and trucks rose 6.7% in September after a 5.4% gain in August and are now up 10.3% in the past 12 months. The September increase is the largest monthly increase since February 1969.

Overall inflation for the last 12 months is up 1.4% while core inflation, which excludes energy and food, is up 1.7%.

IMF Revises its 2020 Global GDP Forecast Higher, 2021 Lower

The International Monetary Fund on Tuesday turned slightly more positive on the global economy for this year, but warned of a “long, uneven and uncertain” recovery. The global economy is now projected to contract by 4.4% in 2020 — an upward revision from an estimate of -4.9% made in June (which has now also been revised to -5.2% due to a new methodology used by the IMF). The IMF’s forecast assumes that social distancing due to the coronavirus pandemic will continue into 2021, and that local transmission will fall everywhere by the end of 2022.

The IMF projected “only limited progress” going forward and cut its gross domestic product growth expectations for next year to 5.2%, from an estimate of 5.4% made in June.

Global Study Shows What Workers Want, Expect and Value in Their Employers

According to a new survey, , “Hindsight 2020: COVID-19 Concerns into 2021, 35% of employees and business leaders wish their offices had closed faster and safety measures for essential workers had been implemented sooner. Still, 20% of surveyed workers felt their organization met their needs.

The Workforce Institute commissioned the survey, which Savanta, Inc. conducted in June 2020. A total of 3,903 employees and business leaders between the ages of 18 and 55 responded to general questions about leadership, employee attitudes around trust and crisis response/management from 11 countries: Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, United Kingdom and the United States.

Read the story and key findings from the survey at EHS Today

Gender Employment Gap Widens with Start of Virtual School Year

Women dropped out of the labor force in staggeringly high numbers last month, underscoring how female workers have disproportionately borne the economic brunt of the pandemic, in large part because of changes to child care and schooling.

The disparity threatens to set back decades of progress in closing workplace gender gaps and hinder the overall recovery from the coronavirus recession.

The “K Shaped” Recovery

Economists analyzing the U.S. path to recovery are worried that inside national measures of economic growth lie deepening divisions between industries and people as some sectors recover fast, while employment in the leisure and hospitality industry, for example, remains 20% below where it was in February.

Within the roughly 5,000 worst-off zip codes nearly a quarter of working adults were employed in service occupations as of 2018. By contrast, in prosperous zip codes only 13% of employed adults were in service jobs, while half were in management or professional occupations, a group of jobs considered more adaptable to work-from-home arrangements.

World Economic Forum Survey: 5 Workforce Priorities During the Pandemic and Beyond

In a recent survey of manufacturing companies, respondents were asked to assess their own organizations with input from the shop floor, executives and peers. The dominant theme: “Empowering the factory workforce with knowledge and digital tools”, will be essential to surviving the current pandemic and ensuring that operations can adapt to change anytime, anywhere – crisis or not. Along with that, having strong operational standards and lean practices are critical for navigating this crisis and the future of manufacturing.

Eli Lilly Pauses Trial of Antibody drug Over Safety Concern

Eli Lilly put a temporary halt to tests of a treatment for covid-19, just a day after Johnson & Johnson suspended trials of its vaccine. Lilly cited a “potential safety concern” with its antibody therapy, which President Donald Trump has flattered as a “cure”. Reuters reported that federal drug inspectors have “uncovered serious quality-control problems” at one of Lilly’s manufacturing plants.

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