On the other hand, Americans have much larger and more comfortable homes than Europeans. Americans have big garages to stockpile supplies, which means less trips to the store. Very few people use public transportation regularly. Most people have private back yards. Many more meals are take-out or drive-thru. More Americans use e-commerce for shopping than Europeans.
In Europe by contrast, much more of life revolves around public spaces, like the park, cafes, the city square, and public transport. Americans tend to spend little time in restaurants, whereas Europeans relax and enjoy the meal, thus increasing their exposure time.
Think of the areas in the US that seen the worst outbreaks. Seattle, the Bay Area, New York, Boston. These are the metros, where the average resident is least likely to live a typical middle-American lifestyle. San Francisco in many ways is closer to Copenhagen than it is to Jacksonville.
Overall, social distancing is probably easier for Americans because our way of life already involves a good deal of social distance to begin with.
It sounds like you've never been outside of a city in Europe and never been to a city in the US? Urban population in the EU in 2018 is 76% while 82% for the same year in the US according to The World Bank.
Lived in Sweden for the last 15 years. Yeah, people out of cities have big back yards (people in cities have none), most workers eat out every day for lunch, shopping online (except for food) is pretty much the default. Denmark's pretty much the same.
I've lived in both, and you're missing how large the difference is. Not to mention you seem to be missing the point.
What the OP was saying is that americans don't eat out that much, is a very heavily home-oriented society - thats why the OP mentioned take out and delivery - not going out for lunch.
And yes people out of cities in nearly all countries have big backyards, but you are missing the people have big back yards in the US EVEN inside city limits. There are ofcourse the couple exceptions like NYC etc. but mostly even big cities have the weird suburban style houses even in the most expensive areas!
Guys, you are missing the point - these stereotypes, however true they might have been (or not), are over currently for Europe. Restaurants are empty or closed, people limit their social interaction and overall exposure to minimum. It doesn't matter much if we speak about Sweden or Italy or anything in between.
What will happen or won't in US or Europe is not anymore dependent on these behaviors.
Not sure how the backyard argument is relevant anyway. It's not like that makes not spreading the disease that much easier. Public transport is certainly a risk. But I'm not even sure if e-commerce helps. Going to Walmart at 1am and using self checkout is probably much safer than receiving your delivery from someone who might be infected and visits several hundred homes a day.
Got a citation for those numbers? Another poster claims that the US suburb population alone is 175M, and that's roughly half the country right there. Add in the rural population (46M), and 82% urban seems not even remotely correct.
Urban population in Europe also includes suburbs. Yes, there's less sprawl but enough people in Europe living in urban settings have backyards and reasonably large houses.
> Overall, social distancing is probably easier for Americans because our way of life already involves a good deal of social distance to begin with.
While that's true, behavior trumps lifestyle I think. I had a dentist appointment scheduled for this morning in San Francisco. I called my dentist office and explained that my wife has some mild-flu symptoms and asked if we should reschedule. They said that's since I don't have symptoms myself it's not necessary to postpone the appointment. That may happen in Jacksonville too.
omg yes! The dentist's going to stick their face right in his! after having stuck their face right into a bunch of other patients! and then they'll stick their face into a few more patients! It sounds like the perfect breeding ground. Even if I wasn't sick, I'd want to cancel for that alone!
Yeah but they use protections like masks, gloves. I think it's reasonable to assume that a dentist's office likely know better than you about how to minimize the risk. They have motivation in not ruining their business by being a source of local outbreak.
>Americans have big garages to stockpile supplies, which means less trips to the store
This is FUD. That isn't where you risk getting sick. The countries with the most effective response to COVIR-19 doesn't even try to stop everyday shopping or movement in cars at all.
>In Europe by contrast, much more of life revolves around public spaces, like the park, cafes, the city square, and public transport.
You don't get sick by being in a park or city square with someone else. More FUD. Please do some reading on the appropriate measures and what actually constitutes a risk of infection.
From what I've read, China tries to get people to go grocery shopping only once per week. They are the only ones who appear to manage to get the infection rate from 1.3x down to 0.3x in the past days.
Americans all gather together in the same room 5 days a week to work. They also have less protections for paid sick days so you will have min wage mcdonalds workers coming in sick and coughing on your burgers.
- we have a better healthcare system than is US (better as in public and for everyone)
- we own the most cars per capita in the west and are second in the world, public transport wasn't a big factor in this pandemia here
- food is much more controlled and we have a tradition of home made, home grown food, that doesn't require to go to the supermarket
- things are closer so trips are shorter and you can shop at many non packed smaller shops
- we react better to panic and are not armed
- infection has spread in small cities in the country where houses are larger, they have more storage, don't use public transport and social distancing in theory was easier
Wait until all the coronavirus infected hourly workers, who can't get treated because of a lack of healthcare and who have to continue going to work so they can pay rent, infect everyone through the take-out food :)
I mean there was literally a guy on the post from yesterday talking about how we're all paranoid and he's going to enjoy "exploring Boston and eating out while the lines are short".
Yeah some people are going to take advantage of cheap flights and small crowds. The thinner crowds is the point though. it still achieves the objective of lowering the R value.
I bought an annual unlimited longhaul flight pass on AirAsia for ~$150 USD, still have to pay taxes and airport charges. One return flight home and it pays for itself. Will see how that turns out, but is very much bargain hunting time for the brave.
Also traffic is great now. One good thing to come out of this is that governments might see the huge infrastructure benefits from just a small increase in remote workers.
> Americans have big garages to stockpile supplies
No they don't. No one in NYC, Boston, San Francisco, Seattle, ... have big garages to stockpile supplies and most of the US lives in those big cities with apartments without garages.
In the suburbs they do but that's a minority of the population.
> About 46 million Americans live in the nation’s rural counties, 175 million in its suburbs and small metros and about 98 million in its urban core counties.
> As a group, the population in rural counties grew 3% since 2000, less than their 8% growth in the 1990s. Urban county population rose 13% since 2000 and the population in suburban and small metro counties went up 16%, growth rates somewhat higher than in the 1990s.
It's hidden in plain sight: you mention "Boston, San Fransisco, and Seattle" in the same breath as NYC, but numbers-wise those are all pretty small and you're leaving out not only their suburbs but also the LA, Chicago, DFW and Houston areas which all have considerable amounts of suburbs and single family living, and hold almost 40M people alone...
And hell, a decent portion of SF at least land-wise is covered in single-family homes and duplexes, many (most?) of which are decently spacious and have garages. Even in cities, Americans tend to have more space than equivalently-situated Europeans.
Common most of the houses in outer richmond, sunset, ingleside, ... have multiple in-law units and converted garages. The cost of living is too expensive in those cities.
How does a garage help? Many people living in urban areas in Europe have a basement. And even those who don't shouldn't have issues storing 2 weeks worth of food in their houses or apartments. Fridge space is probably the only restriction for that.
Majority of US population lives in the suburbs. Roughly 30% live in urban areas and many of them would have garages or basements. For example, my town is considered urban and all the houses have garages.
> No one in NYC, Boston, San Francisco, Seattle, ... have big garages to stockpile supplies
I think most of San Francisco by area is zoned "RH-" (Residential Housing), and most of that RH- area is RH-1 or RH-1D (single family). Most of the homes in those regions have lots of space.
We're not just talking about Zuck's mansion either, plenty of homes in the Sunset or other West SF areas that have that kind of room.
Friend of mine went on a walkabout. Camping in his van and decided to live off just what was in his food bin. Basically a short half full rubber maid container. Lasted him three weeks.
In Europe by contrast, much more of life revolves around public spaces, like the park, cafes, the city square, and public transport. Americans tend to spend little time in restaurants, whereas Europeans relax and enjoy the meal, thus increasing their exposure time.
Think of the areas in the US that seen the worst outbreaks. Seattle, the Bay Area, New York, Boston. These are the metros, where the average resident is least likely to live a typical middle-American lifestyle. San Francisco in many ways is closer to Copenhagen than it is to Jacksonville.
Overall, social distancing is probably easier for Americans because our way of life already involves a good deal of social distance to begin with.