| This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a New Deal of Bloomberg Opinion's opinions. Sign up here. Today's Agenda  We've already got the bread lines. Photographer: Mario Tama/Getty Images North America Covid Depression Is a Frustrating Mess Way back on March 6, when dinosaurs ruled the Earth, Bloomberg Businessweek's Peter Coy suggested we might already be in a coronavirus recession. Some sniffed this was too pessimistic. The risk now is this prescient column didn't go far enough. Because if we can escape this pandemic with a mere recession, then we should count ourselves fortunate. There's a not-negligible chance this could turn into a depression instead, Noah Smith writes. Social-distancing measures have shut down economic activity around the world, spiking unemployment almost immediately to something like 20%, a depression-y number if ever there was one. But that's just the start. The trouble is, the economy won't fully recover until everybody feels safe, globally. That could take years — and rushing to reopen the economy will only make it worse — and such duration is a key ingredient for turning a nasty recession into a depression. (Deflation is another such ingredient, Tim Duy has written; for a hint of that, please refer to "oil prices, negative.") Hence we've gotten extraordinary relief efforts from the world's central banks and fiscal policy makers, though the latter keep falling short. The Paycheck Protection Program set up by Congress to help small and medium businesses keep their employees ran out of cash without protecting nearly enough paychecks. The fund will be replenished, but small businesses may still struggle to get loans, especially if they're relying on big banks, warns Joe Nocera. He writes many applicants had better luck dealing with small banks instead. The PPP top-up came only after political horse-trading that may have included Democrats giving up on relief for state and local governments (another key to avoiding a depression, as Marcus Stanley has written). This sure felt a lot like Democrats caving in, but Jonathan Bernstein suggests Republicans may have been threatening to walk away from any extra stimulus at all, making this the most Democrats could get. And simply letting states go bankrupt, as Mitch McConnell suggests, will and should be a nonstarter for pulse-having policy makers anyway, writes Brian Chappatta. Political haggling over the furniture may seem petty when the house is on fire, but politics will be driving the economic response to this crisis for the foreseeable future, writes Narayana Kocherlakota. Talk about depressing. Further Depression-Fighting Reading: Invisible Enemy Keeps Being Invisible As we've written a million times, we're suffering through these significant lockdowns mainly because we lack good data on just how wild the coronavirus is running. Where scientists have been able to test whole populations — on ships or in small towns, say — the results hint the virus is more widespread than official tallies suggest. But even those studies are fraught with uncertainty, write Justin Fox and Noah Smith. Skewed data can even be deadly, warns Cathy O'Neil: Poor treatment has killed many elderly and poor patients in this pandemic, and their higher numbers may convince health workers such populations are less likely to survive and thus less deserving of rationed care. Even our understanding of how to fight the pandemic is changing constantly. Until very recently, Singapore had been a role model for its Covid-19 tactics, but now it's suffering a new surge in cases, notes Dan Moss. Even the best-run response can spring leaks. Widespread testing forgives a lot of sins, especially when followed by widespread tracing. The downside is that it also involves living in a surveillance state for a while, writes Andreas Kluth. He suggests we study how they do it in Taiwan and Iceland, which have managed to balance information and privacy. Post-Covid National Security America's national security was already on an iffy path before the coronavirus, what with the rise of China and Russia as global rivals to the U.S., helped by Trump's attacking the post-World War II global order with a monkey wrench. But Covid-19 presents even new challenges — and maybe also opportunities? — for America's national security, say Bloomberg Opinion writers: Telltale Charts You never want to see China's air pollution bouncing back, but maybe in this case we'll make an exception, writes Ben Schott.  Even if people have other streaming services, they see Netflix as a necessity, writes Tara Lachapelle.  Even before the price crashed, oil ETFs were mainly good for flushing all your money down the toilet, writes Lionel Laurent. Mom and pop investors are discovering that the hard way.  Further Reading In an obscure case in the middle of a pandemic, the U.S. Supreme Court just previewed a Roe v. Wade fight. — Noah Feldman Covid-19 may finally end Big Oil's increasingly pointless devotion to big dividends. — Liam Denning The Gucci brand could suffer as shoppers seek less-flashy styles. — Andrea Felsted As usual, credit ratings are meaningless to bond investors, who keep snapping up corporate debt despite ratings cuts. — Matt Winkler The virus has meant the end of plastic-bag bans, but consumers will probably keep shunning single-use plastics. — Adam Minter ICYMI Layoffs are spreading to office jobs. The self-employed are getting a raw deal. A meat shortage is looming. Kickers How the environment has changed since the first Earth Day 50 years ago. Adult immune systems "remember" germs to which they've never been exposed. Scientific paper dares to ask "What's the deal with birds?" Why our brains crave new music. Note: Please send new music and complaints to Mark Gongloff at mgongloff1@bloomberg.net. Sign up here and follow us on Twitter and Facebook. | 
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