SWC’s Fast Five
A pandemic baby boom goes bust while the kids we have get in line for their COVID shots, Google crumbles some of it tracking cookies, evictions and back rent just keep growing and WFH, we’re still doing that for a while.
So, here’s this week’s Fast Five:
1 Another WFH year
There is much at stake – employee productivity and happiness, tax implications, cost of living components of salary and benefits, help with childcare while not rankling dependent-free workers, client resistance to business travel when their offices are opening at less than capacity for their employees.
2 $60 billion owed in back rent and utilities at the start of 2021
As state and federal moratoriums are expected to expire in the next few months, an estimated 30 to 40 million Americans are at risk of being evicted. Black and Latino people make up approximately 80 percent of those facing eviction. Landlords say they are feeling pressure as well.
3 What’s next for children and COVID-19 vaccines
The Pfizer vaccine already is cleared for use starting at age 16. Pfizer and Moderna both have completed enrollment for studies of children ages 12 and older and expect to release the data over the summer. The Moderna vaccine is currently cleared for people 18 and older.
4 A pandemic baby bust
Research anticipates 300,000 fewer births in 2021 than in a non-pandemic year. There are many implications but one real societal challenge of a COVID baby bust will be a smaller work force, which portends lower economic productivity and fewer workers to contribute to the tax base. It also means a lower ratio of workers to retirees, which stresses Social Security.
5 Cookies crumble as Google phases out select web browsing tracking technology
For years, online ad technology companies including Google could tell a shoe retailer to personalize an ad to someone reading a Reuters.com article after having tracked that person the week before researching a shoe on Nike.com and checking for a specific color on FootLocker.com. Under these new policies, that tracking across multiple websites is unfeasible.
