This week we got some good news from Pfizer on a vaccine, and a whole lot of bad news about COVID infections exploding nationwide. A recent trial indicated that Pfizer’s novel vaccine was more than 90% effective. This would make it about twice as effective as the normal flu vaccine. Medical experts believe that up to 30 million Americans could receive the vaccine by the end of the year and it could be widely available by April. Thank God. At the same time, COVID infections in the United States are approaching 200,000 a day. This means a lot of people are going to die in the coming months. Tragic. Those of us in the housing business have been spared the financial devastation that others are experiencing right now. We’ve been lucky. Millions of people are still out of work and the economy is far from recovered. That said, we just need to get past this. I’ve had friends who became infected with barely any symptoms, and I’ve had other friends who were hit so hard, they were sure they were going to die. As difficult as it is for everyone right now, mentally, physically and economically, we have to make it to the other side of this. The one thing I hope we have all learned from the pandemic, is that nothing is more important than health, because everything else can be replaced. Stay safe and wear a mask.
The usual solutions will not solve the current housing affordability crisis. Any solution that does not begin and end with a sustainable plan to radically increase housing supply is just noise. The barriers to increasing housing supply are complex and require the crucial cooperation of both public and private sectors, and more education.
“Boomerang” was a different kind of film. It was a movie about friendship, loyalty, and romance set in NYC at a medium-sized Black-led company that sold beauty products. Boomerang had an all-black cast and a plot that had nothing to do with being Black. While that was unheard of at the time, Murphy was such a big star that it didn’t seem like a big deal.
Terms like “great, genius,” and “world-class” are overused, perhaps because they mean something different to everyone. Greatness is subjective. Some might say you must be great just to be employed in the film business or to play professional sports, but I don’t think Will Smith or LeBron James think that way. The concept of being great also requires context. You could be a great high school athlete but only an average college player.