@djlc78 @rcolvile @RishiSunak It certainly stimulated people to do what Sunak wanted them to do, which was to eat out. And it got money to a sector hit hard by covid19 lockdown. But the reason that sector was locked down was because it was judged to be generating risky activity for workers and consumers.
@djlc78 @rcolvile @RishiSunak Subsidizing people to resume that socially risky activity is an extremely peverse policy. Akin to subsidizing pollution, or littering, or noise generation, or climate change. Money could have gone to that sector anyway without the risky activity involved in cooking and eating.
@djlc78 @rcolvile @RishiSunak It would be appropriate if people had overstated the risks to society and under-engaged in the risk. But is there a convincing account of that? I don't see one.
@djlc78 @rcolvile @RishiSunak The extra risk puts pressure on a seemingly failing test and trace capacity; it is part of a fixed 'budget' for risky activities that that capacity entails, and which is going to be strained [shrunk basically] by winter weather, schools reopening, and other health conditions.
@djlc78 @rcolvile @RishiSunak IMO eat out to help out was a waste of time and potential suppressive effects of other measures, which could have brought case numbers down to a level that even our bad test and trace capacity could have overwhelmed, helping us through the pre-vaccine winter season.
@djlc78 @rcolvile @RishiSunak So, in short, EOTHO did what it said on the tin, but we should not have been doing that given the state of the virus and our other policy measures.
@djlc78 @rcolvile @RishiSunak If you want a summary of supportive evidence, look at the daily case numbers from the trough until now.
