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Alec MacGillis Profile picture
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26 May, 4 tweets, 1 min read
The no-cash-accepted rules are still lingering, long after the CDC belatedly declared surface transmission virtually nonexistent. Coffee shops, baseball concessions etc etc. Life getting ever harder for those without plastic.
Those people without plastic of course include kids. Before, a kid could run down the street to buy chips or ice cream with a fiver. Now you need mom's bank card. If mom has a bank card.
Meanwhile, the hand sanitizer is going begging...
Another place not accepting cash these days: @Amtrak. I am a big passenger rail booster. But why in the world can one not use cash to buy a ticket to the next city or a bottle of water on the train.

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More from @AlecMacGillis

Alec MacGillis Profile picture
20 May
I'm not sure it's sunk in just how flush state (and many local) governments are now, between higher than expected tax revenues and the surge in federal aid. The challenge is figuring out how to spend it well. Officials just aren't used to this largesse. washingtonpost.com/local/virginia…
And many local governments also lack the capacity to spend the money well, because they've been so stripped down by lack of funding in recent years. There's a mismatch between a thin government infrastructure and this massive wave of one-time money to spend.
I mean, this is wild: "All told, Virginia has received or is slated to receive about $26.5 billion in federal aid to state and local governments — an amount roughly equivalent to the state’s general fund."
Read 4 tweets
Alec MacGillis Profile picture
14 May
Late to this thoughtful, nuanced @MckeanCarrie dispatch from Midland, Texas on the Covid-response regional divide: nytimes.com/2021/05/12/opi…
"Despite the tragedy of lives still being lost, it’s not demonstrably clear to many Texans that the governor’s rollback of rules was foolish or that the high cost of draconian measures in other areas provided markedly better outcomes than our approach."
"In the midst of all this confusion and deep loss, we also experienced odd pockets of joy this past year, perhaps thanks to the more flexible social consensus found here than in deep-blue areas."
Read 4 tweets
Alec MacGillis Profile picture
11 May
"Pediatricians say they are seeing alarming weight gains in children and adolescents as many return for in-person visits for the first time since the pandemic began." @rddysum: wsj.com/livecoverage/c…
"Doctors also report increases in weight-related health conditions, such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol and fatty liver disease. And some children with prediabetes are being diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes."
"'I’ve been really shocked by the amount of kids who have gone from normal weight to obese in a short period of time during the pandemic,' says Rachana Shah, medical director of the healthy weight program at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia."
Read 4 tweets
Alec MacGillis Profile picture
8 May
This story is insane.
At the very moment where the CDC confirms what experts have been saying all year about outdoor masking being less urgent, @UMass, the largest public university in New England, suspends three students for a single off-campus photo reported to them by a third-party informant. Wow.
For further context, it appears related to this outdoor party in March: masslive.com/coronavirus/20…
Read 4 tweets
Alec MacGillis Profile picture
3 May
Brookline MA, the second-most educated town in the country, has decided to overrule the CDC and keep an outdoor mask mandate in place: boston.cbslocal.com/2021/05/01/cor…
Good time to re-up @NoreenMalone's great piece about Brookline's resistance to reopening schools, despite having heaps of parental expertise on how to do it safely: slate.com/human-interest…
And apropos, @GiniaNYT's latest from NY: nytimes.com/2021/04/29/nyr…
Read 4 tweets
Alec MacGillis Profile picture
30 Apr
"The combined yearly revenue of Amazon, Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft & Facebook is $1.2 trillion, >25% higher than [before] pandemic. In less than a week, those 5 giants make more in sales than McDonald’s does in a year." @ShiraOvide on where we've arrived: nytimes.com/2021/04/29/tec…
"America’s technology superpowers aren’t making bonkers dollars in spite of the deadly coronavirus and its ripple effects through the global economy. They have grown even stronger *because* of the pandemic. It’s both logical and slightly nuts."
"The dictionary doesn’t have enough superlatives to describe what’s happening to the five biggest tech companies. It’s all a bit awkward, really."
That's exactly it. I've found it hard to find language to capture Amazon's growth. You start using comic-book words.
#fulfilllment
Read 4 tweets

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