You can’t turn the economy back on like a light switch

LTC Eugene Chu Most Definitely!

You can if the light switch has a rheostat.

The economy was already slowing as we entered into 2020. And even if we were to get a vax that eradicates the virus, thinking the market will go to the moon is, well, Cramer is a talking head and selling hype. First the valuations are stretched both on P/E and fwd P/E. Hell, no on now knows what the forward E is. Second, we just pumped another few trillion into the economy while ballooning our debt. This cut the taxes and trickle down movement is delusional at best. So while the economy was doing ok going into 2020, we already saw signs of a slowdown as credit markets froze towards the end of 2019 (spreads of CLOs blew out for instance). The virus just happened to come along at a time when we had an over validated market and an economy that was turning the corner.
Looking forward... even if we get a vax today, it will take months to produce on a wide scale. Second, to move from Phase 1 to Phase 2 trials is the easiest move. But only about 9.6% of P1 trials make it to FDA approval. And the average time is 1.6 years. Once we are out of this the next is inflation if we are lucky and stagflation if we are not. Need to fix our tax codes for people making $500k or more... Fix deductions on property rentals (reduce the deduction thereby increasing home ownership rather than renting which is a transfer of wealth), along with cutting back on people that receive entitlements but make too much money in retirement. Make $250k in retirement, prob don’t need your social security check.