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Comment by monksy | Hacker News Reader

This is really bad for the construction industry. Spraying oil based paints, environments with asbestos, dealing with lead paint, spraying insulation, and other really chemical heavy operations require protective gear.

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Gearing up hospitals to protect before a possible full blown outbreak ranks higher than private industry specific needs. If those construction employers care, they can pay the premium supply vs demand price increase not their employees.

The problem is construction firms "encouraging" their employees to work without proper PPE. This is illegal, but...

That's been a VERY big problem in the construction industry.

Unions ftw

Or they won't do it. Which will degrade homes and infrastructure.

I'm relatively sure that homes and infrastructure can manage waiting a year.

Your permits will expire and the banks funding your construction are going to have a fit. If there is a market crash because of the virus that leads to a real estate slump, however, this could be a blessing in disguise. On the other hand, it could also be suppressed market activity that pushes the economy over the edge.

Construction industry? I’ve had several people tell me this week, from plumbing to transport, saying people are starting to be let go because supply isn’t coming from China.

You can’t have a construction industry when the supply chain has choked

I ended up needing to paint something myself for a project due in a month and might just give up if I can't find any respirators.

I had to beg around my friends and asks for masks so I could do my hardie board install.

I've heard that harbor freight still has some in stock.. but there is a sense of irony buying facemasks from the country of covid19 epicenter... oh well

Oh nice, remodeling a bathroom with that hardie board or what? Is that the concrete sheet for wet environments?

Maybe they were shipping over the used ones.

can you say for certain that home depot supplies the construction industry to such an extreme degree that it will be really bad? maybe for small businesses, but the bigger ones have independent suppliers that aren't home depot for their shit.

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