vox--2020-09-10--How to think about coronavirus risk in your life

Covid-19 has turned life into an endless series of risk calculations .
Can I take my child to see their grandparents , even if it means getting on a plane ?
Is it okay to begin seeing friends or dating ?
Should I attend religious services even if they are held inside ?
Do I have to wear a mask around my roommates ?
The profusion of these questions reflects public health failures , but we live in the wreckage of those failures .
So how do we live our lives ?
Julia Marcus is an epidemiologist at Harvard Medical @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Atlantic who has penned a brilliant series of essays about how to think about risk in the midst of this pandemic .
Marcus ’ s starting point , which emerges from her previous work on HIV prevention , is that an all-or-nothing approach is blindly unrealistic : Everything is a trade-off .
Shaming is a terrible public health strategy .
And we can ’ t have a conversation about risk that ignores the reality of benefits , too .
In this conversation on The Ezra Klein Show , Marcus offers a framework for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ same time managing coronavirus risk .
We also discuss what the risk calculation for someone living in Germany or South Korea looks like , how the US government ’ s abdication of responsibility has shifted the burden of risk management onto individuals , the kinds of activities we tend to underestimate and overestimate the riskiness of , the principles that should guide us in the age of coronavirus , how long we can expect this pandemic to last , and much more .
An edited excerpt from our conversation follows .
The full @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Klein Show .
Subscribe to The Ezra Klein Show wherever you listen to podcasts , including : Apple Podcasts , Google Podcasts , Spotify , and Stitcher .
In March , if I ’ d ask you to predict what kinds of risk decisions we would all be making today , would you have predicted something like this ?
I don ’ t think I would have predicted where we are now until sometime in April .
In March , I was still in the camp of hopefully we ’ ll get this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ April , it became obvious not just to me but to everybody that this was not going away anytime soon .
And that really shifted my thinking .
I think there was a big shift societally around needing to think about sustainability .
It took some time , and I think we still have not actually fully caught up to that in terms of the way we ’ re thinking about navigating our everyday lives .
What haven ’ t we caught up to in terms of that everyday thinking ?
If we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ some very binary thinking going on around two options .
One was : Let ’ s just stay home until there ’ s a vaccine .
And the other was : Let ’ s just go back to business as usual .
Of course , there ’ s a million things in between ; risk is not binary .
I think we ’ ve gotten out of some of that binary thinking .
But , in a way , I think we have unfortunately continued to apply binary thinking , not just to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , but also to masks to schools to Sweden , you name it .
Any hot button topic right now has become dichotomized in a way that I find really concerning , especially around scientific decision-making and also for people making everyday decisions who are trying to navigate this .
There has to be nuance in all this , and I feel like nuance died sometime in March .
The conversation I want to have today is about how to think about risk in this era .
It strikes me that the question @ @ @ @ @ @ @ onto individuals than I would ’ ve hoped a couple of months ago .
We are living in the void where an effective policy response should have been .
If our contact tracing and quarantining and testing was where it should be , the question of risk management for individuals would be very different ; risk that would have been shared between individuals and government is now risk that individuals have to bear the bulk of themselves .
Do you think that ’ s a reasonable way of looking at this moment ?
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The burden of decision-making and risk in this pandemic has been fully transitioned from the top down to the individual .
I think it started with basically being transitioned to the states , and then transitioned to the local school districts , for instance , and then down to the individual .
I think you can see it in the way that people talk about personal responsibility and the way that we see so much shaming about individual-level behavior .
It ’ s true that individuals have responsibility in an infectious disease @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the sense that our choices affect other people .
But there ’ s been a total abdication of responsibility at the top to create an environment in which individuals aren ’ t burdened with that much risk and have to make those decisions entirely on their own .
And it ’ s not just a policy gap .
Compounding that is a public health messaging gap .
The CDC has been silent or silenced .
And without that unified public health voice , I think there ’ s so much more confusion than @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the past when we have had a well-respected , trusted public health voice that we ’ re hearing from on a regular basis .
You can see the difference in other countries where there really is that voice — it makes a difference in terms of public trust and people ’ s willingness to make sacrifices that are really difficult right now .
What often feels so hard about this moment to me is that it ’ s one thing to manage a risk that primarily falls on you as an individual , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ t have co-morbidities and are not in an at-risk age band , the bigger danger is not the risk to me but the risk of me passing it on to someone for whom it ’ s even more dangerous .
I find that much harder .
Could you talk a little bit about that difference and how it changes our conception of risk in this conversation ?
I think this is very salient on college campuses right now where people who are somewhere between the ages of 18 and 22 are being @ @ @ @ @ @ @ something that is a very distal risk for them .
They are also at risk of infection , and some of them may or will have bad outcomes , but for them it ’ s a much lower risk than , say , older people in the surrounding community or their families who they live with .
And we ’ re not asking people to just make a slight shift in their behavior — this is not just a seatbelt we ’ re talking about .
We ’ re talking about asking people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that may be really counter to what they need and want in their everyday lives .
And we ’ re asking them to do it not for themselves but for others .
It ’ s a big ask .
I ’ m not saying it ’ s not something we shouldn ’ t ask , but it is something that we need to consider when we make these asks .
We need to find ways of making it easier for people to make that decision without just saying , “ If you really @ @ @ @ @ @ @ do this , and you ’ re selfish if you don ’ t. ” There has to be some give there and some recognition of what we ’ re really asking and what ’ s realistic and what ’ s sustainable .
Does social shaming and scolding work as a communication strategy around public health ?
I generally try to stay away from absolutist responses , but my instinct is to flat-out say no : Scolding and shaming are toxic to public health .
Almost full stop , with very few exceptions .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ instinct to want to shame somebody for several reasons .
One is we ’ re watching people do what we perceive as risky , and it ’ s not just putting themselves at risk — we ’ re watching them potentially put others at risk .
There ’ s a lot of frustration and anger that comes up in that situation .
But from a public health perspective , trying to shame somebody into changing their behavior just doesn ’ t work .
It doesn ’ t deter the behavior generally .
For @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on a general population level , what it will do is actually just deter disclosure of the behavior .
So if we think about what shame is doing , it ’ s essentially saying you ’ re a bad person for doing this .
Going back to the colleges right now , we ’ re seeing plenty of examples of administrators saying you are selfish and reckless and irresponsible — that doesn ’ t put somebody in a place of action to change their behavior .
And it also doesn ’ t solve @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is to say , “ What ’ s actually going on here ?
Why are students partying or why are people not wearing masks ?
” If you take a step back and ask that question , you might come up with a very different approach .
In the case of college students , you may conclude that they really need to socialize and have fun .
They ’ re like 19 years old — this is what 19-year-olds do .
So then the question becomes , how do we help them meet @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s safer ?
And that is far more productive in public health .
We see it for HIV prevention , for substance use .
It ’ s the same situation here with Covid where we really need to be thinking about how we can help people meet their needs , not how we can shame them into changing their behavior .
Let ’ s talk a bit about what we ’ ve actually learned here .
What are behaviors or activities where we tend to overestimate their coronavirus risk , in your experience @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tend to underestimate the danger ?
What is off in our social and societal risk perception ?
That ’ s a hard question to answer in a generalized way .
I think everyone is assessing risk differently , and policy-level decisions about risk differ wildly depending on the setting because we don ’ t have a national response — we have many local responses that look very different .
At the policy level , we see situations like a few weeks ago in Hawaii where there were indoor restaurants and gyms open , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hiking trails were closed .
That struck me as really backwards .
We see some of that on an individual level as well , where we have some people who are still disinfecting their groceries , even though there has been little to no evidence of fomite transmission .
I would not say it ’ s impossible , but it appears to be a low risk .
And then we have people who are having crowded indoor gatherings with family because they feel like family is probably pretty safe and they ’ re @ @ @ @ @ @ @ So I don ’ t think there ’ s one way that we are assessing risk in the wrong way .
I think there ’ s a variety of myths and misperceptions around risk .
And that ’ s normal .
I see it in HIV as well .
We are not robots , we are human beings .
And we ’ re not going to assess things perfectly all the time .
It strikes me that it would have been good from the beginning to build out a couple principles that seem @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that anything that can move outdoors should .
We know people are not going to stay in their homes all the time .
If we can get them outside as opposed to inside , that will be better .
I think we should be permissive with outside activities and really urge it so people are not driven inside .
Also , if you ’ re going to be seeing people , which is a reality for most at this point , I think it would be better if that was a stable set @ @ @ @ @ @ @ course , there ’ s masking when you ’ re around other people .
It seems like there could have been like five or seven things like this that should have been the principles that we should have been almost restructuring society around for a while .
And instead , we ’ re just fighting over every individual case endlessly with no resolution and a billion different plans in a million different places .
You summed it up beautifully .
I think that ’ s exactly what ’ s happening .
And I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ spaces in epidemiology .
When we talk about relative risk and we look at various causes and effects , we rarely see relative risks above like 1.5 or 2 — like twice the risk in this setting versus that setting or this drug versus that drug .
When we talk about outdoor risk of transmission versus indoor , we ’ re talking about like 20 times difference with indoor risk being 20 times higher .
So it ’ s just a huge prevention opportunity .
And , as you said , we are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ beings .
So let ’ s find ways to keep our contacts at a minimum and keep them outdoors .
If we work with that framework , I think there ’ s a lot we can do .
That is more sustainable than the approach we ’ re currently taking , which is fragmented and unproductive .
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Covid-19 has turned life into an endless series of risk calculations. Can I take my child to see their grandparents, even if it means getting on a plane? Is it okay to begin seeing friends or dating? Should I attend religious services even if they are held inside? Do I have to wear a mask around my roommates? The profusion of these questions reflects public health failures, but we live in the wreckage of those failures. So how do we live our lives?
Julia Marcus is an epidemiologist at Harvard Medical School and a contributing writer for the Atlantic who has penned a brilliant series of essays about how to think about risk in the midst of this pandemic. Marcus’s starting point, which emerges from her previous work on HIV prevention, is that an all-or-nothing approach is blindly unrealistic: Everything is a trade-off. Shaming is a terrible public health strategy. And we can’t have a conversation about risk that ignores the reality of benefits, too.
In this conversation on The Ezra Klein Show, Marcus offers a framework for making key life decisions while at the same time managing coronavirus risk. We also discuss what the risk calculation for someone living in Germany or South Korea looks like, how the US government’s abdication of responsibility has shifted the burden of risk management onto individuals, the kinds of activities we tend to underestimate and overestimate the riskiness of, the principles that should guide us in the age of coronavirus, how long we can expect this pandemic to last, and much more.
An edited excerpt from our conversation follows. The full conversation can be heard on The Ezra Klein Show.
Subscribe to The Ezra Klein Show wherever you listen to podcasts, including: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, and Stitcher.
Ezra Klein
In March, if I’d ask you to predict what kinds of risk decisions we would all be making today, would you have predicted something like this?
Julia Marcus
I don’t think I would have predicted where we are now until sometime in April. In March, I was still in the camp of hopefully we’ll get this sorted out pretty quickly.
In early April, it became obvious not just to me but to everybody that this was not going away anytime soon. And that really shifted my thinking. I think there was a big shift societally around needing to think about sustainability. It took some time, and I think we still have not actually fully caught up to that in terms of the way we’re thinking about navigating our everyday lives.
Ezra Klein
What haven’t we caught up to in terms of that everyday thinking?
Julia Marcus
If we think back to March, there was some very binary thinking going on around two options. One was: Let’s just stay home until there’s a vaccine. And the other was: Let’s just go back to business as usual. Of course, there’s a million things in between; risk is not binary. I think we’ve gotten out of some of that binary thinking. But, in a way, I think we have unfortunately continued to apply binary thinking, not just to staying at home versus business as usual, but also to masks to schools to Sweden, you name it.
Any hot button topic right now has become dichotomized in a way that I find really concerning, especially around scientific decision-making and also for people making everyday decisions who are trying to navigate this. There has to be nuance in all this, and I feel like nuance died sometime in March.
Ezra Klein
The conversation I want to have today is about how to think about risk in this era. It strikes me that the question of risk has been shunted far more onto individuals than I would’ve hoped a couple of months ago. We are living in the void where an effective policy response should have been. If our contact tracing and quarantining and testing was where it should be, the question of risk management for individuals would be very different; risk that would have been shared between individuals and government is now risk that individuals have to bear the bulk of themselves. Do you think that’s a reasonable way of looking at this moment?
Julia Marcus
I think that’s exactly right. The burden of decision-making and risk in this pandemic has been fully transitioned from the top down to the individual. I think it started with basically being transitioned to the states, and then transitioned to the local school districts, for instance, and then down to the individual.
I think you can see it in the way that people talk about personal responsibility and the way that we see so much shaming about individual-level behavior. It’s true that individuals have responsibility in an infectious disease outbreak, and more than usual in the sense that our choices affect other people. But there’s been a total abdication of responsibility at the top to create an environment in which individuals aren’t burdened with that much risk and have to make those decisions entirely on their own.
And it’s not just a policy gap. Compounding that is a public health messaging gap. The CDC has been silent or silenced. And without that unified public health voice, I think there’s so much more confusion than there has been in similar situations in the past when we have had a well-respected, trusted public health voice that we’re hearing from on a regular basis. You can see the difference in other countries where there really is that voice — it makes a difference in terms of public trust and people’s willingness to make sacrifices that are really difficult right now.
Ezra Klein
What often feels so hard about this moment to me is that it’s one thing to manage a risk that primarily falls on you as an individual, but for many of us who don’t have co-morbidities and are not in an at-risk age band, the bigger danger is not the risk to me but the risk of me passing it on to someone for whom it’s even more dangerous. I find that much harder.
Could you talk a little bit about that difference and how it changes our conception of risk in this conversation?
Julia Marcus
I think this is very salient on college campuses right now where people who are somewhere between the ages of 18 and 22 are being asked to make enormous sacrifices to prevent something that is a very distal risk for them. They are also at risk of infection, and some of them may or will have bad outcomes, but for them it’s a much lower risk than, say, older people in the surrounding community or their families who they live with.
And we’re not asking people to just make a slight shift in their behavior — this is not just a seatbelt we’re talking about. We’re talking about asking people to make radical changes to their behavior that may be really counter to what they need and want in their everyday lives. And we’re asking them to do it not for themselves but for others. It’s a big ask.
I’m not saying it’s not something we shouldn’t ask, but it is something that we need to consider when we make these asks. We need to find ways of making it easier for people to make that decision without just saying, “If you really cared about other people, you would do this, and you’re selfish if you don’t.” There has to be some give there and some recognition of what we’re really asking and what’s realistic and what’s sustainable.
Ezra Klein
Does social shaming and scolding work as a communication strategy around public health?
Julia Marcus
I generally try to stay away from absolutist responses, but my instinct is to flat-out say no: Scolding and shaming are toxic to public health. Almost full stop, with very few exceptions.
I think it’s a natural instinct to want to shame somebody for several reasons. One is we’re watching people do what we perceive as risky, and it’s not just putting themselves at risk — we’re watching them potentially put others at risk. There’s a lot of frustration and anger that comes up in that situation. But from a public health perspective, trying to shame somebody into changing their behavior just doesn’t work. It doesn’t deter the behavior generally. For some individuals, it might, but on a general population level, what it will do is actually just deter disclosure of the behavior. So if we think about what shame is doing, it’s essentially saying you’re a bad person for doing this.
Going back to the colleges right now, we’re seeing plenty of examples of administrators saying you are selfish and reckless and irresponsible — that doesn’t put somebody in a place of action to change their behavior. And it also doesn’t solve the root problem. An alternative approach is to say, “What’s actually going on here? Why are students partying or why are people not wearing masks?”
If you take a step back and ask that question, you might come up with a very different approach. In the case of college students, you may conclude that they really need to socialize and have fun. They’re like 19 years old — this is what 19-year-olds do. So then the question becomes, how do we help them meet those needs in a way that’s safer? And that is far more productive in public health. We see it for HIV prevention, for substance use. It’s the same situation here with Covid where we really need to be thinking about how we can help people meet their needs, not how we can shame them into changing their behavior.
Ezra Klein
Let’s talk a bit about what we’ve actually learned here. What are behaviors or activities where we tend to overestimate their coronavirus risk, in your experience? And what are things where we tend to underestimate the danger? What is off in our social and societal risk perception?
Julia Marcus
That’s a hard question to answer in a generalized way. I think everyone is assessing risk differently, and policy-level decisions about risk differ wildly depending on the setting because we don’t have a national response — we have many local responses that look very different.
At the policy level, we see situations like a few weeks ago in Hawaii where there were indoor restaurants and gyms open, but public outdoor spaces like beaches and hiking trails were closed. That struck me as really backwards.
We see some of that on an individual level as well, where we have some people who are still disinfecting their groceries, even though there has been little to no evidence of fomite transmission. I would not say it’s impossible, but it appears to be a low risk. And then we have people who are having crowded indoor gatherings with family because they feel like family is probably pretty safe and they’re not registering that as potentially risky.
So I don’t think there’s one way that we are assessing risk in the wrong way. I think there’s a variety of myths and misperceptions around risk. And that’s normal. I see it in HIV as well. We are not robots, we are human beings. And we’re not going to assess things perfectly all the time.
Ezra Klein
It strikes me that it would have been good from the beginning to build out a couple principles that seem to apply to everything. One is that anything that can move outdoors should. We know people are not going to stay in their homes all the time. If we can get them outside as opposed to inside, that will be better. I think we should be permissive with outside activities and really urge it so people are not driven inside. Also, if you’re going to be seeing people, which is a reality for most at this point, I think it would be better if that was a stable set of people. And then, of course, there’s masking when you’re around other people.
It seems like there could have been like five or seven things like this that should have been the principles that we should have been almost restructuring society around for a while. And instead, we’re just fighting over every individual case endlessly with no resolution and a billion different plans in a million different places.
Julia Marcus
You summed it up beautifully. I think that’s exactly what’s happening. And I couldn’t agree more about outdoor spaces in epidemiology. When we talk about relative risk and we look at various causes and effects, we rarely see relative risks above like 1.5 or 2 — like twice the risk in this setting versus that setting or this drug versus that drug. When we talk about outdoor risk of transmission versus indoor, we’re talking about like 20 times difference with indoor risk being 20 times higher. So it’s just a huge prevention opportunity.
And, as you said, we are not going to stop interacting as human beings. So let’s find ways to keep our contacts at a minimum and keep them outdoors. If we work with that framework, I think there’s a lot we can do. That is more sustainable than the approach we’re currently taking, which is fragmented and unproductive.


vox--2020-09-10--A third of Americans might refuse a Covid-19 vaccine. How screwed are we?

Share All sharing options for : A third of Americans might refuse a Covid-19 vaccine .
How screwed are we ?
When the Covid-19 pandemic became a full-fledged crisis in March , public health experts gave a prescription for riding it out : Flatten the curve with social distancing , lockdowns , contact tracing , etc.
, and then wait for a vaccine .
The hope was , and still is , that a mass vaccination campaign can restore the world to normal .
For many reasons , the success of a vaccination campaign is not guaranteed .
The vaccine @ @ @ @ @ @ @ needs to be enough of it to put a dent in transmission .
Another challenge perhaps overlooked : “ What if we get a safe and effective vaccine and people choose not to get it ?
” says Matt Motta , a political scientist at Oklahoma State University .
Pervasive vaccine refusal looks like a real possibility .
Motta ’ s research on a hypothetical Covid-19 vaccine , as well as polling from Gallup ( and others ) this summer , reveals that between a quarter and a third of the American public @ @ @ @ @ @ @ vaccinated against Covid-19 .
These surveys generally ask about a hypothetical FDA-approved vaccine and not about one approved under an emergency use authorization before clinical trials have ended .
A new Kaiser Family Foundation poll asked respondents if they ’ d take a free vaccine approved before election day : 54 percent said they would decline .
The surveys actually might be underselling the problem .
“ When we look at seasonal influenza vaccination rates , for example , surveys always overestimate the number of people who get it , ” Motta says @ @ @ @ @ @ @ you ’ re going to get a vaccine to a pollster than it is to actually go get one .
The hesitation showing up in these polls is not about a skepticism of all vaccines ( although there is some of that , for sure ) .
It ’ s skepticism about this potential vaccine , created in record time , via the Trump administration ’ s Operation Warp Speed .
Overall , 83 percent of Americans agree that if a vaccine is approved too quickly , they would worry about its safety @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the US response to the pandemic that has been botched .
We failed on testing early and then failed to scale it up .
We failed on contact tracing , on reopening many of our communities safely .
But we haven ’ t screwed up a vaccine campaign yet .
There ’ s still time to get it right .
It requires not just developing a safe vaccine , approved without the taint of a political rush job , but also conducting a vast social science research effort to better understand people ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ then help move them toward acceptance .
No approved vaccine exists yet .
But every day , pharmaceutical companies are making progress on vaccine trials , and some may release data before the end of this year .
That means the window to get it right “ is closing , ” Emily Brunson , a medical anthropologist at Texas State University , says .
“ If we don ’ t , we run the risk of undermining public health in the US — and even more specifically undermining the entire vaccination program.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the US government itself Billions have been spent on developing the Covid-19 vaccines .
But lacking in the development process is a key ingredient : the public ’ s trust .
There ’ s a tension here : The White House itself is diminishing the credibility of its own Food and Drug Administration .
On the one hand , public health researchers and experts want to figure out how to convince people who are vaccine hesitant to accept it to put the brakes on the pandemic .
On the other , the Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that lead to — at best — the appearance of a politically compromised FDA , the US agency tasked with approving a vaccine for widespread public use .
There ’ s reasonable confusion : Is operation Warp Speed designed to save the American public or ensure Trump ’ s reelection ?
In August , FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn cited misleading statistics about the efficacy of using blood plasma to treat severe Covid-19 .
And now , the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ( CDC ) has told hospitals to be prepared to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ close to Election Day ) .
As Vox ’ s Umair Irfan reports , it ’ s still unlikely that a vaccine will be authorized for use by then .
But even the appearance of political interference could lead to lasting damage to a vaccination campaign .
Sketchiness is creeping into these key public health agencies : CNN reports that sudden changes to CDC Covid-19 testing guidelines ( which experts strongly oppose ) came from “ the top down.
” According to the Kaiser Family Foundation poll , 62 percent of the public @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the White House will result in a FDA-approved vaccine arriving before all the safety data is in .
Even Republicans are worried about political influence on the vaccine process .
Seventy-two percent of Republicans and 82 percent of Democrats worry the vaccine approval process is being driven more by politics than science , according to a recent Stat and Harris poll .
( In the Kaiser poll , 35 percent of Republicans agreed that the administration will push the FDA to approve a too-soon vaccine . )
“ This is a scary moment @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the department of family science at the University of Maryland , says .
“ I worry that any pressure to try to move one of those [ vaccine candidates ] forward as an electoral strategy , political strategy , while undermining the public ’ s trust , will damage us for years to come .
...
The public ’ s trust in the FDA is really critical here .
With every effort the White House makes to pressure FDA on decisions , we further risk the credibility of the agency and the likelihood @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Vaccine hesitancy is not uniform .
Black communities — some of the hardest hit by Covid-19 — are particularly hesitant .
If a vaccine is approved , it will likely be voluntary for people to get .
Right now , the polling and research finds that some communities will be more willing to volunteer than others .
Of particular concern is the increased level of hesitancy in Black communities — for many reasons — which have already been disproportionately impacted by the pandemic .
Higher vaccine refusal in these communities could lead to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is , if these communities have access to the vaccine in the first place . )
In a May to June survey , Motta and co-authors estimated Black Americans may be about 40 percent more likely to refuse a vaccine than white Americans ( their demographically representative survey found 43 percent of Black Americans plan to refuse a vaccine versus around 29 percent of the American public at large ) .
In July , Gallup found 67 percent of white Americans said they ’ d get an FDA-approved Covid-19 vaccine ; 59 percent @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Zinzi Bailey , a social epidemiologist at the University of Miami , is not surprised by this disparity .
“ These are historically rooted , longstanding issues , ” she says .
Black communities have been exploited and harmed by medical researchers , and biases in medicine persist .
“ I think a lot of people feel like they ’ re going to be experimented on , ” Bailey says .
“ Words like ‘ warp speed ’ are not reassuring in this case.
” In Motta ’ s survey , he and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ could refuse a vaccine .
They ’ re worried about safety and effectiveness .
They are also worried about access : that they won ’ t be able to get or afford a vaccine when it becomes available .
In terms of access , their fears are well grounded .
Already during the pandemic , there have been access problems with Black and minority communities , namely testing .
In April , Vox ’ s Aaron Ross Coleman found that the White House ’ s initiative to partner with retail stores for testing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Bailey stresses that the increased hesitancy in Black communities shouldn ’ t be framed as a deficiency within those communities .
Rather , it is a reflection of how our society has treated them .
“ I think what these [ survey ] results are indicating is an underlying level of mistrust that is rampant in the country , ” she says .
“ Mistrust is the name of the game right now , which hampers our ability to move forward with public health initiatives.
” Again , there are indications that this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in general but that there ’ s added uncertainty about the Covid-19 vaccines in development .
“ Black community and other minority communities vaccinate their kids for measles , mumps , rubella , ” says Justin Stoler , who studies health disparities at the University of Miami .
“ There are disparities there , but not disparities like we ’ re seeing with Covid willingness.
” It ’ s not just Black communities that may be less willing to vaccinate .
Women also report greater hesitancy about a vaccine ( they are 70 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ than men , according to Motta ’ s research ) , as do political conservatives and people living in rural areas .
Plus , there ’ s the longstanding anti-vaccination movement , which will likely seek to undermine Covid-19 vaccination efforts .
The challenge is that each of these communities may require a different strategy , have different underlying anxieties and fears , and require a slightly different intervention to placate their fears .
We need more vaccine social science research How do we get ahead of this hesitancy problem ?
Experts I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ widespread , on-the-ground anthropological research in communities to find out what their vaccine concerns are and to test educational campaigns to address those concerns .
“ We are , and should be , investing an enormous amount of resources in the research and development of a vaccine , ” Crouse Quinn says .
“ We ’ ve invested very few , almost no resources , in the social and behavioral science research that will help us understand in real time how the public will respond to a vaccine.
” In August , Brunson @ @ @ @ @ @ @ social science research agenda for a Covid-19 vaccine campaign .
“ What we ’ re arguing for is that state and local health departments need to be given the funding , ” she says , to go out into communities and figure out what anxieties people have about the vaccine , and the messages and educational materials that might placate those fears .
Research and development into the vaccine technology costs billions .
Brunson says the social science component might cost , nationally , around $ 40 million .
But it ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been talking with people in the Senate , we ’ ve been talking with Congress , we ’ ve been really trying to push this even with nonprofits and nothing has come through yet , ” Brunson says .
Which is a shame .
“ I think a lot of people feel like they ’ re going to be experimented on ” “ There ’ s an assumption that if we can develop the vaccine technology , that if we build it , people will come , and we ’ ll get vaccinated @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it ’ s not true .
The social component is as complicated if not even more complicated than developing the vaccine technology.
” ( Such a suite of on-the-ground social science research has been effective in increasing willingness to vaccinate for Ebola in African countries . )
Motta and his collaborators are independently doing some of this research ( which has not yet been published ) , trying to figure out what sorts of messages might move people toward vaccine acceptance .
“ We don ’ t have a lot of research on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” he says .
But preliminarily , “ we find that if you talk about the personal health risks of Covid , that ’ s something that seems to resonate.
” Messages about how a vaccine could help the economy don ’ t work , and messages about how the vaccine could help save others are less effective than messages about personal risk .
Most importantly , we know what doesn ’ t work : shaming , and , as Motta says , “ telling people ‘ you ’ re wrong and here @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be a lot of different strategies that work .
“ We know from my own research that the more people you believe want you to get a flu vaccine , the more likely you are to take it , ” Crouse Quinn says .
“ We know that if you have a high perceived risk of the disease , you ’ re more likely to take the vaccine .
But if you have a high perceived risk of vaccine side effects , that will depress your willingness.
” It ’ s complicated to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that works , and for whom .
Trump could upend it all .
He has a remarkable , well-documented power for taking issues that normally are apolitical and splitting opinion on them along political lines .
This could happen with a vaccine , leading to a swell of refusal among his political opponents .
“ By tying vaccine safety issues to his personal political ambitions , Trump [ could make ] vaccine safety a partisan issue , ” Motta says .
“ That ’ s potentially a huge problem , as Democrats are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ intend to vaccinate .
If Democrats start to doubt that a truly effective vaccine was rigorously vetted , we could see even greater compliance problems.
” How many people need to be vaccinated against Covid-19 , anyway ?
Let ’ s say there is a safe and effective Covid-19 vaccine , approved without political interference by the FDA .
And still , 30 percent or more of Americans refuse to get it .
Does that immediately ruin the chances of a vaccination campaign succeeding ?
Natalie Dean , a biostatistician and vaccine researcher @ @ @ @ @ @ @ there are several variables at play that will determine what proportion of the population will need to be vaccinated .
Dean sent along the following chart to explain .
At first glance , it ’ s a little hard to interpret , but it can help us think through the math .
What it shows is that varying levels of vaccine effectiveness ( the different colored line ) , and the effective contagiousness of the disease ( the R ) , affect how many people in a population need to be vaccinated to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the vaccine , the fewer people need to be vaccinated .
A less potent vaccine ( or perhaps one that requires multiple doses to achieve its highest potency ) would likely require nearly everyone to be vaccinated .
The good news in this chart is that R is not a fixed number .
It changes based on our actions ( like wearing masks ) , and depending on how we use other public health tools to combat the spread of Covid-19 .
“ If we ’ re able to bring the effective R @ @ @ @ @ @ @ says , “ by having better contact tracing , or better isolation , or reducing the superspreading events , or having more testing so that we can catch people in their infectious period ... all these ways that we can reduce R , then that will also reduce that [ vaccine ] threshold that we need to hit.
” A vaccine , Dean reminds , “ is a potentially valuable tool , but it ’ s not the only tool.
” A successful Covid-19 vaccine campaign is not lost yet .
But the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in a window of time right now where this can actually be addressed , and be addressed well , ” Brunson says .
A botched vaccine campaign could undermine public health in the United States .
But a good campaign , she stresses , could lift it up , and “ increase faith in public health and belief in vaccination .
That would really put us as a country , across the board , on a better path.
” Help keep Vox free for all Millions turn to Vox each month to understand @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , from the coronavirus crisis to a racial reckoning to what is , quite possibly , the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes .
Our mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment : to empower you through understanding .
But our distinctive brand of explanatory journalism takes resources — particularly during a pandemic and an economic downturn .
Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers , your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work , and helping everyone make sense @ @ @ @ @ @ @ today from as little as $ 3 .

Share All sharing options for: A third of Americans might refuse a Covid-19 vaccine. How screwed are we?
When the Covid-19 pandemic became a full-fledged crisis in March, public health experts gave a prescription for riding it out: Flatten the curve with social distancing, lockdowns, contact tracing, etc., and then wait for a vaccine. The hope was, and still is, that a mass vaccination campaign can restore the world to normal.
For many reasons, the success of a vaccination campaign is not guaranteed. The vaccine has to be effective, and there needs to be enough of it to put a dent in transmission. Another challenge perhaps overlooked: “What if we get a safe and effective vaccine and people choose not to get it?” says Matt Motta, a political scientist at Oklahoma State University.
Pervasive vaccine refusal looks like a real possibility. Motta’s research on a hypothetical Covid-19 vaccine, as well as polling from Gallup (and others) this summer, reveals that between a quarter and a third of the American public say they would be unwilling to be vaccinated against Covid-19. These surveys generally ask about a hypothetical FDA-approved vaccine and not about one approved under an emergency use authorization before clinical trials have ended. A new Kaiser Family Foundation poll asked respondents if they’d take a free vaccine approved before election day: 54 percent said they would decline.
The surveys actually might be underselling the problem. “When we look at seasonal influenza vaccination rates, for example, surveys always overestimate the number of people who get it,” Motta says. It’s easier to say you’re going to get a vaccine to a pollster than it is to actually go get one.
The hesitation showing up in these polls is not about a skepticism of all vaccines (although there is some of that, for sure). It’s skepticism about this potential vaccine, created in record time, via the Trump administration’s Operation Warp Speed. Overall, 83 percent of Americans agree that if a vaccine is approved too quickly, they would worry about its safety.
There’s so much about the US response to the pandemic that has been botched. We failed on testing early and then failed to scale it up. We failed on contact tracing, on reopening many of our communities safely. But we haven’t screwed up a vaccine campaign yet.
There’s still time to get it right. It requires not just developing a safe vaccine, approved without the taint of a political rush job, but also conducting a vast social science research effort to better understand people’s anxieties about the vaccine, and then help move them toward acceptance.
No approved vaccine exists yet. But every day, pharmaceutical companies are making progress on vaccine trials, and some may release data before the end of this year. That means the window to get it right “is closing,” Emily Brunson, a medical anthropologist at Texas State University, says. “If we don’t, we run the risk of undermining public health in the US — and even more specifically undermining the entire vaccination program.”
US public health may be undermined by the US government itself
Billions have been spent on developing the Covid-19 vaccines. But lacking in the development process is a key ingredient: the public’s trust. There’s a tension here: The White House itself is diminishing the credibility of its own Food and Drug Administration.
On the one hand, public health researchers and experts want to figure out how to convince people who are vaccine hesitant to accept it to put the brakes on the pandemic. On the other, the Trump administration is muddying the waters with actions that lead to — at best — the appearance of a politically compromised FDA, the US agency tasked with approving a vaccine for widespread public use. There’s reasonable confusion: Is operation Warp Speed designed to save the American public or ensure Trump’s reelection?
In August, FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn cited misleading statistics about the efficacy of using blood plasma to treat severe Covid-19. And now, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has told hospitals to be prepared to distribute a vaccine by November 1 (close to Election Day). As Vox’s Umair Irfan reports, it’s still unlikely that a vaccine will be authorized for use by then. But even the appearance of political interference could lead to lasting damage to a vaccination campaign. Sketchiness is creeping into these key public health agencies: CNN reports that sudden changes to CDC Covid-19 testing guidelines (which experts strongly oppose) came from “the top down.”
According to the Kaiser Family Foundation poll, 62 percent of the public are now worried that political pressure from the White House will result in a FDA-approved vaccine arriving before all the safety data is in.
Even Republicans are worried about political influence on the vaccine process. Seventy-two percent of Republicans and 82 percent of Democrats worry the vaccine approval process is being driven more by politics than science, according to a recent Stat and Harris poll. (In the Kaiser poll, 35 percent of Republicans agreed that the administration will push the FDA to approve a too-soon vaccine.)
“This is a scary moment,” Sandra Crouse Quinn, chair the department of family science at the University of Maryland, says. “I worry that any pressure to try to move one of those [vaccine candidates] forward as an electoral strategy, political strategy, while undermining the public’s trust, will damage us for years to come. ... The public’s trust in the FDA is really critical here. With every effort the White House makes to pressure FDA on decisions, we further risk the credibility of the agency and the likelihood the public will take this vaccine.”
Vaccine hesitancy is not uniform. Black communities — some of the hardest hit by Covid-19 — are particularly hesitant.
If a vaccine is approved, it will likely be voluntary for people to get. Right now, the polling and research finds that some communities will be more willing to volunteer than others.
Of particular concern is the increased level of hesitancy in Black communities — for many reasons — which have already been disproportionately impacted by the pandemic. Higher vaccine refusal in these communities could lead to continued disproportionate Covid-19 suffering. (That is, if these communities have access to the vaccine in the first place.)
In a May to June survey, Motta and co-authors estimated Black Americans may be about 40 percent more likely to refuse a vaccine than white Americans (their demographically representative survey found 43 percent of Black Americans plan to refuse a vaccine versus around 29 percent of the American public at large). In July, Gallup found 67 percent of white Americans said they’d get an FDA-approved Covid-19 vaccine; 59 percent of nonwhite Americans said the same.
Zinzi Bailey, a social epidemiologist at the University of Miami, is not surprised by this disparity. “These are historically rooted, longstanding issues,” she says. Black communities have been exploited and harmed by medical researchers, and biases in medicine persist.
“I think a lot of people feel like they’re going to be experimented on,” Bailey says. “Words like ‘warp speed’ are not reassuring in this case.”
In Motta’s survey, he and his colleagues find several reasons Black Americans could refuse a vaccine. They’re worried about safety and effectiveness. They are also worried about access: that they won’t be able to get or afford a vaccine when it becomes available.
In terms of access, their fears are well grounded. Already during the pandemic, there have been access problems with Black and minority communities, namely testing. In April, Vox’s Aaron Ross Coleman found that the White House’s initiative to partner with retail stores for testing largely left communities of color underserved.
Bailey stresses that the increased hesitancy in Black communities shouldn’t be framed as a deficiency within those communities. Rather, it is a reflection of how our society has treated them. “I think what these [survey] results are indicating is an underlying level of mistrust that is rampant in the country,” she says. “Mistrust is the name of the game right now, which hampers our ability to move forward with public health initiatives.”
Again, there are indications that this hesitancy isn’t just about vaccines in general but that there’s added uncertainty about the Covid-19 vaccines in development. “Black community and other minority communities vaccinate their kids for measles, mumps, rubella,” says Justin Stoler, who studies health disparities at the University of Miami. “There are disparities there, but not disparities like we’re seeing with Covid willingness.”
It’s not just Black communities that may be less willing to vaccinate. Women also report greater hesitancy about a vaccine (they are 70 percent more likely to refuse a vaccine than men, according to Motta’s research), as do political conservatives and people living in rural areas. Plus, there’s the longstanding anti-vaccination movement, which will likely seek to undermine Covid-19 vaccination efforts.
The challenge is that each of these communities may require a different strategy, have different underlying anxieties and fears, and require a slightly different intervention to placate their fears.
We need more vaccine social science research
How do we get ahead of this hesitancy problem? Experts I spoke to say there needs to be widespread, on-the-ground anthropological research in communities to find out what their vaccine concerns are and to test educational campaigns to address those concerns.
“We are, and should be, investing an enormous amount of resources in the research and development of a vaccine,” Crouse Quinn says. “We’ve invested very few, almost no resources, in the social and behavioral science research that will help us understand in real time how the public will respond to a vaccine.”
In August, Brunson headed a working group that published a social science research agenda for a Covid-19 vaccine campaign. “What we’re arguing for is that state and local health departments need to be given the funding,” she says, to go out into communities and figure out what anxieties people have about the vaccine, and the messages and educational materials that might placate those fears.
Research and development into the vaccine technology costs billions. Brunson says the social science component might cost, nationally, around $40 million. But it’s being overlooked. “We’ve been talking with people in the Senate, we’ve been talking with Congress, we’ve been really trying to push this even with nonprofits and nothing has come through yet,” Brunson says. Which is a shame.
“I think a lot of people feel like they’re going to be experimented on”
“There’s an assumption that if we can develop the vaccine technology, that if we build it, people will come, and we’ll get vaccinated,” she says. “And it’s not true. The social component is as complicated if not even more complicated than developing the vaccine technology.” (Such a suite of on-the-ground social science research has been effective in increasing willingness to vaccinate for Ebola in African countries.)
Motta and his collaborators are independently doing some of this research (which has not yet been published), trying to figure out what sorts of messages might move people toward vaccine acceptance.
“We don’t have a lot of research on how to communicate during a pandemic,” he says. But preliminarily, “we find that if you talk about the personal health risks of Covid, that’s something that seems to resonate.” Messages about how a vaccine could help the economy don’t work, and messages about how the vaccine could help save others are less effective than messages about personal risk. Most importantly, we know what doesn’t work: shaming, and, as Motta says, “telling people ‘you’re wrong and here’s why.’”
There could be a lot of different strategies that work.
“We know from my own research that the more people you believe want you to get a flu vaccine, the more likely you are to take it,” Crouse Quinn says. “We know that if you have a high perceived risk of the disease, you’re more likely to take the vaccine. But if you have a high perceived risk of vaccine side effects, that will depress your willingness.”
It’s complicated to find out the right mix of messaging that works, and for whom. Trump could upend it all. He has a remarkable, well-documented power for taking issues that normally are apolitical and splitting opinion on them along political lines.
This could happen with a vaccine, leading to a swell of refusal among his political opponents.
“By tying vaccine safety issues to his personal political ambitions, Trump [could make] vaccine safety a partisan issue,” Motta says. “That’s potentially a huge problem, as Democrats are currently much more likely than Republicans to intend to vaccinate. If Democrats start to doubt that a truly effective vaccine was rigorously vetted, we could see even greater compliance problems.”
How many people need to be vaccinated against Covid-19, anyway?
Let’s say there is a safe and effective Covid-19 vaccine, approved without political interference by the FDA. And still, 30 percent or more of Americans refuse to get it. Does that immediately ruin the chances of a vaccination campaign succeeding?
Not necessarily.
Natalie Dean, a biostatistician and vaccine researcher at the University of Florida, explains there are several variables at play that will determine what proportion of the population will need to be vaccinated.
Dean sent along the following chart to explain. At first glance, it’s a little hard to interpret, but it can help us think through the math.
What it shows is that varying levels of vaccine effectiveness (the different colored line), and the effective contagiousness of the disease (the R), affect how many people in a population need to be vaccinated to eliminate the disease.
The more potent the vaccine, the fewer people need to be vaccinated. A less potent vaccine (or perhaps one that requires multiple doses to achieve its highest potency) would likely require nearly everyone to be vaccinated.
The good news in this chart is that R is not a fixed number. It changes based on our actions (like wearing masks), and depending on how we use other public health tools to combat the spread of Covid-19.
“If we’re able to bring the effective R down by other means,” Dean says, “by having better contact tracing, or better isolation, or reducing the superspreading events, or having more testing so that we can catch people in their infectious period ... all these ways that we can reduce R, then that will also reduce that [vaccine] threshold that we need to hit.”
A vaccine, Dean reminds, “is a potentially valuable tool, but it’s not the only tool.”
A successful Covid-19 vaccine campaign is not lost yet. But the clock is ticking.
“We are in a window of time right now where this can actually be addressed, and be addressed well,” Brunson says. A botched vaccine campaign could undermine public health in the United States. But a good campaign, she stresses, could lift it up, and “increase faith in public health and belief in vaccination. That would really put us as a country, across the board, on a better path.”


vox--2020-09-11--Money Talks: The college friends launching a company in a pandemic

Welcome to Money Talks , a series in which we interview people about their relationship with money , their relationship with each other , and how those relationships inform one another .
Ken Chester Jr. and Linglong Wei have known each other since college .
They ’ re entrepreneurs and consultants who both spent time in Silicon Valley before relocating to New York City .
After Ken lost his consulting gig during the coronavirus-related economic downturn , he and Linglong decided to create WorkJustly , which they describe as the first job platform to mandate “ blind hiring , ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ethnic discrimination by prohibiting names on resumes .
The motivation behind WorkJustly is , in part , personal — Wei , who is Chinese , has experienced name-based discrimination during the hiring process that Chester , who is white , has not .
As of this writing , Ken and Linglong have recruited eight different employers to post jobs on WorkJustly , including Race Forward and MoveOn.org .
Prior to losing his job , Ken earned around $ 4,000 a month as a contractor .
Linglong is earning around $ 6,000 a month @ @ @ @ @ @ @ build out WorkJustly .
Their challenge is to get WorkJustly to the point where it starts earning money — before their earnings , unemployment benefits , and savings run out .
This conversation has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity .
Ken : I ’ ve been a serial entrepreneur since leaving school , and I ’ ve always had some connection to either an international or social impact angle .
I guess you could say I ’ m a social impact entrepreneur .
I met Linglong when I was the international @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was in my group .
Michigan State , where we went to school , had the largest enrollment of Chinese students in the country for a couple of years , and at one point Lansing was one of the top 10 midsized cities for refugee resettlement .
That ’ s what first got me into international and social impact work .
Linglong : [ After ] Michigan State , I started a company and became a consultant , and then I went to Cornell to get my MBA and computer science degree .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ as a product manager for startups .
I ’ m also an actress , so I ’ m doing both things right now .
Ken : Before Covid-19 , I was working for a private equity firm .
They cut their budget big time after Covid-19 — it wasn ’ t immediate , but a couple months in it was time to really cut back .
First my salary was cut , and then I thought , “ Oh , the writing ’ s on the wall.
” That was in late May @ @ @ @ @ @ @ George Floyd protests started , and I started thinking about the company I might create .
There are all of these things going on economically with Covid-19 , with racial injustice — Black and brown folks have had skyrocketing cases of Covid-19 compared to folks that look like me , and that ’ s because people are working jobs where they can ’ t work from home .
I was able to pull in unemployment benefits from the CARES Act .
But jobs are a big deal — people have lost their livelihoods @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s why blind hiring is WorkJustly ’ s marquee policy .
You ’ re not necessarily going to see someone ’ s gender , race , immigration status on a resume .
Linglong : When I was in school , I gave my resume to my classmates for feedback .
They said “ Don ’ t use Linglong Wei .
Change it to Laura Wei .
Make it sound Asian American.
” If employers see “ Linglong Wei , ” they know I ’ m not from this country , and there ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t get an interview .
When I used “ Linglong Wei ” on my resume , I didn ’ t get a lot of interviews .
Once I switched to “ Laura Wei , ” I got many more chances — but I also faced a lot of gender discrimination .
When Ken brought up this idea [ for WorkJustly ] , I said , “ Let ’ s do it .
Let ’ s do something to help people.
” I built the site because I have a computer science background .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ mine , so he ’ s more focused on marketing .
Ken : We collaborate on strategy , but Linglong built the site .
We ’ re both co-founders now , but we ’ re working on formalizing — this is very new .
We just built this in August .
Linglong : It went really fast .
Ken : We talked about it for a while , but once we decided to do it , you built it really fast .
It also meant there weren ’ t a lot of upfront @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people to build a website , but in this case , I could do it myself .
Ken : Right now we ’ re testing outreach strategies .
I got a few companies on board through word of mouth , since I ’ m part of the startup ecosystem .
We ’ re kind of in the A/B testing phase right now , so we ’ re figuring out which approaches work best .
I ’ m really hoping we can get one of the bigger companies on board , because they can @ @ @ @ @ @ @ job openings ] on there .
They can really help us scale up .
We want to get employers used to this , and we want them to see this can work .
I can ’ t promise a job candidate that their resume won ’ t be free from hiring bias , because the employer might also be reading resumes from [ other job sites ] , but I do hope to promote a culture where an employer might see the value in posting through us .
Maybe once they start hiring @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they ’ ll see the value in blind hiring .
We want to promote incremental change .
We want to say this makes a positive difference .
We ’ re also trying to highlight employers with certain policies related to protections at work , including Covid-19 safety protections that people might not have thought about before this year .
We ’ re also highlighting companies that hedge against layoffs — instead of laying off one person , for example , two people will take a reduction in hours but neither of them will @ @ @ @ @ @ @ some applicants , finding a company that offers the right policies — like work-from-home policies — are what they care about the most right now .
Ken : My gut tells me that [ the policy section of WorkJustly ] could be bigger .
We ’ re introducing applicants to companies that offer benefits and policies that aren ’ t really talked about , like a four-day workweek .
I don ’ t have the data yet — we ’ re too new — but that could be a bigger issue .
We @ @ @ @ @ @ @ forward and push people to change .
Sometimes recruiters have already posted [ job listings ] in five other places and they don ’ t want to deal with the name-blind thing , so I ’ m hoping to target people who are aligned with the vision .
They can be our early adopters .
“ Oh , sure , we ’ ll do blind hiring , that ’ s great !
We ’ re all for making more diverse companies.
” We really need to gear up the amount of employers listing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to job seekers .
Linglong : We ’ ve been testing whether or not to hide what school job applicants come from , too .
I did a lot of research into that and a lot of surveys .
People usually grade you based on schools , especially Ivy League schools — they ’ re really intense about that .
Job seekers also think , “ I worked so hard to go to that school , and I want to show it.
” People who come from really tough schools like Harvard , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the company .
So we might make what school you came from optional .
Ken : There are inequalities throughout the whole education process — if people didn ’ t get a good education in elementary school , middle school , high school , there are gaps that cut people off from higher ed or certain levels of higher ed .
That ’ s something I hope society can address .
But when we did testing and outreach , we learned that people who feel like they worked hard for something don @ @ @ @ @ @ @ blind hiring process .
Linglong : We talk about these kinds of ideas every day .
Sometimes we disagree with each other , and the best way to resolve that is through surveys and testing .
Use the evidence to prove it .
Sometimes I worry that I ’ m biased about an idea , which is also why we do the surveys .
Ken : I wanted to do age-blind resumes , too .
This is from personal experience — I don ’ t think I ’ m terribly old , but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ m older than 25 .
People are all , “ You should have IPO ’ d by now.
” But we looked at the data , what does the data say , and we decided not to push the envelope too far .
Linglong : A lot of people like to show their ages because it shows that they have a rich experience .
That ’ s why I use the data .
I don ’ t like it , you don ’ t like it , but the data shows that people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ why including your age on your resume is optional .
Ken : In terms of making money [ from the site ] , we have different tiered plans .
A company can pay extra to have their job appear at the top of the feed , or to have their job expire later than other jobs .
That ’ s how the competitor sites do it .
I ’ m still looking for work , something I can do while we build this — and by the terms of unemployment , I should @ @ @ @ @ @ @ [ the pandemic ] has afforded me time to work on this .
In some sense I like the time I ’ ve had , but I do worry about the financial implications of this .
When unemployment runs out , what kind of side gig can I take to keep pushing this forward ?
There ’ s going to have to be a financial reckoning at some point .
Either WorkJustly scales up quickly , or I grab some other gig .
I think I can stretch things through the end of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tight .
If all else fails and I totally run out of money , I have family back home .
My mom wants me to come back all the time , and I could remotely do stuff back home if I needed to .
Linglong : I can use savings to pay for things , and if I run out of money , I can get a part-time job .
I believe we only live once , life is short , so I should do something I want to do .
Ken : @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the founders of WorkJustly used their site to find part-time jobs , but this is something we believe in and something that I think needs to happen .
We ’ re at a point in history where if people don ’ t do something , I ’ m really worried about our future .
If there ’ s some minor risk for me , if I fail , so be it .
Linglong : Sometimes you get less of a chance because of your name , your race , and your gender .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ whether I would post my resume on WorkJustly , I ’ d say , “ Of course .
That would help me get more opportunity.
” That ’ s the reason I wanted to start this company .
If you have a compelling story about how money comes into play in one of your relationships — whether with a partner , a friend , a sibling , a coworker — we want to hear about it !
Email alanna.okun @ vox.com and karen.turner @ vox.com with a little about yourself .
Help keep @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Vox each month to understand what ’ s happening in the news , from the coronavirus crisis to a racial reckoning to what is , quite possibly , the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes .
Our mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment : to empower you through understanding .
But our distinctive brand of explanatory journalism takes resources .
Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers , your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work .
If you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ If you haven ’ t , please consider helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world : Contribute today from as little as $ 3 .

Welcome to Money Talks, a series in which we interview people about their relationship with money, their relationship with each other, and how those relationships inform one another.
Ken Chester Jr. and Linglong Wei have known each other since college. They’re entrepreneurs and consultants who both spent time in Silicon Valley before relocating to New York City. After Ken lost his consulting gig during the coronavirus-related economic downturn, he and Linglong decided to create WorkJustly, which they describe as the first job platform to mandate “blind hiring,” a method of avoiding pre-interview racial and ethnic discrimination by prohibiting names on resumes. The motivation behind WorkJustly is, in part, personal — Wei, who is Chinese, has experienced name-based discrimination during the hiring process that Chester, who is white, has not.
As of this writing, Ken and Linglong have recruited eight different employers to post jobs on WorkJustly, including Race Forward and MoveOn.org. Prior to losing his job, Ken earned around $4,000 a month as a contractor. Linglong is earning around $6,000 a month as a consultant while simultaneously working to build out WorkJustly. Their challenge is to get WorkJustly to the point where it starts earning money — before their earnings, unemployment benefits, and savings run out.
This conversation has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.
Ken: I’ve been a serial entrepreneur since leaving school, and I’ve always had some connection to either an international or social impact angle. I guess you could say I’m a social impact entrepreneur.
I met Linglong when I was the international student orientation leader at college — she was in my group. Michigan State, where we went to school, had the largest enrollment of Chinese students in the country for a couple of years, and at one point Lansing was one of the top 10 midsized cities for refugee resettlement. That’s what first got me into international and social impact work.
Linglong: [After] Michigan State, I started a company and became a consultant, and then I went to Cornell to get my MBA and computer science degree. I graduated in 2018 and began working as a product manager for startups. I’m also an actress, so I’m doing both things right now.
Ken: Before Covid-19, I was working for a private equity firm. They cut their budget big time after Covid-19 — it wasn’t immediate, but a couple months in it was time to really cut back. First my salary was cut, and then I thought, “Oh, the writing’s on the wall.”
That was in late May, early June, right when the George Floyd protests started, and I started thinking about the company I might create. There are all of these things going on economically with Covid-19, with racial injustice — Black and brown folks have had skyrocketing cases of Covid-19 compared to folks that look like me, and that’s because people are working jobs where they can’t work from home.
I was able to pull in unemployment benefits from the CARES Act. But jobs are a big deal — people have lost their livelihoods, people are worried. That’s why blind hiring is WorkJustly’s marquee policy. You’re not necessarily going to see someone’s gender, race, immigration status on a resume.
Linglong: When I was in school, I gave my resume to my classmates for feedback. They said “Don’t use Linglong Wei. Change it to Laura Wei. Make it sound Asian American.” If employers see “Linglong Wei,” they know I’m not from this country, and there’s a high chance I won’t get an interview.
When I used “Linglong Wei” on my resume, I didn’t get a lot of interviews. Once I switched to “Laura Wei,” I got many more chances — but I also faced a lot of gender discrimination. When Ken brought up this idea [for WorkJustly], I said, “Let’s do it. Let’s do something to help people.”
I built the site because I have a computer science background. Ken, his English is better than mine, so he’s more focused on marketing.
Ken: We collaborate on strategy, but Linglong built the site. We’re both co-founders now, but we’re working on formalizing — this is very new. We just built this in August.
Linglong: It went really fast.
Ken: We talked about it for a while, but once we decided to do it, you built it really fast. It also meant there weren’t a lot of upfront costs.
Linglong: Usually you hire people to build a website, but in this case, I could do it myself.
Ken: Right now we’re testing outreach strategies. I got a few companies on board through word of mouth, since I’m part of the startup ecosystem. We’re kind of in the A/B testing phase right now, so we’re figuring out which approaches work best. I’m really hoping we can get one of the bigger companies on board, because they can dump, like, a hundred [job openings] on there. They can really help us scale up.
We want to get employers used to this, and we want them to see this can work. I can’t promise a job candidate that their resume won’t be free from hiring bias, because the employer might also be reading resumes from [other job sites], but I do hope to promote a culture where an employer might see the value in posting through us. Maybe once they start hiring people they found through WorkJustly, maybe they’ll see the value in blind hiring.
We want to promote incremental change. We want to say this makes a positive difference.
We’re also trying to highlight employers with certain policies related to protections at work, including Covid-19 safety protections that people might not have thought about before this year. We’re also highlighting companies that hedge against layoffs — instead of laying off one person, for example, two people will take a reduction in hours but neither of them will get laid off.
Linglong: For some applicants, finding a company that offers the right policies — like work-from-home policies — are what they care about the most right now.
Ken: My gut tells me that [the policy section of WorkJustly] could be bigger. We’re introducing applicants to companies that offer benefits and policies that aren’t really talked about, like a four-day workweek. I don’t have the data yet — we’re too new — but that could be a bigger issue.
We’re trying to push this company forward and push people to change. Sometimes recruiters have already posted [job listings] in five other places and they don’t want to deal with the name-blind thing, so I’m hoping to target people who are aligned with the vision. They can be our early adopters. “Oh, sure, we’ll do blind hiring, that’s great! We’re all for making more diverse companies.” We really need to gear up the amount of employers listing with us before we start pushing out to job seekers.
Linglong: We’ve been testing whether or not to hide what school job applicants come from, too. I did a lot of research into that and a lot of surveys. People usually grade you based on schools, especially Ivy League schools — they’re really intense about that. Job seekers also think, “I worked so hard to go to that school, and I want to show it.” People who come from really tough schools like Harvard, they want to connect with the CEO of the company. So we might make what school you came from optional.
Ken: There are inequalities throughout the whole education process — if people didn’t get a good education in elementary school, middle school, high school, there are gaps that cut people off from higher ed or certain levels of higher ed. That’s something I hope society can address. But when we did testing and outreach, we learned that people who feel like they worked hard for something don’t want it removed during the blind hiring process.
Linglong: We talk about these kinds of ideas every day. Sometimes we disagree with each other, and the best way to resolve that is through surveys and testing. Use the evidence to prove it. Sometimes I worry that I’m biased about an idea, which is also why we do the surveys.
Ken: I wanted to do age-blind resumes, too. This is from personal experience — I don’t think I’m terribly old, but in the startup world, I’m older than 25. People are all, “You should have IPO’d by now.” But we looked at the data, what does the data say, and we decided not to push the envelope too far.
Linglong: A lot of people like to show their ages because it shows that they have a rich experience. That’s why I use the data. I don’t like it, you don’t like it, but the data shows that people like it, so that’s why including your age on your resume is optional.
Ken: In terms of making money [from the site], we have different tiered plans. A company can pay extra to have their job appear at the top of the feed, or to have their job expire later than other jobs. That’s how the competitor sites do it.
I’m still looking for work, something I can do while we build this — and by the terms of unemployment, I should be looking for work anyway — but [the pandemic] has afforded me time to work on this. In some sense I like the time I’ve had, but I do worry about the financial implications of this. When unemployment runs out, what kind of side gig can I take to keep pushing this forward?
There’s going to have to be a financial reckoning at some point. Either WorkJustly scales up quickly, or I grab some other gig. I think I can stretch things through the end of the year, but it might get tight. If all else fails and I totally run out of money, I have family back home. My mom wants me to come back all the time, and I could remotely do stuff back home if I needed to.
Linglong: I can use savings to pay for things, and if I run out of money, I can get a part-time job. I believe we only live once, life is short, so I should do something I want to do.
Ken: It would be a little ironic if the founders of WorkJustly used their site to find part-time jobs, but this is something we believe in and something that I think needs to happen. We’re at a point in history where if people don’t do something, I’m really worried about our future. If there’s some minor risk for me, if I fail, so be it.
Linglong: Sometimes you get less of a chance because of your name, your race, and your gender. So if you’re asking me whether I would post my resume on WorkJustly, I’d say, “Of course. That would help me get more opportunity.” That’s the reason I wanted to start this company.
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