As more and more documentation of the worthlessness and destructive power of lockdowns has come out, Kate Brown and her bureaucat acolyte Pat Allen from the Oregon Health Authority have ignored that data, continuing to use their worthless and arbitrary, "risk" categories, all while businesses have continued to close.

As anyone with common sense can tell you, businesses closing means fewer jobs, and the Wall Street Journal recently documented the relationship between lockdowns and job creation, or rather, the lack thereof:

Recall the political panic after the Labor Department reported 140,000 job losses in December? Well, the government’s state employment report released Tuesday shows those losses were largely related to state lockdowns, and jobs are rebounding rapidly in less restrictive states.

Despite the virus surge, employment increased in 15 states last month including Texas (64,200), Georgia (44,700), North Carolina (33,600), Wisconsin (15,100) and South Carolina (14,600). But these gains were more than offset by losses in Michigan (-64,400), California (-52,200), Minnesota (-49,800), Pennsylvania (-37,600) and New York (-37,200).

Democratic governors of the latter states shut down indoor dining (and outdoors in California), so not surprisingly nearly all of their job losses were in leisure and hospitality. Yet most states added jobs across industries, especially trade and transportation, and some including Georgia and Texas even added thousands in leisure and hospitality.

This underlines that the economy and jobs were recovering in most states before Congress passed its $900 billion relief bill and Joe Biden became President. The states that are struggling most imposed excessive business shutdowns, which didn’t control the virus any better than states that allowed business to operate with social distancing.

Something that was documented very well in a recent study from Stanford University.

Note the nearby table that shows 10 states with the largest employment declines from December 2019 to December 2020: Hawaii (-13.8%) has suffered from unique tourism losses, but how do you explain Michigan (-10.9%), New York (-10.4%), Massachusetts (-9.1%) and the others if not by the degree of their lockdowns? Most lost jobs were in leisure and hospitality, as well as health care, education and manufacturing.

On the other hand, consider the 10 states with the fewest job losses as a share of total employment: Most are in the South, West and Midwest and kept their economies open to a greater degree. Georgia (-1.7%) with its diversified economy is especially notable. Utah and Idaho even gained jobs.

Florida’s employment fell only 4.6% despite its heavy reliance on tourism and service industries, while Texas declined only 3.3%. Both were derided in the national press for not following California and New York in shutting down their economies.

On a side note, what is even more interesting is the fact that COVID19 deaths in California have surpassed Florida's, even though California has been tightly locked down, while Florida removed all restrictions months ago.

So even though Oregon has some of the lowest number of cases, but the strictest lockdowns, Kate will obviously continue her quest to destroy the 95% for the 5%.