i want to say, thank you very much to ashley, lauren and susan. we're all in different locations. we're communicating quite well i think. despite the distance and we will see you all again. neil, it's yours. neil: all right, stuart, thank you very, very much we're keeping track of end of the month, end of the quarter market number, stuart. but we're also following developments you touched on in new york. the number of cases the state has jumped in a big way and in new york city itself. new york accounts for close to half the cases in all of america and close to half the deaths. connell mcshane has more. hey, connell? >> neil, we've been monitoring a press conference that continues with the governor of new york, andrew cuomo, updating reporters as he does on a daily basis. you showed numbers, over 75,000, the most recent figure of total cases in new york.

what the governor said a moment ago, he is tired of being behind this virus. we have been behind it, playing catchup from day one, trying to put a plan in place that puts him ahead of it, plans what he believes will be the apex in terms of the virus and the impact on the state of new york in the next two to three weeks. before we go back to the numbers, another thing the governor mentioned in albany a moment ago, his brother chris, who host as nightly program on cnn, is positive for covid-19. his symptoms, according to cnn, are mild. chris cuomo will continue to host his nightly program, they say from his home on a daily basis, again with mild symptoms. the governor has been talking about his brother who he says is his best friend here for the last few minutes. before that he did go through these numbers. let's put them back up there. 75,759 cases in the state of new york and 1500 deaths. 1550 is the latest number, up from over 1200 yesterday.

these numbers, to neil's point continue to rise, 43,000 plus in new york city in terms of infectious. new cases there going up by nearly 5700. that type of an increase, that type of a surge is something we're told to expect especially here over the next week or two. now, the city and the state are doing what they can to prepare for that. as an example a field hospital has been set up in new york central park. you're talking about 68 additional hospital beds as far as the field hospital. javits center is being set up with additional beds. mayor of new york city, bill de blasio, who was on nbc's "today show" this morning, said even measures like this, even though they're being taken the health care system in the city will still be tested like never before. here's the mayor. >> let me give you the projection, it is very blunt, savannah. we have 20,000 hospital beds in

all of new york city, the beginning of this month, normal times. we project the potential of all of those beds, all 20,000 will have to be turned into intensive care beds to focus on covid-19 patients who are really, really sick. that gives you a sense just how abnormal it could be. now i hope the projections don't come true, but as dr. fauci said, you have to plan for the worst. the projection has it getting worse over the next few weeks, potentially expanding well into may. >> the huge hospital ship we talked about yesterday, the usns comfort that came into new york harbor should help. 1200 additional beds, the patients treated there will not have covid-19 as the ship tries to ease some of the stress the mayor was talking about on the system. different models, neil, have different forecasts as dr. fauci talked about but the estimates from the institute of health

metrics evaluation, which is one of the organizations people are following through the university of washington say new york state will hit its peak in terms of resources needed, hospital beds, icu units, ventilators in the next eight days. so that means this next week could be very, very tough. also really important, neil, in, in fighting this outbreak, just going back to the governor in albany, he said the apex from what experts who have been advising him, in the next two to three weeks. back to you. neil: connell, thank you. we obviously wish chris cuomo well, fighting this, doing a show through it all. says something about it. be well, chris. in the meantime this is the last day of the month, last day of the quarter. that means tomorrow is the first day of the new month, start of a new quarter and a lot of peoples rents and mortgages are due tomorrow. there is a fox survey out that says, actually a little more

than one out of three americans are ready to pay, certainly the rent that comes due tomorrow. that might be just a microcosm of the problem the economy could be facing. barbara corcoran with us, corcoran group real estate expert, so much more. barbara, that number surprised me. specifically 38% of american families will not be able to make the rent payment due tomorrow. what did you make of that? >> it was a surprise to me as well, neil, but what is also surprising is that commercial tenants are not planning to pay the landlord tomorrow. so it is across the board. a lot of people calling up landlord, or simply ignoring sending in the check saying i can't do it. for them it feels like d-day tomorrow, april the 1st. it is first day people will come to terms how different everything is right now. neil: i was looking at it too, you're quite right. one of the big mall tenants

across the country, cheesecake factory, already telegraphed to its mall owners we're not going to be paying our rent coming up this month. it wasn't a surprise but others have followed suit. i notice some big mall operators are already announcing from simon and a host of others lay offs, furloughs. this does have a spiraling effect? >> it has a terrible effect because at the root of all problems, not about paying rent, not about paying mortgage, it is about jobs. they moved so quickly to eliminate jobs, i think unfairly so easy for me to say, people were not on my payroll but if the stimulus package comes out there is a very good chance they will be rehired. anyone with less than 500 employees, they have many more, but it is per store location. so all these people should be hired back up if we could get our hands on the money. neil: i'm also wondering, you touched on it, people say the

oh, landlords, big evil landlords and all, they have obligations and payrolls to meet as well. rental income isn't coming in, they have their own commercial mortgage obligations to make, they can't make it, there will be layoffs on that front as well. >> nobody likes the landlord, nobody feels sorry for the landlord, that is reality. if the tenant doesn't pay expenses mortgage, heat, whatever they have to pay more. i shouldn't say, a good percentage of commercial mortgages across america are underwritten by the federal government, with federally insured loans. already that has been changed. they cannot move to evict anybody for three months n a real way, even though tenants officially have the right not to pay the rent for three months, if they don't, there is not a single thing landlords can do about it. i think there will be legislation to save the landlords too. why not? everybody will get saved with this lottery happened to everybody that will shore every

sector economy up, from the individuals at home, to the business people and eventually to the landlords. neil: you know, barbara what do you recommend a lot of people do? we talk about rents and all, but even mortgages, many banks, they don't advertise this, but bank of america i believe has, one of the few, to say if you can't make your mortgage, you have a grace period here. so do you recommend those who are concerned about making payments tomorrow, for the heck of it to call their bank, call their lender, see if they can get 30-day, 60-day reprieve? >> there is two-ways to go at it. one is, to call the landlord before you know you have a real problem. that is really when the landlord wants to hear from you, and propose something reasonable you genuinely can afford, right? let's say you have really have no money, i say before you call the landlord, stop paying your rent, puts you in much better

negotiating position, if you're holding any money you have versus paying little you can then begging for forgiveness. i think the moratorium will come out federally. i think it is really going to stop the clock for a lot of people. i think this month, i'm hoping that this month is a high pressure month for everyone out there because we have all the promises but we haven't had the cash in hand. but calling your landlord is the order of business but i believe before that you should stop paying your rent. neil: you know, there are a lot of folks, i think it started in new york, it might have gone to other cities, barbara, there is a protest movement, hell no, we're not going to pay, we're not going to pay. not that we're looking for a delay, we just won't pay the rent because of this whole virus thing, and we're not, we're not going to do it. about 2,000 strong in the new york metropolitan area. i don't know if it is extended beyond that, they're urging those who would have no problem paying rent otherwise to join them.

what do you make of all that? >> i don't think it is really fair because it doesn't certainly look at the landlord's position, providing heat and place for to you live. i don't think it is right not just to decide not to pay the rent f you're in need that makes sense. these group movements are very powerful and they should be taken very seriously because it is very easy for politicians to roll with the voter versus take the side of say the landlord. for example, in los angeles, only this morning i think it was announced all rent hikes have been frozen. the bills continue to go up for every landlord but the rents get frozen. that is very damaging. in new york city, there is 90-day moratorium on evictions and suspension of all the mortgage payments. that is problem for landlords. even in new york city, after the 90-days is over you can only begin to file for eviction. you could have landlords with three to five to six months rent because there is bound to be a backlog.

neil: i would imagine a significant one. barbara corcoran, thank you very much, good seeing you again. >> my pleasure, neil. nice here. neil: be well. meantime we did say before we get to the first we have to close out the month and the quarter. no matter what happens today, it will be a lousy quarter, the question is, how lousy? here is deirdre jolt inch bolton with the news. i love the joltin bolton, no matter the day. how does it look. >> running shoes on to match that amazing introduction, as you say, last trading day of the month, last trading day of the quarter, many investors would say good riddance. we look what the dow has done so far. for the quarter it is down around 21%. tough go back to 1987, neil, to see a quarter this bad and that is when the dow dropped 25.3%.

s&p 500, we're down around 18 1/2% for this fiscal first quarter. yearly annual first quarter. go back to 2008 if you like, a drop of around 22%. the nasdaq has actually fallen the least. so for this first quarter so far we're down around 12 1/2%. 2018, you remember that huge sell off? that was the last time we saw the nasdaq fall off in that percentage point terms, we fell that quarter 17 1/2%. interestingly enough there is some virus-related stocks and technology that really held up so far year-to-date. and a lot of it is just because of the way we're changing the way we live. not surprisingly amazon is up. so many people self-isolating or in quarantine, they're having everything delivered. that bodes well for amazon, to say nothing of amazon prime and amazon cloud. netflix up in the same vain

year-to-date. microsoft, cloud, more and more companies have employees work online. that is good for cloud. also good for 365 microsoft team, many teams are working now virtually or by video. so if tech fell the least, in the first quarter, and we will say that energy to great surprise of none, i am sure, fell the most. we've talked about oil yesterday, trading at a 18-year low. it is down around 60, six, zero, percent, year-to-date. not surprisingly energy and industrials down the most in this first quarter. goldman sachs we know saying a second quarter gdp could actually contract as much as 34%. actually -- tweaked their estimates. that is originally lower than 24%. it is not difficult to see where investors would say, okay we don't want to buy energy, we don't want to buy industrials, we know these are people, groups investors bet on when they're

betting on economic expansion. one silver lining to the goldman call, take it or leave it, think actually say third quarter gdp they expect a pretty good expansion up to 19%. goldman saying, second quarter, quite frankly economic growth will suffer. third quarter should be the rebound. you were talking with barbara corcoran, super interesting conversation especially from her point of view, i heard her say, don't pay your rent if you can't, which i think is interesting and good advice for people if they need it, but you mention the employee furloughs. there are certainly companies continuing to do that. seaworld, obviously nobody is going out to theme parks or recreational centers. macy's, simon properties a lot of malls, obviously people can't go out and shop, kohl's, l brands, all those companies are fur lowing the employees. one silver lining, neil, i want to put the automakers up. you see on your screens, ford, gm, chrysler. we know that ford, and gm

stopped making cars but they are retooling themselves to make ventilators, other necessary equipment for the health care community which i think is the best of all of us, right? corporate america coming to the aid of its citizens. i know that many people are grateful forethose two companies efforts, neil. so a silver lining to leave it on and you know, green on the screens at least for the moment, for the day. neil, back to you. neil: yeah, at least for the day. we'll see what happens. deirdre, thank you very, very much. to put in perspective what deirdre was just saying, bloomingdale's's macy's, 130,000 furloughs, steve madden shoes, gannett with furloughs and the like, throw in ford, still postponing opening key plants, my math and adding all of these, there are many others, i don't have time to give you the names, the next two hours we will, 1.1 million layoffs and furloughs announced by fortune 500 concerns. these are the biggest companies.

let alone the small, mom-and-pop concerns that are doing it on a daily basis to the tune of tens of thousands. we'll have more after this.

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macy's's, bloomingdale's, 130,000 workers, gap, 80,000 workers, kohl's dumping pretty much majority of sales force, cutting executive pay. sysco the food distributor, also laying off or planning to lay off thousands. simon property, the big mall owner, as i discussed with barbara corcoran looking to furlough up to 30% of its workforce. gannett in the vicinity of 20%. steve madden shoes also looking at a significant number of layoffs, although it did not outline the exact number. all of this on frozen activity. people are not coming out of their homes, they're not going to stores. even for those stores might now and then be open, which are few and far between, there is no business to be had. all right, meantime, it is the virus and tracking the virus and whether that is arcing in a better direction. so far that does not appear to be the case but they're throwing anything and everything at this as we see that the number of

cases in the united states has just jumped over 164,000. the number of deaths, more than 3170 right now. about half of those are in new york. let's get a read on where we stand in this fight against this disease with dr. roger klein. you know, doctor, always love it when you join us here, to get a perspective of where we stand in this fight and sometimes we discover other drugs, i guess there is one that treats hiv, breast cancer, that could be used here. could you explain that? >> yeah. so there has been an exciting development with a new drug called -- [inaudible] loranlmat. it target as receptor called ccr-5. this receptor is involved in immune response. part of the problem we see in coronavirus infections is an exaggerated immune response.

the, in fact, the drug hydrochloroquine and chloroquine president touting effective, also works through it in immune mechanism potentially. this as it turns out this receptor is also the entry point for hiv itself. we have a drug that is effective, appears to be effective in hiv, blocking entry into cells and that drug has immunological effects that are, are beneficial or may be beneficial in coronavirus infections. neil: doctor, how do you recommend we divest the startling number much new cases in the united states? i know we've got quicker means by which to identify those who either have antibodies of this or there is a virus itself? so it is startling when you see the numbers rise as rapidly as

they have. the flipside of that i understand you change the equation about the percentage of those who sadly die of this but what do you think of the sheer number we're getting hit with now? >> i have got to be honest with you, i am surprised i think most people are surprised by the numbers of infections. what it suggests it transmits very readily, particularly in populations in regions but again if you suggest that, what, all deaths are tragic but relatively low absolute numbers of reported deaths both here and around the here relative to what are probably a number of infections that are many times those reported, suggest that for most people this is very likely a mild disease and it is going to be infrequently severe and rarely fatal but we're seeing a lot of cases. neil: i don't know, you're the policy advisor of the heartland

institute, but there is a report out of the cdc, no poo-pooing use of face masks. departing from general orthodoxy, doctor, maybe they are a good idea. what do you think? >> well i think we need to reserve our face masks for our, our health care workers, quite frankly. in my view we're starting to get into the realm of speculation and theory which suggests our data are limited. at this point, the theory would be that, it wouldn't be to protect you, it would be under the assumption that so many people are carrying the virus you would prevent spread but i think this is speculation. most people probably, or may not use these masks even properly or appropriately. and we're clearly having issues with personal protect tiff equipment among our health care workers. we need to keep them safe. at this point i would not suggest that that's probably a

good idea. neil: all right. dr. roger klein, thank you very, very much. always learn something, i appreciate that, doctor. >> thank you. neil: on the front lines, dr. roger klein, dealing with all of this. the questions back and forth and fears, just gives you straight answers which i think we badly need. you herd the rules of social distancing how routinely they are ignored like in new york when people wanted to see the usns comfort work its way up the new york harbor. they're kicking around the idea, if you do that again we'll fine you. if you're on the road at the wrong time in new jersey, we'll really fine you, maybe add points to your license. what are we looking at here? apparently it is a trend. not everyone is doing as officials say they should be doing but now those officials are saying you know what? time for some fining. i've always loved seeing what's next.

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♪. neil: all right. she say the check is in the mail quite literally but these relief checks for americans, most americans, and those with kids, could be coming or directly deposited in accounts, coming in weeks or three weeks at the most. there is all the money for the small business administration. actually talking about 350 to $400 billion at play here. the question is, how do you get your hot hands on it and what do you do? edward lawrence is looking into that. hey, edward?

reporter: neil, they have say the check is being processed, that is what the irs is saying and they started to do the work. you don't have to do anything to get a check for most americans. they will use the last tax returning 2018 or 2019 if you filed the tax return to see where the direct deposit or check goes. if the check gets bounced back or deposit bounced back, the check will be sent to the address. the irs is setting up a process right now, if you changed banks, you can go on the website next week, to be able to put in where the new check should go. for those who have not filed a return, low income taxpayers and veterans, people with disabilities who don't need to file returns, the irs says you will have to file a simple tax form. no taxes taken out but puts you in the system to get the checks, on friday, first loans for small businesses will be sent out. senator marco rubio hinting at fact there may be more help for small businesses if another

stimulus package is created. >> obviously there is always the prospect this goes longer than any of us have anticipated, and we would go in replenish the assistance for small business that is in the bill. reporter: loans for small businesses would cover eight weeks of payroll but only covers employees up to $100,000, for those loans to be forgiven. also rent, mortgage, utilities could all be paid with these loans and still be forgiven. the treasury department also announcing the rules on the basically, the bailout for the airline industry. $25 billion going to air passengers carriers, four billion for cargo air carriers, 17 billion for businesses critical to maintaining national security. could be talking about lockheed martin or boeing there. now all of these are loans. in the regulations what is missing actually is how the government will take ownership in part of the company based on activating these loans here. those rules, according to the treasury official are still being laid out.

back to you. neil: all right. thank you very, very much, edward lawrence on all of that. you know a lot of states and municipalities have slapped serious fines on those who violate the stay at home provisions or at least throw it back at official's face. our dan has been looking into this state by state, curious dan found the time to be so fixated on fines that is a separate story but anyway, in alaska, that is a class a misdemeanor, reckless endangerment. you could face upwards after year in jail, 25,000-dollar fine. do the same thing violating the self-isolation orders in colorado, 1000-dollar fine, up to a year in jail. in maryland, up to a 5000-dollar fine, a year in jail. massachusetts, 500-dollar fine but significant prison time. washington, d.c., 5000-dollar fine. it looks like here we have about a third of the states and up to half, when you include those

that have strict measures on self-quarantining that are going to go after you if you keep ignoring what they say. jonathan hoenig, you're the sort of classic libertarian type guy. how do you feel about that? >> neil, first of all, crisis is the time for principles. people need to first and foremost think rationally, neil, and take care of themselves and their immediate family. if you are certainly older, if you are compromised, myself, neil, i'm juvenile diabetic, i know you had health issues in the past, you don't want to be a risk to yourself or risk to others. so you want to take the steps of self-quarantine, make sure you and your loved ones are safe. when government gets in here, neil, forces manditorily massive quarantine which insures shuttering of businesses big and small, you're assuring that you're going to have bad health because you're going to turn, what in my estimate could be a recession and turn it into a great depression.

neil: now they say they're doing this for people's own good and that if you're going to be a jerk about it, you're endangering other people's lives and health so they have to do it, because there are jerks out there who will ignore them. what do you think of that argument? >> first and foremost you have to acknowledge, neil, every community is not the same. the situation in manhattan obviously very different than in parts of texas where there is lot, much less density. while i'm not a legal scholar, someone sin teched they're on a objective threat certainly to other people. mandatory for those sick makes great sense but for people, who, neil are, recovered, who are young, who are healthy, perhaps, who are in the tech world who can find interesting ways to get back to work, neil, creatively, we're seeing businesses big and small, finding a way to get engine of progress moving again, that is what we need to keep the economy going.

otherwise, neil, we're never going to get the medical supplies we need, we'll never get any of the goods and progress we need to literally survive day-to-day. so this mandatory quarantining i think, fining is missing the point. let businesses, let people who are healthy be creative, take care of themselves but also find an opportunity to keep the wheels of this country's economy going. neil: good luck on that front because it is not happening right now, but you raise a number of good points as you always do, jonathan. continued good health, jonathan hoenig on all of that. jonathan was touching on this, businesses that have to deal with this, how do they ultimately bounce back? people want it to be like a v, zooming out of it, but i have seen a lot of commercial about couples in foreign countries having a great time. how quickly will they go back to flying, going abroad, doing all of that, when ever that day comes? maybe it is going to be a v or something else.

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♪. neil: all right, amazon is dealing with some labor issues that appear to have gone viral, not the least of which at its whole foods markets chain. a lot of people are planning a sickout, they have been arguing parent, amazon, has not done enough to protect them or look after them. so what happens right now? grady trimble in chicago with the latest on that front. grady? reporter: neil a worker at this whole foods recently tested positive for the coronavirus and these workers who are participating in a sickout today, saying stores like this should be closed and undergo an extreme deep cleaning before they reopen. some of their other demand include paid leave for workers who choose to self-quarantine as well as hazard pay two times their regular hourly rate as well as health care for part-time workers. you noted, amazon is the parent

company of whole foods and whole foods, or amazon as a whole has dealt with a host of complaints including yesterday with a walkout at the staten island warehouse where an organizer of that event said he was fired out of retaliation for planning it but amazon says he was not following social distancing guidelines. he went on site even though he was asked to stay home with pay for 14 days after coming into contact with a coworker who had coronavirus. now back here at the whole foods, they have been cleaning stores more regularly and more thoroughly than they normal by do. they put up sneeze guards, plexiglass guards at the checkout counters to protect the workers and workers have unlimited callouts which means they can participate in the sickout without fearing repercussions or losing their jobs. whole foods says in a statement, employees have up to two weeks paid time off if they test

positive for covid and increased overtime pay. it is hard to say exactly how many workers are participating in the sickout today. obviously this story behind me is open without any issues. we've asked amazon and whole foods that question. we're waiting to hear back. one thing we know for sure though, this has gained support of prominent democratic lawmakers including representative alexandria ocasio-cortez. neil? neil: all right, grady much. perfect timing for us to have this next woman on, a pioneer in the business world when it comes to looking at labor issues, quick solutions, benefits and all of that. jane bryant runs a group of ceo first african-american woman to operate a company generating a billion dollars or more in revenue. we're very honored to have her with us now. thank you for taking the time. >> hey, neil, great to be with

you you under these circumstances. neil: you know what? i'm looking at, i was thinking of you given these problems that amazon encountering with whole foods, if you think about it, you deal with staffing, work source, workforce solutions all of this stuff on a day-by-day basis in close to 2,000 countries around the world. how is this virus complicating that wordwide? sew a lot of businesses then have to make a gut decision, lay off people, do i restrict their hours, to get me through the hump? what do you recommend? >> well, i'll tell you first of all the answer to your first question, which how is this impacting people, you know at the at one group, the -- [inaudible]. we see them as one of our clients. our other clients are those companies who are hiring these folks. both are being impacted ways that are separate and collide. one thing that impacts workers, many workers, neil, you are you

know are employed by mid or small sized companies and they may or may not have access to technology from their homes. while they may have the skillset they're not able to work from home. the impact to the companies then, neil, becomes that these companies have to find quick, data, he educatable ways for companies to help workers at home. we're finding most folks are ambitious to adapt to this new environment, and by the way it won't be new for long because i think a lot of will change the way we work. neil: you know, i was wondering though, part of this stimulus package, relief package, that the government has gotten done, the president signed off on it a couple days ago is this relief for small businesses in terms of loans to help their workers and those loans become grants if they don't terminate those workers. what do you think of that?

>> well, i think that the issue of the political side of it is one i'm not here to address but on behalf of the workers i can tell you smart companies are going to treat workers right. the employees really are taxpayers as well but more importantly they support the infrastructure that keeps everything going. i also think most of the companies i work with and i do meet a lot of companies networking and working with them, with clients, through organizations like we bank and wpo and we connect, which connects businesses across the world, all of these companies we're talking about really do want to do the right things for their employees, whether or not they behave in that manner, in the time of stress will be proven but i have seen that the majority of companies i know, that are small sized companies, are hiring the majority of people, they are hiring new

skillsets so many of the skillsets they hired for are people to go into infrastructure, heavy environments now transfer easily from home or out of the workplace. so i think that these companies are going to want to do the right thing. there is always going to be a bad apple in a bunch but i guarranty you that these companies with, the right regulations in front of them, the right requirements in front of them, will want to be behave well as well as made to behave well. neil: you know, some of them say, janice, we're trying to behave well but we have basic money issues, money in, money out, a lot of money that's stopped all of a sudden because of virus so some of them are just furloughing now, hoping the virus will resolve itself and hire the people back later. i was noticing in the case of macy's, in the case of bed bath bodyworks, steve madden shoes,

men's wearhouse, a host of others, just in the last 24 hours about a million plus furloughs have been announced by some pretty big companies. do you think they could have avoided that or should have held off on that or what? >> i can't speak to whether they should have held off on it. i would like to think that nobody would want to let go people. what i can tell you it is happening across the board and it is painful for employers to make this decision, regardless i think of where they're coming from in the moment. i think that smart companies are keeping great relationships with their employees, and you know, we work in our organization with something called talent etl and talent communities, so we're able to aggregate a multiplicity of talent and people that companies can work with as they find need to, whether new hiring, temp hiring, statement of work, which is basically a body of work performed by group

of people, out sourced or even rehiring or bringing people in a different way. but the talent community has been changing before the covid virus hit advantage of it throuh organizations like ours, you know, actone delivers technology, talent and process to companies. we do it in over 32 countries, so we're seeing the value of it, proven in different marketplaces and in different industries. neil: you're also pretty good at retaining your talent. that is very unusual in corporate america today. i'm just curious, any tips for small, medium, bigger businesses how to get through this crisis besides trying to hang on to people if you can but i'm the view people never forget what you did for them when they were done but they will very much forget you if you didn't do

anything for them when they were down. >> neil, you hit on something very important. we're just in economic crisis or is it simply a health crisis, this really is an emotional crisis for many people. that emotional crisis is and outside of the companies. folks are having to live at home in ways differently than they had planned. i spoke with someone just yesterday and she was asking me, how am i going to be able to conduct my business from home? there are four kids here. she and her husband, they find out they are learning things about each other they never knew before. so you just multiply that across economic levels as well as skillsets or inside or outside of a corporation it matters. so i the thing first ink think companies need to do, and it is smart to do it as well as right to do it, you have to understand where people, that p.m. people are coming from, a very different emotional place right now. you have to be thoughtful how you communicate.

clear, consistent, complete communication and you know, i come from a bible environment where we're talk to count the days as weeks, the weeks as months and the months as years. you never before regardless where you're from, from a faith based or from a spiritual base, it is important to value that things are happening very fast, people don't see the tomorrow as clearly as they did before and they're afraid of the american dream no matter what country they're in. and so i think clear communication is important. thoughtful communication. another thing to do is to make sure that you're enabling those workers who need that extra support to be able to work from home, to do so. that means that you got to be very careful about you who you protect your data and your client's data. you also got to be very thoughtful about the environment that you're asking people to work from. schedule meet national a way that be meetings in a way that allow people to meet during morning hours if possible.

encourage them to take a break. it is still legal to take a break at home. neil: i take too many of those. janice bryant howroyd,actone group. she practices what she preaches. no one thought she had any chance when she started this some decades back and depending on kindness of strangers. now a conglomerate worldwide, just by being decent to people. there is hope. more after this.

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♪. neil: all right. it seems odd after three different rounds of systemlous, that nancy pelosi and others are cooking up fourth round ever stimulus. what we do know we're still digesting the $2.3 trillion

measure that calls for bailouts of airlines and other firms and industries directly affected by the coronavirus shutdown, if you will. 100 billion in a prior, you know, staunch of tax credit for employers offering paid sick leave. in the first wave, 8 1/2 billion dollars that to help agencies, health care workers and the like. that has not even filtered through the system yet, but people are saying we need a little more right now. charlie gasparino has been following that, particularly the business component, the small business component a big chunk of change in that, close to $400 billion worth. charlie? >> yeah, neil, one of the reasons i should point out they're talking about another round ever stimulus, i'm -- of stimulus, i'm getting from sources that projections by goldman sachs and wall street firms, recovery will not start until the fourth quarter. the economic impact of the virus shutdown will be even more dramatic so stay tuned for that, more on that as we get bit but

here is what we know about the current stimulus program and this is the scary part. it's unclear if government is administering it in the right way as it applies to the small businesses and small businesses getting those -- to get them through a rough period until we reopen again. that is key for them to stay in business, to keep employing people but at least stay in business. they have a liquidity crisis. here is what we're getting from small businesses and big banks. they say the federal government has yet to issue any sort of guidelines. those guidelines how to exactly dot loans, how to make them? what are the procedures? they're waiting on them from some semblance of the small business administration, the fdic, the treasury department but they're not getting it. until they really get those loans, what they're telling me it is hard for them to make loans. they expect to get them. they were told they were going

to get them but they still haven't got -- this is starting to get a little worrisome, following our reporting where we're telling people call the banks, start the process rolling, the banks are now telling people calling them, these are small business owners, hey, really to get this going we need to hear from the federal government and that our sources in the trump administration are indicating to us that those guidelines are going to come within the next 24 hours, that they have heard the complaints, they know this is a stimulus program, it's like turning around a big battleship, that they're going to get it soon. so we have to wait to be seen. as you know, this might be the most important part of the stimulus package because small businesses make up half the work force. if they go out of business more, if they keep having failures, we got some real economic problems on our hands. back to you. neil: all right, my friend. be strong, be healthy, be you.

charlie gasparino. by the way, that's what happens when you put together a package very very quickly. people don't know quite what's in it before they vote for it. there's good and bad to that. more after this. on your every move. like this left turn. it's the next one. you always drive this slow? how did you make someone i love? that must be why you're always so late. i do not speed. and that's saving me cash with drivewise. [mayhem] you always drive like an old lady? [tina] you're an old lady.

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neil: well, it is part of the surreal nature of the coronavirus that it's emptied streets in new york, that's one thing, but to start seeing field hospitals set up in central park and morgue centers outside smaller hospitals in and around manhattan, you begin to think it's a very different world right now. david lee miller in the middle of that on what's happening in central park. david lee? reporter: neil, indeed, it is a very different world. at this hour we are still waiting for the first coronavirus patients, possibly other patients as well, to

arrive here at the field hospital that has been constructed in central park. take a look over my shoulder. we will pan over now and you can see what's happening at this hour. they are constructing what we are told is an additional and larger tent. there are now 14 tents if place. a few moments ago they started bringing in extra equipment. the work here on this tent city, this field hospital, began on sunday and they said that by the end of today, it would be ready to see the first patients. now, this field hospital has the capability to treat 68 people. it will have 68 beds, including ten with icu capability. according to one doctor, they can treat the sickest of the sick. mt. sinai hospital which is directly croacross the street i going to administer admissions. mt. sinai is struggling to cope with the growing number of coronavirus patients. governor cuomo has ordered all hospitals in the state to

increase bed capacity by 50% and take a look at these photos, they are now constructing facilities in the building's lobby to accommodate patients. in brooklyn's brookdale hospital, doctors say they are working an excessive number of hours and using one mask for an entire shift. one physician calls it exhausting. >> it's like a war zone. a medical war zone. i'm working with limited resources, with constant disparities and pain and suffering we see not only with those who are afflicted with the coronavirus, but also those who are coming in for trauma and pediatric emergencies. reporter: in hard-hit queens, parts of the u.s. open stadium will be converted into a hospital. 350 beds will be set up at the billie jean king national tennis center. plans are to use the center to treat non-coronavirus patients but that could change according to need. we may hear more when mayor

deblasio holds a news conference there. according to news reports, a brooklyn man secretly had a stash of 80,000 medical masks, discovered by agents who were investigating the hoarding of medical supplies. lastly, new york city officials are now reporting the first death of a child caused by the coronavirus. they have not released details except we are told the child did have an underlying medical condition. back to you. neil: so sad. david lee miller, thank you very, very much. as david was speaking, we are just learning that new jersey governor phil murphy sitting at the microphone to address his much stricter rules on quarantining as much of the garden state population as possible and exacting serious fines if anybody disobeys. let's listen in. >> our statewide count stands at 18,696. again, 2,196 positive test results overnight since

yesterday, a total of 18,696 in total. and we continue to lose invaluable members of our new jersey family to covid-19 related complications and this does not get any easier to speak to, never mind live through. since yesterday, another 69 residents have died and that total now stands at 267. each of them a precious life lost from our new jersey family. a couple of -- taking that number which is a big one and putting a face to it maybe in a couple of different ways, one of those precious souls lost was passaic firefighter israel tolentino, jr. he became a firefighter about a year and a half ago. he had been a volunteer before that. he had served as an emt. he was only 33 years old. i spoke to his wife maria

earlier. they have two children, one who is 9 and one who is 7. i also spoke to his chief as well as i exchanged notes with the mayor of passaic, hector laura. by all accounts, an incredible guy and somebody who we mourn with his family and friends. we keep his family in our prayers as we do every single new jersey family who is dealing with the absolute worst part from this emergency. another name, another young person, you may have read about ben luderer, head baseball coach at cliffside park, 30 years old. a star in that famous don bosco prep undefeated team of 2008. they were number one in the nation. he went on and played at marist.

to his wife brandy and his family, god rest his soul. just stop for a second. you just heard about a 33-year-old and a 30-year-old. now you are going to hear from judy when she goes through the dimensions of the fatalities that those are on the somewhat exception side, that clearly the demographic that is older is the one that's being hit the hardest, but may i just repeat to everybody who is listening, this is a reality for all of us. this is not abstract no matter how good our health is, no matter how young we might be, and by the way, even if it doesn't impact you, never mind kill you, you may unwittingly carry this virus and pass it on to someone else who you hold dear. so to each of israel and ben and to all the other 67 folks who we lost overnight, bless their hearts. the disease has taken service members, first responders,

coaches, loved ones, many friends and too many new jerseyans and sadly, we know that this number will grow. i cannot be any clearer in my call, stay at home before this hits home, like it has now for 267 of our families. please do your part to flatten this curve that we showed you yesterday and think of what we saw and the totality of where this could go if it was left unchecked and where social distance i distancing can take us. again, the chart on the left, best judgment, again, this is as of yesterday, this changes every day, but look at where this virus would have taken us had we not stayed at home, had we not done everything we can to

flatten the curve. you see on the left needing as many as just under 80,000 hospital beds and there's no state in america that has the wherewithal or the resources to come up with that sort of peak in surge and meet it. but look at the chart on the right. that's just if we behave as an average state based on past pandemics. that's what we can do. now, the blue line that surges at the top is still north of that red line that's straight underneath it. the red line is the current capacity of hospital beds and the blue line is the surge, but that's an average result. we, i repeat, we are not an average state. we are the quintessential all come together, one family, we can do the impossible state. that is new jersey. our job collectively is to stay at home, keep social distancing and flatten the hell out of that curve to get it as close to that

red line as humanly possible. neil: all right. that was new jersey governor phil murphy. i apologize for the feed going out but you got the gist of it. cases are going up sharply in the garden state. it is second only to new york in the number of cases, the number of deaths, and it is accelerating. that's a big worry. he has cracked down on this social distancing, you have heard a great deal about in new jersey. they are even pushing fines up to $1,000, even jail time if you do not honor the 8:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. curfew. in fact, they are cordoning off exits on to the major highways in and throughout the state to make sure you don't. blake berman on this whole social distancing issue the administration is wrestling with. do you know anything yet? reporter: it was one governor

there, as you just saw from new jersey talking about social distancing. we are going to hear from the federal government later this afternoon, 5:00 hour, i'm told we expect president trump and/or members of his task force to outline the new social distancing guidelines. as you know when we heard from the president in the rose garden on sunday, he said that he would be presenting the underlying data and the figures and the evidence as to why he made the decision to extend the social distancing guidelines through the end of april, the 15-day initial guidelines up today so now we await from the president, maybe dr. birx, maybe dr. fauci this afternoon, as to exactly what all of us should expect and what all of the guidelines should be going forward, whether or not there will be any changes and if there are, what those changes might be. so that's on the social distancing front. on the health front, on the economic side as well today, we also heard from the president about what he wants to see going forward, potentially with a phase four relief package.

this would be if the president gets his way, in the form of infrastructure. this was the tweet from president trump earlier this morning. he said quote, with interest rates for the united states being at zero, this is the time to do our decades-long awaited infrastructure bill. it should be very big and bold, $2 trillion and be focused solely on jobs and rebuilding the once great infrastructure of our country, phase four. however, there are already hesitations about going down that road. for example, the republican senator james lankford who sits on the senate appropriations committee had this concern. watch. >> some in washington, d.c. that just spent $2 trillion is like a teenager getting on a roller coaster said that was fun, let's do that again, that are immediately trying to jump into this and say i want to spend another $2 trillion and to be able to keep going at this point. reporter: next hour, president trump will also be meeting with leaders within the

telecommunications industry. there has been a push among many to make sure that the information gets out to all, to everyone across the country, so that is likely to be a part of the discussion between the president and telecom leaders next hour. but 5:00 or at least in the 5:00 hour, we expect to hear from the president and/or members of his team about those new guidelines or the potentially same guidelines, maybe, with a small tweak about what to expect over the upcoming month. neil? neil: you know, it's interesting, there's an m.i.t. professor getting a great deal of attention talking about the six feet distance thing is actually too small, she thought it was wiser to extend it to 27 feet. variety of reasons for that, i don't want to get into. but that could be a game changer right there. reporter: and remember, too, you talk about feet between communicating with people, talking with them. the last time 15 days ago when

we got the social distancing guidelines from the white house, in the briefing room, the guidelines were ten people, no more than ten. that was a big change at the time because i think before that it might have been like 25 or 50. either way, it was a big shift downward. over the last 15 days, we have been talking about six feet and ten people or fewer. from what i have been led to believe, we will get sort of that same outline or at least whatever the details are within it from the administration later this afternoon into the early evening. neil? neil: all right. thank you my friend, very much. that professor is an associate professor over at m.i.t. she's researched the dynamics of what they call exhalations like coughs and sneezes and decided the fluid dynamics of the disease transmission laboratory, they found out the sneezes and coughs with cause gasseous

clouds that can travel up to 27 feet. hence that 27 foot gap that now she's recommending and others concurred at this laboratory might be wise. that would be a herculean task to enforce, to put it mildly. many stores have six-foot gap or distance measures already in place, taped on to their floors. can you imagine if they had to extend it to 27 feet? that's being kicked around at the white house, no the tt the t thing but revisiting distancing rules. lily, when you see all of this, what do you make of it? how far does this go? john lonski, i will bounce that off you i guess, first. >> okay. who knows. this is a scary situation. this is unprecedented. for this country, for the u.s.

economy and reflecting all of this uncertainty would be the wide range of estimates you are getting as to how real gdp is going to behave in the second quarter, third quarter, likewise for the unemployment rate. i say for the time being, prepare for the worst. you have to adhere to social distancing, that is a moral imperative, that is your patriotic duty. we want to bring this curve down, we want to have this peak as soon as possible. neil: i made a mistake. i apologize. lily is not here. i was very rude, i apologize for that. if they change these guidelines, erin, you could make an argument this is really going to confuse a lot of people, to say nothing of when they go shopping and already have this six-foot gap and it has to be four times that, just the possibility. what do you think? >> absolutely.

26, 27 feet is next to impossible for us to go shopping at our local grocery store. it really puts a higher demand on amazon, instacart deliveries and we are already seeing the employees getting really frustrated with the measures, the safety measures that those companies are taking for delivery workers. so it really creates an even bigger headache but at this time, you really do see chaos beating up reality. the best and the worst in people, i like to be a realist in terms of how we can handle this and how we are all taking the opportunity to flatten the curve. neil: you know, lauren, i don't know how it is around you but obviously new jersey governor murphy among governors across the country were taking a very tough stance on these, you know, staying at home rules and even

going out, fines being considered up to $1,000, even jail time because he says we're not bumping around on this. the next wave could be just that. what do you think? >> exactly. no one knows anything right now. i think the message is you need to stay at home, whether it's six feet or 27 feet away from someone. just stay at home to be safe. as we look at all these different models of how much the economy is going to contract in the second quarter, how high the jobless rate is going to spike, the numbers are all bad. does it matter how bad it is, no. it matters how long this last, how severe it gets before it can get better and no model as far as i know is factoring in the fact that we have new potential tests and treatments and vaccines coming. is that good news being taken into account? probably not. the other thing to consider is what we do know from china and other countriess 27 days, they started to see the death

rate level off. where are we right now? i think we are on day 15 or day 16. so we have a solid probably two weeks at least to go before we know how severe this is going to get and then we will talk about the recovery. neil: well put. thank you guys, very much. we are just getting news here that a lot of people as we told you in this fox survey, very anxious about not only paying their rent due tomorrow but their mortgage due. don't know how it necessarily works with rent. a lot of you can just call up your bank and your lender, they don't advertise this, but you can say you are under duress, they might give you a break. odds are, they will. we will explain after this. turn on my tv and boom, it's got all my favorite shows right there. i wish my trading platform worked like that. well have you tried thinkorswim?

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neil: well, he's politically connected. but he's actually better known as a national real estate developer and he was kind enough to stop by and maybe give a sense of what a lot of americans will be facing tomorrow on that mortgage payment, rent payment, whathave you. we are already seeing in a fox survey that only about a third of americans are ready for that and i'm just wondering what they can do or do they get concessions from their lenders? what do you think happens? >> i think the lenders are going to have no choice. the economy in the u.s. is closed down, people are not able to work and not able to pay their bills. most americans or at least half of them were not prepared for even a $400 unexpected expense. some lenders are going to have

to forbear. they should contact their lenders and work lenders like commercial property lenders will have to do as well. new york state is considering a 90-day moratorium on rent payments already. i think they will look to do more with regard to mortgage payments. neil: you know, earlier on in the broadcast, we had barbara corcoran here, saying she is concerned about renters in this fix but she's also concerned about landlords who are not all evildoers, that they have bills and staff to pay and that if renters get a moratorium, that might be certainly compassionate for 60, 90 days, she doesn't know if a lot of those guys will still be around, landlords, she's saying. what do you think of that? >> i think she's right. look, first of all, most landlords are hard-working entrepreneurs who are trying to provide a valuable service for the country and for their

tenants. many, most are living from cash flow to cash flow in terms of running these buildings. there are many small landlords without much capital reserve. so the lenders are going to have to work with them as well and the states are going to have to work with them with regard to taxes, the utility companies as well. this is going to be a big snowball effect. the reality is that there are going to be significant delinquencies on rent for single -- for apartments, there's going to be significant delinquencies on mortgage payments and there's going to be significant delinquencies on property taxes and other associated real estate revenue for the local and state governments as well. neil: i would imagine as well it's put a freeze on people looking at real estate, period, especially those that were going to use as part of the down payment whatever they had been making in the market which is a lot less now. what about that side of it? >> look, real estate has come to a halt in many instances. the capital markets are

essentially frozen. lenders are focusing on their existing portfolio and how to manage those issues. we are going to see a shutdown with regard to new acquisitions. buyers, home buyers can't even go and look at property. i think there's going to be a lingering impact of this. we will get through this pandemic as a nation, and the world will, but the aftermath of this is going to be that businesses are going to become much more efficient. the consumption of real estate space such as retail and office space is going to decline dramatically. and there's going to be a lesser demand for housing and there are going to be fewer people that can afford to pay what they are paying now and that's going to have a depressive impact on the value of real estate across the board. neil: don, thank you very much.

all right. we heard about these cases that are happening cross the country now, virtually every state in the nation has some coronavirus problems. the louisiana phenomenon, though, is the most remarkable because that came out of nowhere, particularly new orleans. it has become a hot spot, sort of a ground zero spot certainly in the south. the read from the former louisiana governor bobby jindal on that, after this.

neil: all right. in wall street jargon, sometimes they call this a dead cat bounce but you are seeing shares of royal caribbean cruises, carnival and norwegian cruise line up anywhere from 5% to as high as 5.6%. a lot of that has to do with the bounce-back from maybe oversold conditions just yesterday. a lot of people discovered that, a lot of the cruise lines were not going to get any of that stimulus dough, at least in this latest round, and the reality that some of them were-re-saili the middle of june, has them selling off. carnival was down close to 20% before ending up down 11%. norwegian down close to 19%, ultimately down 12%. i only mention those stats to put these latest in perspective.

they are still net-net down since all this started and way, way down at that. but it is an interesting pocket today to explore. also, talking about restaurants and leisure industry, specifically the restaurants, who hope takeout and delivery is helping. the fact of the matter is the math doesn't work that way. deirdre bolton has been examining all that. deirdre: yeah, hey, neil. some of these restaurant owners are really between a rock and a hard place. no other way to say it. they are seeing their sales just decline, some by as much as 30%, some by even more than that. i want to take you through a few stats. the restaurant industry estimated losses, this is just from march 1st, three million jobs across our nation, $25 billion and in the next say three months, there are some estimates that say the total number of jobs lost could be as high as between five and seven million as far as that march in

the billions at this point, a drop of 60% in some cases. april sales expected to fall another $60 billion. so we reached out through a few industry associations and here is what their members are telling us. they say in the next month, 44% have either temporarily closed or will close temporarily 11% answered they will be closing within the next 30 to 60 days, then 3% have permanently closed. enza, a very small neighborhoody italian restaurant 30 minutes north of philadelphia, that owner told us they had to make a decision, they did have to lay off 20 of 26 employees and he said it was done as close to consensus as possible in the sense they are still doing takeout and he kept the

employees who really needed the shifts the most. he said essentially they tried to choose who got to keep theire money the most. other bigger restaurants have a few more choices, if you like. todd grace is founder and ceo of raising cane's chicken fingers, based in baton rouge, with restaurants across 27 states. he outright refuses to lay off any of his crew even though sales are down he says about 30%. here's more on what told us. >> it's been our goal since day one when this crisis started to get through this and get through it with all 25,000 crew members intact and not have to lay anybody off. the easiest decision through this whole crisis was just foregoing my salary. we would rather people be able to keep their jobs than us keep our salaries right now. deirdre: and randy and michelle

dewitt making a similar kind of decision, so they are furloughing their employees. they have this company called front burner restaurant and similarly, 32 locations, six states but a lot of them in texas. so what they told us is they put their employees on furlough so that the employees could keep their health benefits, but they are doing something amazing. they are feeding up to 1,000 people per day. here's what they told us. >> we are feeding up to 1,000 people a day a hot meal. so i'm really proud of my team. we're committed to keeping furlough kitchen open through the duration of the quarantine and shelter in place orders that we have. deirdre: so he actually says a lot of people they are feeding for free are hospitality workers so other workers who have been laid off either by restaurant or

hotel companies. extraordinary efforts, extraordinary generosity, as we say. crisis brings out the best in people, sometimes the worst, but more than not, thank goodness, the best. back to you. neil: i think you're right on the latter. more often than not, the best. that's remarkable. thank you for sharing that with us. deirdre bolton on that. we talk about the cases across the country. i know johns hopkins is constantly updating these right now but what's been remarkable is in louisiana. it's crossed the 5,000 case level but it's the rate of increase that seems to be slowing that has a lot of people in the state thinking that maybe the social distancing rules are helping out. i don't want to minimize the severity of the state or that 60 out of the 64 parishes there are affected by this and that they've had better than 1800 cases in new orleans alone or close to 240 deaths. still, it's the trend or the slowdown of the increase that's

given people some hope here and they clasp anything they can get. bobby jindal, former louisiana governor, presidential candidate, with us as well. thank you for taking the time. >> thank you for having me. good talking to you. hope you and your family and viewers are all staying safe and at home. neil: we indeed are. you as well, governor. i'm curious, what do you make of this? we latch on to something, it's still tough news for louisiana, the sheer number of cases that spiked really in the last few weeks and then seem to have slowed a little. what can we read into that? >> so some glimmers of good news, then some challenges. here are the glimmers of good news. you're right, in new orleans, jefferson parish, two of the hardest hit parishes, they started off with over two-thirds of our cases. still over a majority of our cases. what we have seen, when you look at the data for the last couple days versus the previous couple days, you did see a decline. you saw flattening before that. it's still too early to declare victory, still too early to say

that's a peak. that's certainly progress. that's the glimmer of good news. here's the challenge. overnight, last 24 hours, we saw 30% increase in cases, 29% increase in deaths statewide. as you are beginning to hopefully see some encouraging glimmers in new orleans and jefferson parish, you are seeing challenges in other parts of the state, especially shreveport, northwestern corner of our state, about five hours from new orleans. so not near that region. they are seeing an increase in cases. as you noted, we've got cases in 60 out of our 64 parishes. way too early to declare victory in new orleans but it does suggest that social distancing works and that's why i encourage people to follow their guidelines, what you are hearing from your local, state and public health officials. it can be burdensome but it really does work. neil: what do you think of governors now who are forcing this social distancing thing because they say some residents aren't listening. you talk about this famous corona party that was going on,

a couple dozen largely kids whooping it up, endangering not only themselves but those with whom they would come in contact. now there are fines out there, potential jail time out there. what do you think of measures like that? >> look, you never want to get to the point where you are having to lock people up or fine people. i understand that's got to be a resort, you know, your last tool in your box. i understand if governors have to do that, they have a bigger responsibility to their public, their states. you hate to have to lock people up. hopefully through education we can convince people how serious this is, especially now that we have had several days, weeks now of watching what happened in new york, what could be happening in new orleans, what could be happening in washington state and other of these states. look, those are the canaries in the coal mine. my message to young people or other folks who think they are invincible or less likely to get this or more likely to recover is do this for your own health, but secondly do it for people around you. this is a way to protect not only your elderly parents and grandparents, it's also a way for you to help protect your communities and the sooner we get through this, the faster we can get back to our regular lives, back to work, open up our

businesses, get out of our homes. my plea to anybody who is tempted to violate the rules, to think it won't hurt them, do it for yourself. if not for yourself, do it for your neighbor. neil: or just fine them. just fine them. in all seriousness, one last question. you talked about the sooner we get back to business. a lot of people are talking about when this is over, it's going to be a v-shaped recovery, in other words, we will spike up. i'm no expert on this. i would just find that hard to believe. i think a lot of people are going to think twice about getting on a cruise ship, whether that's justified or not. i think they will think twice about flying certainly abroad. and they will hold back a little bit. they will look at how close so many of them came to financial distress or worse. i don't know if they are going to want to tempt fate any time soon. i don't know whether that recovery will be as immediate as many hope. it's good to hope that, but i don't think it's wise to get

people false hope that it's going to be a spike. what do you think? >> i think two things that can cause it to be a stronger recovery. one, to the extent we've got widespread testing, especially if we can test for antibodies, if we can test asymptomatic people quickly, cheaply, preferably at home and figure fout they have immunity, people can get back to their regular lives. secondly, i agree, i think there will be a strong recovery but i don't think -- i think you will have winners and losers. i don't think companies will pick up where they were before. i think for example, telehealth will be much stronger than before. i know they expanded it temporarily. it will be hard to go back to the way things were before. i think some of these travel companies, i think some retail companies may have a tougher time but i think overall, the economy will come back strong but i think there will be some companies will have a tougher time recovering than others and there will be some companies that will come out of this even stronger, as people permanently switch some of their spending habits. neil: yeah. we'll see. i have no doubt that we are down for this. i just don't know it will be quick as some led us to believe.

we'll see. thank you, sir. very good seeing you. continued good health. governor bobby jindal of louisiana. right now, just want to let you know that here's what gives encouragement to this notion that we could get out of this. how quickly is anyone's guess. china is coming out of this. china's companies are expanding. manufacturing had a plus in front of it. what's that all about? after this. the american red cross urgently needs blood and platelet donations and asks all healthy donors to schedule an appointment to give. now, with the corona virus outbreak, it is important to maintain a sufficient blood supply. your blood donation is critical

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neil: it all started in china and now signs increasingly that china could be on the way out of this whole coronavirus mess. there is hope, if you look at the manufacturing numbers that just came out of the country. again, we depend on what the chinese tell us, we can't verify this, but they saw a slight expansion in manufacturing activity in the latest month when most were looking for

contraction. i'm not saying this to be distrustful of the chinese but a lot of their data has been questionable in the past. still, if you argue that the trend might be turning right now from just awful, awful news that 60 million people quarantined from the rest of the world, it's far fewer than that right now and a lot of those people are being told they can go back to work and indeed, a lot of them are going back to work. what to make of that. back with us, lauren and john. we have debated this over the years about whether the information you get from china is accurate. but sometimes, i feel that their comments are analogous to the progress stories i share with people on my diet. it's a lie. so leaving that aside, i'm wondering what you make right now of what the chinese are saying, that they might be through the worst of it. >> well, skepticism is warranted. i would be interested in what u.s. companies that have manufacturing facilities in china, other western companies that have factories in china, are telling us, what they are

picking up as far as a restarting of chinese industrial production. if it turns out that apple says you know, they are beginning to produce more of these iphones, then i would -- that would lend credibility to this claim by the chinese government that manufacturing activity is improving. neil: lauren, what do you think? >> i think the data we got overnight shows the direction of the economy in china is improving but certainly not the magnitude. talking about a v-shaped recovery, i'm not certain that that's what china is seeing. whether you can believe them or not. i think china also acknowledges that. i was looking at what china said about these statistics and they said unprecedented austerity and complexity behind all this on both supply and demand. even they are not saying they are out of the woods just yet. bottom line, i think it's

encouraging but there's no v-shaped recovery happening in china right now, not to mention beijing is also bracing for a second wave of coronavirus cases. will they have to lock down a little bit once again? neil: you know, to that point, the second wave, a lot of people are saying if you do want to look at the encouraging side of this and argue they had this two to three months before we did and they are going through this positive arc or favorable arc, whatever you want to call it, now, that we could be two months or so away from the same thing. what do you make of that? >> okay. i would have to say you know, we have a building up of demand right now in the united states at least. there's a lot of purchases that are not being made for the simple fact that people have to keep a distance. you're not going out to look at a new home, if you are thinking of buying housing, you are not at this point in time looking at a new car. if you were thinking of buying

an automobile. once the restrictions on social distancing are relaxed, we are probably going to see at least a temporary jump by consumer spending. it's not going to be surprising that after double digit percentage declines by real gdp, we then perhaps in the third quarter if we're lucky begin to see double digit percentage increases by gdp. that being said, after say a quick rebound, my guess is that economic growth will level off to an underlying pace of perhaps between 2% to 2.5% on a quarter by quarter basis. neil: we shall see. john lonski, final word. lauren simonetti, thank you both very, very much. well, if that potentially encouraging news on china doesn't get your attention, maybe warren buffett riding in to the rescue with a big plan, will. after this.

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[ applause and band playing ] only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ neil: all right. warren buffett to the coronavirus rescue? maybe. laura ingall has more on that. reporter: we are coming to you from outside the nurses' station on long island, this is nassau county, of course. we are staged right outside the nurses' station. you can see right behind me, this is a staging area where people can pull in to the emergency department and get screened if they have covid-1 covid-19-like symptoms. they can go there so the emergency department isn't overwhelmed with contagious patients. that's where they will be transferred to the forward

triage unit, the big white tent behind that nurses' station so that people like with a broken arm or cardiac situation can go into the e.r. safely. the amount of covid patients being treated here went from 100 to 220 in the last two days. hospital workers say they are being stretched to the limit here in terms of ventilators, respiratory nurses who know how to work vents and the all-important personal protective equipment we have all been talking about known as ppes. some good news as you mentioned at the top, we have learned through a source familiar with mt. sinai's operations that warren buffett, the ceo of berkshire hathaway, commissioned two private planes through his company, sending them to china to obtain approximately 130,000 n95 face masks on behalf of the mt. sinai network to be distributed to the hospitals which are mnow treating over 130 covid patients system-wide. the need is still strong all around long island. we have staff telling us that

they currently have more than 2200 covid positive patients in the area, a three-fold increase from one week ago, but reportedly received a significant supply of n95 masks and ventilators from fema yesterday. right now, long island's two largest counties are in the midst of a surge of covid-19 cases. nassau county was up nearly 900 cases from sunday to monday, and suffolk county also saw a spike with 768 cases in that same day. yesterday, some other good news here, doctors and nurses received large donations, bags of groceries, fresh supplies, eggs, milk and vegetables to go home with so they wouldn't have to go to stores because they are exhausted at the end of these long shifts. they are also getting some prepackaged meals here today from other donors but everybody is trying to pitch in as much as they can to help these nurses and doctors out. neil? neil: good for them. thank you. we needed to hear that. now to hillary vaughn, another good story for you. d.c. tavern owner who is looking

after his workers. hillary? reporter: we talked with bill thomas this morning, the owner of jack rose dining saloon, homes to one of the world's largest whiskey and bourbon collections in the world. he was supposed to be in london today picking up an award he received for the best whiskey bar if 2020 awarded by the whiskey magazine but instead, he's here in d.c. trying to keep his business and his workers afloat. >> we really need deferments for nearly three years. that's how long, we run a razor thin margin so when you talk about kicking the can down the road three or four months, you are inevitably -- what i think will happen is literally 30% of the businesses won't come back because they just won't have the ability to do so. reporter: jack rose is open for carryout and is selling off bottles of spirits but even with that, business is down 85% to 90%. they are also taking on hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt and they don't know yet if they will be able to benefit from

some of this money, the $350 billion allocated for small businesses just like theirs. he says they are working through the red tape, looking at the terms, trying to make sure that taking this money is the right deal for them. >> but it needs to be really trimmed down. we really have to have it in bullet points because it's really difficult right now to run what you can, focus, pivot your business, then have to worry about regulation, putting together an insane amount of paperwork. reporter: one easy thing he says that would actually really help them right now is removing sales tax. the small amount of revenue they are still bringing in, they are still paying sales tax on. neil? neil: thank you very much, hillary vaughn. to robert wolf, the former ubs chairman, uncanny read of all things money and a lot of things, he was the first to tell me keep an eye on joe biden and what's going to happen in south carolina. that was then. he was right every step of the way. you know, robert, let's talk a

little about this talk of a fourth round of stimulus. nancy pelosi first raised it, some republicans >> we absolutely need a fourth round. the two trillion, i wouldn't even call it stimulus. it was an aid package and which probably need at least another trillion. we need to give first, to the medical supply system and the hospitals. we need to give a lot more to states and municipalities. a lot more to those individuals impacted by the pandemic. so this package was way too small. we know it was way too small, because in the second quarter, we're talking about unemployment and negative gdp, deeper than we've ever seen since the 1930s during the great depression. we're talking about possibly 15 to 25% unemployment and north of 20% negative gdp. and we renewed the numbers on friday were worse than we have

ever seen by four times historically the jobless claims. so yes, we definitely need -- neil: but a lot of this money hasn't gotten out there, robert, right? i'm sorry, a lot of money hasn't gotten out there, to say nothing of the federal reserve and trillions more pouring in, shouldn't we wait to see what happens before we throw more in. >> no, we shouldn't give more time. already congress in recess to the end of april. by the time they come back, we'll already be in first month of the deep recession. the question i would ask congress is do we want the an recovery l-shaped, u-shapedded or v-shaped? let's all agree we want a v. we're already seeing what economists are forecasting the second quarter to be, which means we know we'll need another phase. i'm not why we're waiting for that. we know some of these areas have -- neil: why do you think it would be v or u-shaped?

a lot of americans will be leery of traveling? they will be leery of spending a lot of money right now with the financial dire straits they're in. what makes you think that the v out of that? >> because i'm thinking, i think it will be a u-shaped because i'm thinking by the fourth quarter, we have our arms around the entire pandemic. i'm not saying that, you know, there will be no illnesses but we'll have enough kits, enough ppe, enough testing we'll understand, hopefully, there will be some ideas of when vaccines come to play. i think that within six months a lot of this will be what i will call the recovery phase. when we get into the recovery phase, we know that unemployment is going to come back rapidly. actually a lot of these places will come back to fruition. neil: all right. >> i'm not saying there will not be a new normal. i'm just saying we're going to have some sort of normally sass we get into the fourth quarter and we have to make sure people

are ready for that. neil: all right. we'll see what happens. robert wolf, thank you, always good catching up with you. ppe, you hear that term mentioned quite a bit. it refers to personal protection equipment, something that health care workers all need and you need, but it gets bandied around a lot. glad to see this fellow back to steer us through the next hour, charles payne. charles: neil, thank you very much. robert wolf with all the optimism, who knew. thank you very much, my friend. good afternoon, i'm charles payne, this is "making money" and breaking right now the market exhibits resolve trying to stop a massive leg down. we have better read on march consumer confidence. but here is the big question, folks, must major indices test lows before investors can buy aggressively? plus we have to take a closer look at the massive 2 trillion-dollar stimulus package. are americans being hung out to