http://www.bog.frb.fed.us/y2k/CSPAN/19980818/Brock.ram

-- (vid@see.free), April 05, 1999

Answers

Thanks for the interesting video from a business perspective. If avoiding Y2K disaster depends on "business processes" and "continuity planning" then the situation is even worse than if it were "just" fixing all of the code.

A lot of businesses apparently have no ability avoid disruptions caused by even relatively minor problems. For example when faced with power interruptions that are common during spring thunderstorm season, our local supermarkets and discount stores stop dead in their tracks. If I were the manager of one of these stores, I would find a way to keep making money, but they simply stop doing business.

Twenty-three years ago, when I was a college kid working in McDonalds, we would occasionally get a larger than expected dinner rush. There were a lot fewer fast food restaurants back then, and sometimes the line would stretch out the door. Our managers solution was to send some of us out into the lobby to take orders on old-fashioned order pads. I dont know if workers in that restaurant could do that now without dragging the computerized registers with them.

If enough businesses stop doing business for long enough, recession is a reality. Does anyone have a model for exactly how long a disruption it would take to tip the economic balance?

-- Robert Neely (robert_neely@ncsu.edu), April 05, 1999.