A lot changed for Americans in 2020, whether we liked it or not. But with many challenges of COVID-19 and the ensuing quarantines, there were as many or more creative solutions to help us get used to and even thrive in a new normal. With one of the most tumultuous years of recent history drawing to a close, we're taking stock of some of the biggest changes to daily life, and how we've been able to respond.
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Of all businesses, bars and nightclubs have been among the most affected by quarantine restrictions on social gatherings. They topped the list in a COVID-19 risk scale for common activities by the Texas Medical Association, yet ranked last among activities people missed in a survey by USC's Center for the Digital Future. To make matters even bleaker for local watering holes, many official guidelines went harder on alcohol-dependent businesses than ones that serve primarily food.
Many establishments weren't able to adapt. Some owners fought against government shutdown orders, but that hasn't stopped many bars from closing permanently amid a lack of revenue and ongoing maintenance costs. Those bars that have survived can seem like a shell of their former selves, relying on pickup windows or premade cocktail kits to serve customers. If there's any bright side, at least drinking outdoors has become somewhat less taboo, even despite of laws prohibiting public consumption.
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Eating inside or on the patio of a restaurant rank as considerably less risky than drinking at a bar, but eateries have still experienced major impacts as stay-at-home orders have discouraged customers from coming out. There was a drastic shift in Americans' eating habits, starting with a plunge of two-thirds of adults dining out with the pandemic's arrival.
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Many restaurants have reopened with limited seating options or had to rely increasingly on their online presence and delivery options. In one survey by the delivery service Upserve, nearly half of restaurants reported their biggest challenge was transitioning to online ordering, compared with just 20% citing the lack of income to pay bills. As for the customers, eating at home has increasingly had to suffice, and many have come to rely on delivery and pickup options or honed their home-cooking skills.
It wasn't just food services that felt the squeeze of stay-at-home orders. At the start of the pandemic, supermarkets experienced a surge of shoppers hoarding products for disaster preparedness — most memorably, toilet paper. Other retail sales dropped by a record 16.4% between March and April.
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Retailers have had to alter their business strategies, mainly to focus more on ecommerce, curbside pickups, and other contactless shopping options. Customs such as free samples and fitting rooms are, at least for now, relics, and automated checkout has accelerated. Some businesses have seen sales plummet while others do better than ever due to the nature of their products and customers: Target, Walmart, and (especially) Amazon fared well by supplying many kinds of products in one stop, but mall-based retailers such JCPenney and J. Crew have filed for bankruptcy. From 30% to 49% of Americans expect to do more shopping online even after the pandemic, according to a McKinsey survey.
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Libraries as public services and community gathering spaces have been shuttered for months. While many nations closed down their entire public library systems, the United States had a more patchwork approach, as with so much else based on the discretion of local authorities.
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Readers have found other ways to get their literature, and many libraries have gotten more creative in providing it. According to the International Federation of Library Associations, many libraries unable to stay open turned to book deliveries for vulnerable populations, sometimes partnering with taxi companies and the U.S. Postal Service. All types of libraries have either emphasized digital content or introduced new forms of it, migrating more of their catalogs and literacy programs online. In addition, Little Free Libraries — an international nonprofit offering volunteer-led "take a book, leave a book" boxes — have taken on added significance in areas they serve.
By September 2019, the domestic box office for the United States and Canada was $11.4 billion in annual ticket sales. By the same time this year, that figure was only $2.05 billion. Movie theaters were one of many businesses forced to shut down starting in March, with most major studios shelving scheduled releases. Despite cautious reopenings from the summer onward, there's no sign that chains such as AMC and Cinemark will return to pre-pandemic revenue levels anytime soon.
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Streaming services had to step up like never before. Providers such as Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Disney+ experienced record surges in viewership and subscriptions, and U.S. households with at least one streaming subscription jumping by 2.5 million, or 74%. Media companies such as Disney pivoted to emphasize streaming content and Universal changed release schedules to favor home video. While the conventional theater experience may be out the window until consumers feel safe in crowds again, socially distanced drive-ins have gained new relevance after decades of decline.
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Since the pandemic popularized the concept of "essential workers," nonessential ones have had to contend with often-downsized roles in a quarantined world. Many if not most businesses transitioned to telecommuting options, leaving employees to find a new rhythm in working from home rather than a crowded office.
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According to a survey of 1,000 Americansby the Coronavirus Disruption Project, 42% of workers said the quarantine made them want to work from home more, expressing appreciation for the increased flexibility and lack of commute time. And companies surviving with online applications such as Zoom and Slack will be hard pressed to argue against it. The shift hasn't been all positive; more than 40% of telecommuters in one global survey said their mental health had declined since the outbreak. Reopening offices face challenges in policies for health screenings, staggered shifts, and desk placements and will have reason to reevaluate staffing for the digital age.
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In many ways, those who just had to work from home were the lucky ones. In an economic downturn inseparable from the outbreak, more than 14 million Americans lost their jobs; unemployment spiked to 13% from 3.8% in just three months, more than during two years of the Great Recession. What's more, the strains of unemployment disproportionately affected Black, Latino, indigenous, and immigrant households, as well as those with lower levels of education.
Government responded with relief measures — such as the $2.2 trillion CARES Act in March — often subject to criticism for favoring large corporations at the expense of more vulnerable populations and businesses. While many have struggled to afford food and rent, some have also been inspired to reduce their consumption, spend more time on fitness and family, and even devote themselves to social activism, helping this summer's anti-police brutality protests become likely the largest movement in U.S. history. City dwellers noticed improvements in air quality and increased wildlife presence, and satellite data confirmed a drop in atmospheric pollution over industrial centers across Europe and Asia as traffic lessened and factories closed, reducing annual global emissionsby an estimated 8%.
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Health care systems and hospitals were pushed to their extreme — and sometimes beyond — in responding to COVID-19. Average citizens had even more reasons than usual to avoid seeking medical care, such as the shortage of resources, greater risk of infection, and economic hardship. In addition, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found considerably increased symptoms of anxiety, depression, and suicidal thinking from April to June compared with 2019, particularly among young adults, racial and ethnic minorities, essential workers, and unpaid adult caregivers.
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Medical professionals and patients learned to rely more on email, online portals, and video conferencing for diagnoses and treatment; newly waived fees and Medicare allowances enabled the change. The Cleveland Clinic, for example, reported that demand for virtual visits rose more than 1,000% near the start of the outbreak. Reflecting this shift was the increase in profits and prominence of telehealth and online therapy. Given the benefits of reduced travel and wait times, use of these services are expected to stay high.
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Hanging out with friends and family in 2020 wasn't as simple and innocent a proposition as it used to be. Having dinner or spending time indoors with anyone outside a household would pose at least a moderate risk of COVID transmission, and could be fraught with guilt, social stigma, and weighty moral calculations.
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When face-to-face contact wasn't an option, face-to-screen had to do. Platforms such as Zoom became essential for staying in touch, preserving our ability to connect even if sacrificing subtler levels of social engagement. Teleparty (formerly Netflix Party) offered another outlet to connect by streaming synced entertainment to groups. According to the Coronavirus Disruption Project, people reported their close relationships largely hadn't suffered from the pandemic. This suggests video conferencing may remain a more relevant way to connect going forward — though hopefully, not the main way.
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With even the slightest amount of direct human contact potentially contributing to the spread of a virus, the standard etiquette of handshakes and hugs suddenly became taboo, at least for anyone outside immediate households or inner circles.
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The elbow bump — employed during earlier pandemics too — became a common alternative even among world leaders in the earlier months of dealing with coronavirus. But it's since become discouraged for violating physical distancing recommendations.
Whether you're a fan of sports, music, comedy, or Q&A discussions, 2020 turned out to be a slow year for live entertainment. The pandemic forced musicians, lecturers, podcast hosts, and other entertainers to cancel planned tours and shows often at the last minute, while sports leagues could carry out seasons only under often bizarre and even flat-out dangerous new conditions. All the cancellations and postponements marked the biggest disruption to international sports since World War II.
Events such as the Tokyo Olympics have been postponed, though sports have also tried other adaptations — basketball resumed the 2019-2020 season in the "NBA bubble,” a spectator-free isolation zone within Walt Disney World in Orlando. The music industry suffered the loss of millions of dollars in projected revenue, affecting not just artists and studio employees but the owners of now-shuttered venues. The biggest comfort for fans has been the proliferation of livestreaming performances and seminars, which became easier than ever to schedule, given that performers and lecturers were stuck at home just like everyone else.
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One of the biggest challenges of the pandemic was education. School closings to prevent the spread of disease uprooted the routines of children and parents, and pressures over when and how to reopen schools became one of the year's most controversial debates — which, in 2020, is really saying something.
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When in-person schooling wasn't available, teachers and students migrated online. Virtual curriculum options such as Khan Academy, Coursera, and Byju became more widely integrated into lesson plans, and video conference-based instruction in general. The strain put on some families helped highlight the roles schools play in keeping society functioning normally, as well as the inequities of digital access between school districts and individual households. While the CDC worried that "in-person contacts provide opportunities to facilitate social-emotional development that are difficult, if not impossible, to replicate through distance learning," digital technologies still proved their merit at least as supplemental learning tools. There are many reasons to think some of these changes will endure.
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Cruises, jet-setting vacations, and even weekend road trips became more difficult to justify, and given how hard-hit the United States was by the pandemic, travelers with U.S. passports were prohibited from traveling to all but nine countries without restrictions. As a result, the U.S. Travel Association recently projected a 45% decline in industry revenues for the year, a $519 billion loss.
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The lack of traffic on major highways was good for would-be roadkill, reducing animal casualties the world over. Online cooking classes and other cultural experiences may have helped during a lull in leisure travel, but there's no question that having to stay home so long has whetted many people's appetites for a proper vacation. The industry might look different post-pandemic, though, with cleanliness and sanitation a much higher priority — contributing to higher costs — and self check-in kiosks and vacation rentals becoming more popular. Expect also to see fewer business travelers and more high-tech contact tracing protocols, raising discussions over privacy rights and the implications of international travel.
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City buses, subways, and train cars were another everyday setting that became practically horrifying. When commuters and other riders couldn't simply stay home, they had to cope with often drastic delays and other changes in services, particularly from reduced capacities. In July, Transit App recordeda 58% national reduction in use of transit from the prior year.
Mass transit services did their part to limit capacities and discourage nonessential trips, even at the expense of revenues. Demand remained highest in communities with concentrations of essential workers and vulnerable populations, and companies may increase their focus on servicing the economically disadvantaged and on equity initiatives. Still, that depends on overcoming budget crises — and likely adopting safety technologies such as temperature checks as well as spacing out passengers, which might help restore faith and ridership numbers faster.
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If someone from the halcyon days of 2019 could time travel a year into the future, what would be the first difference they notice? The masks. Though already commonplace in some Asian nations and communities, masks meant to stem the spread of contagion have become ubiquitous and, in many cases, mandated throughout the Western world as well.
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Masks are almost certainly here to stay, though they probably won't remain as prevalent. No, we won't be required to wear face coverings once the threat of pandemic has died down, but they've still invaded our cultural consciousness, and it won't be bizarre to see people wearing them for some sense of security in crowded settings. Reusable masks are expected to grow to a $7.1 billion global market by 2027.
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Along with other dry and canned goods, there were widespread shortages on the bread making essentials of flour and particularly yeast early this year, as many turned to the domestic arts for a quarantine-friendly creative outlet. Supply chains were unprepared to handle this unprecedented spike in demand, up 410% from the prior year, namely because the busy season for baking commodities usually wouldn't occur until the winter holidays. Cleaning products such as Clorox and Lysol wipes remain hard to find, though the shortage most will remember is probably toilet paper.
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When grocery stores failed to provide active dry yeast, bakers got collaborative and creative. Some restaurants and home cooks were able to commune and share their supply, while others just shared knowledge, offering handy DIY instructions for fermenting one's own yeast. Excitement over homemade sourdough starters briefly became a viral phenomenon, so hopefully many households can now enjoy better, fresher baked goods. The toilet paper shortage, meanwhile, brought people in another direction: America finally met the bidet.
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In-person businesses focused on exercising and beautifying the body were another casualty of spring shutdowns, since gyms and salons tend to be high-touch industries. In a sample of 2,000 international fitness businesses, the consultant Glofox found attendance and class bookings reached a low-point at the end of April, down 95% from early March. Similarly, the global beauty industry was expected to see a 15% decline, compared with a standard 4% to 5% annual growth. Salons often have razor-thin profit margins of 2% to 17%, so many were among the small businesses forced to shut their doors permanently.
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The transition to digital fitness kicked into overdrive when gyms could no longer provide in-person instruction. Large chains and standalone gyms alike started to rely more on online classes, setting the stage for a hybrid of fitness offerings in the future. Online adoption and returns to in-person fitness have been sluggish, however, compared with other nations. Similarly, ecommerce sales had to make up some of the difference for beauty salons and retailers' losses from the lack of in-store purchases and appointments. More creative solutions included outdoor seating like in restaurants, or use of shields, but customers have taken more personal control over their beauty and skin-care regimens that now have to account for largely covered faces. Still, salon demand is expected to rebound once pandemic-related hygiene fears abate.
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