The U.S. Is Lagging Behind Many Rich Countries. These Charts Show Why.

ank	Countries and regions	Life expectancy at birth (in years)
		Overall	Female	Male
1	Hong Kong	84.7	87.6	81.8
2	Japan	84.5	87.5	81.1
3	Singapore	83.8	85.8	81.5
4	Italy	83.6	85.5	81.7
5=	Spain	83.4	86.1	80.7
6=	Switzerland	83.4	85.3	81.1
7	Australia	83.3	85.3	81.3
8	Iceland	82.9	84.4	81.3
9=	Israel	82.8	84.4	81.1
10=	South Korea	82.8	85.8	79.7
11	Sweden	82.7	84.4	80.9
12	France	82.5	85.4	79.6
13	Malta	82.4	84.1	80.5
14=	Canada	82.3	84.3	80.3
14=	Norway	82.3	84.3	80.3
16=	Greece	82.1	84.5	79.6
16=	Ireland	82.1	83.7	80.4
16=	Luxembourg	82.1	84.2	80.0
16=	Netherlands	82.1	83.8	80.4
16=	New Zealand	82.1	83.9	80.4
21	Portugal	81.9	84.7	78.8
22	Andorra	81.8
23	Finland	81.7	84.6	78.9
25	Belgium	81.5	83.8	79.1
26	Austria	81.4	83.8	79.0
27	Germany	81.2	83.6	78.8
28	Slovenia	81.2	83.9	78.4
29	United Kingdom	81.2	83.0	79.5
—	European Union	81.2	83.8	78.6
30	Cyprus	80.8	82.9	78.7
31	Denmark	80.8	82.8	77.8
32	Liechtenstein	80.5
33	Costa Rica	80.1	82.7	77.5
34	Chile	80.0	82.4	77.6
35	Czech Republic	79.2	81.8	76.6
36	Barbados	79.1	80.4	77.7
37	Lebanon	78.9	80.8	77.1
38	United States	78.9	81.4	76.3
39	Cuba	78.6	80.6	76.7
40	Estonia	78.6	82.4	73.9
41	Poland	78.5	82.4	74.6
42	Croatia	78.3	81.5	75.1
43	Panama	78.3	81.6	75.2
44	Turkey	78.3	81.0	75.6
45	United Arab Emirates	77.8	79.2	77.1
46	Uruguay	77.8	81.4	74.0
47	Oman	77.6	80.1	75.9
48	Slovakia	77.4	80.8	73.8
49	Bosnia and Herzegovina	77.3	79.7	74.8
50	Bahrain	77.2	78.3	76.3

NY TIMES

The United States is different. In nearly every other high-income country, people have both become richer over the last three decades and been able to enjoy substantially longer lifespans.

But not in the United States. Even as average incomes have risen, much of the economic gains have gone to the affluent — and life expectancy has risen only three years since 1990. There is no other developed country that has suffered such a stark slowdown in lifespans.

Why has this happened? There are multiple causes. But one big one is a lack of political power among the bulk of the population.

Government policy and economic forces have combined to make corporations and the wealthy more powerful, and most workers and their families less powerful. These workers receive a smaller share of society’s resources than they once did and often have less control over their lives. Those lives are generally shorter and more likely to be affected by pollution and chronic health problems.

Here, we show you a series of measures — about power, living standards and more — for a variety of countries. Together, they portray the disturbing new version of American exceptionalism.

We’ll start with union membership.

People in labor unions make substantially more money than similar nonunionized workers, academic research shows. And the share of Americans in unions has plummeted from 35 percent in the mid-1950s to about 10 percent today. The rate is even lower — about 6.2 percent — for private-sector workers.

The decline has happened largely because employers have become more aggressive about keeping out unions and government policy has made it easier for them to do so.

Unionization rates in many other countries are higher:

Union membership in 2018

 

The decline in unionization is one reason that the share of total national income flowing to corporate profits has risen — and the share going to worker pay has declined. The trend is starker in the U.S. than in Europe.

Higher profits have helped make the United States an outlier on executive pay, too. Although executives’ salaries have risen in most countries, relative to those of workers, in recent decades, the trend is more extreme in the U.S.

 

In 2005, the average CEO in the United States earned 262 times the pay of the average worker, the second-highest level of this ratio in the 40 years for which there are data. In 2005, a CEO earned more in one workday (there are 260 in a year) than an average worker earned in 52 weeks.Jun 21, 2006

 

Government policy plays an important role: The minimum wage is higher in other countries than it is in much of the United States. Some states have set a minimum wage higher than the federal standard, but many states in the South — home to large Black populations — have not.

Annual minimum wage in 2018

 

 

In addition to minimum wage, the United States has done less to combat rising corporate concentration. Large U.S. companies are better able to hold down the wages of workers, who don’t always have good employment options, and are also able to charge higher prices because of less competition.

One example: American consumers pay significantly more for cellphone service than people in many other countries.

Cellphone service cost in 2019

 

Arguably the biggest outlier is the American health care system. Prices for drugs, medical procedures and doctors’ visits are all substantially higher in the United States than in other countries. The U.S. also suffers from bureaucratic inefficiency, because of a complex health care system that spans the private sector, state governments and the federal government.

Health expenditures in 2019, share of G.D.P., projected thru 2027

 

In all, Americans pay almost twice as much on average for medical care as citizens of other rich countries. And as you may remember from the opening chart in this article, Americans are far from the world’s healthiest people.

Incarceration plays an important role, too. No other wealthy country puts as many people behind bars — and the prison population is disproportionately Black and Latino.

Time in prison casts a long shadow, leaving people with lingering health problems as well as permanently damaging their ability to find decent-paying work. Mass incarceration is a major reason that, even before the pandemic hit, about 30 percent of middle-aged Black men were not working in a typical week. Many of them do not count as unemployed because they are incarcerated or because they have stopped looking for work.

 

And a final example of how government policy exacerbates the unique inequality in the United States: tax policy.

In some other countries, like France, high-income households still pay more than half of their income in taxes on average. In the U.S., tax rates on the affluent are lower — and have fallen sharply in recent decades.

These trends have combined to increase economic inequality. The middle class and poor receive a smaller share of national income in the U.S. than in much of Europe, while the rich receive a greater share:

Share of national income

 

Source: World Inequality Database

If anything, these statistics understate American exceptionalism on inequality, because Americans also work longer hours for their pay than workers in many other places:

Annual hours worked in 2018

 

The most common way to think about inequality is as an economic story. And it is that. But it is also a story about political power, quality of life and even the amount of time that members of different classes can expect to live.

 

Esco20 is Shocked, Shocked: The Coronavirus Is airborne and is racially unequal!

Revelers enjoy the beach at Coney Island, Saturday, July 4, 2020, (AP Photo/John Minchillo)

The W.H.O. has resisted mounting evidence that viral particles floating indoors are infectious, some scientists say.

NY TIMES

The coronavirus is finding new victims worldwide, in bars and restaurants, offices, markets and casinos, giving rise to frightening clusters of infection that increasingly confirm what many scientists have been saying for months: The virus lingers in the air indoors, infecting those nearby.

If airborne transmission is a significant factor in the pandemic, especially in crowded spaces with poor ventilation, the consequences for containment will be significant. Masks may be needed indoors, even in socially-distant settings. Health care workers may need N95 masks that filter out even the smallest respiratory droplets as they care for coronavirus patients.

Ventilation systems in schools, nursing homes, residences and businesses may need to minimize recirculating air and add powerful new filters. Ultraviolet lights may be needed to kill viral particles floating in tiny droplets indoors.

In an open letter to the W.H.O., 239 scientists in 32 countries have outlined the evidence showing that smaller particles can infect people, and are calling for the agency to revise its recommendations. The researchers plan to publish their letter in a scientific journal next week.

The fullest look yet at the racial inequity of the coronavirus.

 

 

 

Image

Early numbers had shown that Black and Latino people were being harmed by the coronavirus at higher rates, but new federal data — made available after The New York Times sued the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — reveals a clearer and more complete picture: Black and Latino people have been disproportionately affected by the coronavirus in a widespread manner that spans the country, throughout hundreds of counties in urban, suburban and rural areas, and across all age groups.

Coronavirus cases per 10,000 people

White 23

All 38

Black 62

Latino 73

 

Latino and African-American residents of the United States have been three times as likely to become infected as their white neighbors, according to the new data, which provides detailed characteristics of 640,000 infections detected in nearly 1,000 U.S. counties. And Black and Latino people have been nearly twice as likely to die from the virus as white people, the data shows.

 

The disparities persist across state lines and regions. They exist in rural towns on the Great Plains, in suburban counties, like Fairfax County, Va., and in many of the country’s biggest cities.

“Systemic racism doesn’t just evidence itself in the criminal justice system,” said Quinton Lucas, who is the third Black mayor of Kansas City, Mo., which is in a state where 40 percent of those infected are Black or Latino even though those groups make up just 16 percent of the state’s population. “It’s something that we’re seeing taking lives in not just urban America, but rural America, and all types of parts where, frankly, people deserve an equal opportunity to live — to get health care, to get testing, to get tracing.”

UPDATES

 Trump said Saturday that his administration had “made a lot of progress” on controlling the novel coronavirus pandemic, even as the seven-day average of cases in the United States set a record for the 26th straight day.

Officials and health experts watched nervously to see whether July 4 gatherings would increase the spread while the virus continued to spiral out of control in much of the country, particularly in the South. Several states experienced record numbers of confirmed infections and hospitalizations.

Here are some significant developments:

Florida logged another daily high number of new cases. Hospitalizations in Arizona set a record. Intensive care unit capacity at the world’s largest medical center, in Houston, was exceeded at one point in the day.

Several California municipalities dismissed requests from higher governments to forgo fireworks shows or close beach parking lots to promote social distancing, local news outlets in the state reported.

As the United States reported 48,640 new covid-19 cases on Sunday, Arizona and Nevada reported their highest numbers of coronavirus-related hospitalizations to date. Seven-day case averages in 12 states hit new highs, with the most significant upticks reported in West Virginia, Tennessee and Montana.

As Texas continues to report record-breaking numbers of new cases, the mayors of Austin and Houston are warning that their cities’ health care systems could soon be overwhelmed.

Trump got his crowd and his fireworks, and peddled his fiction

WASHINGTON POST

The setting for President Trump’s early Fourth of July celebration was magnificent, as the Black Hills of South Dakota tend to be. The scene was also full of painful history, willful ignorance and deliberate fearmongering.

Friday night, in an amphitheater in the shadow of Mount Rushmore, a military band played smooth jazz on snare drums and trumpets as the country sank under the rising number of coronavirus infections. Thousands of unmasked guests, awaiting the arrival of the president, sat shoulder-to-shoulder in black folding chairs tethered together in a kind of coronavirus chain of denial. The VIPs would, of course, be seated separately onstage — not six feet apart but not amid the storm of exhalations, coughs, vociferous cheers and sneezes. And just to add to the upside-down, inside-out madness of the mass gathering, Ivanka Trump, the president’s adviser and daughter, tweeted a reminder to be safe over the holiday weekend by social distancing and wearing a mask. Her nearest and dearest did not listen to the plea.

Mount Rushmore is painfully complex — much like America itself. The faces of four revered but profoundly flawed presidents were carved into the stone by a talented sculptor who sympathized with the Ku Klux Klan. The majestic monument — a testament to human tenacity — scars land considered sacred by Native Americans.

But the president is not a man of complexity and nuance. He is a man who sees things in gloriously righteous white and suspicious, dangerous black. For him, Mount Rushmore is not complicated. It’s telegenic. His was not an open-armed celebration of American independence and the country’s raucous striving to fulfill its promise. The president had orchestrated a rally — a place where he could wade into a warm embrace of approval.

And oh, how he glowed. He wore a dark suit and red tie. An American flag pin was tacked to his lapel. His skin was dewy in the summer heat. His smile was broad. Trump looked so pleased.

He stepped to the microphone and settled into his speech, which warned his Americans that other Americans were a threat to the country. “Our country is witnessing a merciless campaign to erase our history,” Trump warned. “One of their political weapons is cancel culture. … This is the very definition of totalitarianism.”

“This attack on our liberty, our magnificent liberty, must be stopped,” the president said.

He promised to save the monuments, to defend the monuments, to put the full weight of the federal government into protecting giant hunks of stone and bronze. And why not? It’s so much easier to cordon off a statue, to surround it with police officers, than it is to come to terms with the blood and the glory, the cruelty and goodwill that built this country and that haunts it.

He delivered a dark speech ahead of Independence Day in which he sought to exploit the nation’s racial and social divisions and rally supporters around a law-and-order message that has become a cornerstone of his reelection campaign. Trump focused most of his address before a crowd of several thousand in South Dakota on what he described as a grave threat to the nation from liberals and angry mobs — a “left-wing cultural revolution” that aims to rewrite U.S. history and erase its heritage amid the racial justice protests that have roiled cities for weeks.

“The radical ideology attacking our country advances under the banner of social justice. But in truth, it would demolish both justice and society,” Trump said. “It would transform justice into an instrument of division and vengeance and turn our free society into a place of repression, domination and exclusion. They want to silence us, but we will not be silenced.” Trump, who recently signed an executive order aimed at punishing those who destroy monuments on federal property, referred to “violent mayhem” in the streets, even though many of the mass demonstrations have been largely peaceful. He warned that “angry mobs” were unleashing “a wave of violent crime” 

He will defend the Second Amendment and never defund the police. The crowd chanted “USA, USA.” The crowd demanded “four more years.” The president did not discuss the coronavirus, which has killed more than 126,000 Americans. The crowd did not seem to care.

Trump left the microphone with a promise to the crowd that the best is yet to come. Then the sky over the mountain exploded in a rainbow of lights, a shower of fire and spiraling flames. The spectacle was beautiful, as fireworks tend to be. When the show ended, a cloud of smoke remained. The audience was gazing at the heavens. And then the president was gone.

2020: WORST. YEAR. EVER. and there's still 6 months to go.

We rang it in with high hopes and lofty resolutions, then dropped into a downward spiral of death and despair with people trading punches to get the last roll of toilet paper.

Beyond the bewildering pandemic, we’re dealing with unemployment at its highest level since the Great Depression, a divisive presidential election, Donald Trump and his corrupt, autocratic administration; the repeated deaths of unarmed black people at the hands of police and a nationwide reckoning with systemic racism and systemic inequality.

Overall, the U.S. has lost more than 130,000 people to COVID-19, a quarter of the world’s death toll.

“It feels like a confluence all at once of 1918, 1929 and 1968,” historian Thurston Clarke told The News, referring to the years of the deadly “Spanish Flu” pandemic, the stock market crash that led to the Great Depression and the social unrest following the assassinations of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy.

 

“We had the terrible assassinations and the war in Vietnam in 1968. But now we’ve got a pandemic that’s already killed two times as many Americans as lost their lives in Vietnam. And we’ve got huge job losses and economic problems we didn’t have then,” he said.

Visitors to the Department of Labor are turned away at the door by personnel due to closures over coronavirus concerns, Wednesday, March 18, in New York. (John Minchillo/AP) 

I think all of us who study history are feeling whipsawed because there are so many parallels to the past, but it’s so confusing because one day it feels like 1861, the next 1918, then suddenly 1970,” said Ted Widmer, author of the recent book “Lincoln on the Verge” and a professor at CUNY’s Macaulay Honors College.

“So many things are happening at the same time,” he said. “We have so many extremes feeding each other, driving each other forward, while everyone is simultaneously fearful of the global pandemic.”

During the start of the Civil War in 1861, the breaking point was deep division over the enslavement of black people. Today, the flash points are police brutality and systemic racism, enduring echoes of that shameful institution. 

When the graphic video of Ahmaud Arbery’s Feb. 23 killing at the hands of a white ex-cop and his son published online in early May, it touched off a simmering outrage that exploded into the streets following the May 25 death of George Floyd in the custody of four Minneapolis police officers.

Former Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin during the arrest of George Floyd.

Graphic video of Floyd’s death showed white ex-officer Derek Chauvin kneeling on Floyd’s neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds in sickening silence as the unarmed black man repeatedly cried, “I can’t breathe” before losing consciousness and never regaining it

.

Three days after Floyd’s death, officials released the harrowing 911 call made by Breonna Taylor’s boyfriend after the 26-year-old EMT was shot at least eight times by police inside her Louisville apartment during a botched drug raid March 13.

On June 12, a white police officer in Atlanta pumped two bullets into the back of Rayshard Brooks in the parking lot of an Atlanta Wendy’s even though he knew the black man was running away with only a spent Taser in his hands, the prosecutor who charged the cop with felony murder said. 

 

 But even amid the stirring calls for social justice, many insist America has already accounted for the sins of its past, and its ongoing failures are few.

Widmer said another defining characteristic that sets 2020 apart from past eras has to do with America’s standing in the world.

“It’s really shocking. The respect other countries hold for us is way, way down by any measure," he said.

“It feels like we’ve lost sight of what Lincoln called our ‘better angels’ — our generosity to people other than ourselves and our willingness to lead in the solutions of global problems,” he said.

 

 “Right now it feels like we’re reeling. We’re far from leading in response to the pandemic. We’re being mocked and pitied. The U.S. is seemingly moving through this as though we are alone. We’re not hearing with any regularity that we’re working with our allies to share expertise and resources,” she said. “We’re so used to hearing we’re the best county in the world. But the idea that Europe is barring Americans as it reopens is a very powerful rejection of that myth.”

She said the U.S. has lost “a lot of steam” in the last six months in terms of lost production, disrupted education, forfeited productivity and breakdowns in our supply chains.  “I think we’re going to be a very tired country on New Year’s Eve. Really, really tired.” 

2020 timeline: It’s been one big story after another — after another

NY DAILY NEWS

Workers place bodies of coronavirus victims in a cold storage truck outside Brooklyn Hospital Center in Brooklyn on March 31, 2020. (Gardiner Anderson/for New York Daily News)

 

If it seems like 2020 is one of the more volatile years in recent memory, that’s because it is. Here’s a look back at newsworthy events in what’s already been a whirlwind six months.

Jan. 1: U.S. troops fire tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters, supporters of an Iranian-backed militia, at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq. President Trump says Iran will be held accountable.

A day earlier, the Chinese government announced it was investigating an “outbreak of respiratory illness in the central city of Wuhan.”

Jan. 3: A U.S. drone strikes Baghdad International Airport and kills Iranian general Qasem Soleimani, leader of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force, sparking tensions between U.S. and Iran.

Days later, 56 people are killed in a stampede at Soleimani’s funeral.

Protestors hold posters showing the portrait of Iranian Revolutionary Guard Major General Qassem Soleimani outside the U.S. Consulate in Istanbul, Turkey in January. (Chris McGrath/Getty) 

Jan. 6: U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issues first travel warnings for Americans visiting China.

Jan. 8: Iran launches missiles at two Iraqi bases with American military personnel. Several are injured. Hours later, Iran’s military shoots down Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 shortly after takeoff from Tehran, killing all 176 people on board.

Jan. 8: Prince Harry and wife Meghan Markle announce plans to “step back” from duties as members of the British royal family.

Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex depart Canada House on Jan. 7 in London. (Chris Jackson/Getty Images)

Jan. 13: Houston Astros fire GM Jeff Luhnow and manager A.J. Hinch over sign-stealing scandal.

Jan. 14: Rapper Jay-Z sues the Mississippi Department of Corrections over the deaths of multiple inmates at the state penitentiary in Parchman.

Jan. 15: The House of Representatives votes to send its impeachment articles against President Trump (abuse of power and obstruction of Congress) to the Senate.

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (c.) announces that (from left) Reps. Hakeem Jeffries, Sylvia Garcia, Jerrold Nadler, Adam Schiff, Val Demings, Zoe Lofgren and Jason Crow (D-CO) will be managers of the Senate impeachment trial of President Trump at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 15. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) 

Jan. 20: The first case of coronavirus, a 35-year-old Washington man who returned from China days earlier, is reported in the U.S.

Jan. 22: Opening arguments in the Senate impeachment trial begin.

In Davos, Switzerland, President Trump downplays coronavirus. “We have it under control. It’s going to be just fine,” he tells a reporter during a press conference. China quarantines entire city of Wuhan.

Jan. 24: President Trump writes his first tweet about the pandemic. “China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency. It will all work out well. In particular, on behalf of the American People, I want to thank President Xi!”

Jan. 26: Kobe Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and seven others die in a helicopter crash in California.

Wreckage of the crashed helicopter that was carrying former NBA star Kobe Bryant and his 13-year-old daughter Gianna smolders on the ground on Jan. 26, in Calabasas, Calif. (David McNew/Getty Images)

Efren Andaluz III, better known as Andaluz the Artist, is pictured in front of his mural honoring NBA great Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gianna in Brooklyn in February. Bryant, his daughter and seven others died in a helicopter crash Jan. 26. (Luiz C. Ribeiro/for New York Daily News)

Jan. 29: White House announces creation of coronavirus task force.

Jan. 30: WHO declares the coronavirus outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern.

Jan. 31: President Trump bans travel from China, with some exceptions. Brexit becomes official and the UK begins the process of formally withdrawing from the European Union.

Kansas City Chiefs defensive end Demone Harris celebrates after winning Super Bowl LIV against the San Francisco 49ers in Miami on Feb. 2. (ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty Images)

Feb. 4: President Trump delivers the State of the Union address. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi tears up a copy of Trump’s speech.

The Diamond Princess cruise ship docks and is quarantined in Yokohama, Japan.

Vice President Pence claps as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi appears to rip a copy of President Trump's State of the Union address in Washington on Feb. 4. (MANDEL NGAN / AFP via Getty Images)

Feb. 5: The Senate acquits President Trump after voting against subpoenaing witnesses, including John Bolton. Republican Mitt Romney is the only Republican to vote for removal.

Feb. 6: NASA astronaut Christina Koch returns to Earth after 328 days in space, a record for a woman.

Feb. 7: President Trump fires EU ambassador Gordon Sondland and National Security Council adviser Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, who both testified against the president during the impeachment trial.

Bong Joon-ho holds the Oscars for best original screenplay, best international feature film, best directing, and best picture for "Parasite" at the Governors Ball after the Oscars on Feb. 9. (Richard Shotwell/Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP)

Feb. 23: Ahmaud Arbery is shot and killed while jogging in Georgia.

Ahmaud Arbery (New York Daily News exclusive). (HANDOUT)

Feb. 24: President Trump tweets, “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA“ and “Stock Market starting to look very good to me!” as Dow Jones falls 1,000 points.

Feb. 29: The first coronavirus death reported in the U.S., though earlier deaths will be reported later.

Feb. 29: The U.S. and Taliban reach a conditional peace agreement. 

 

March 3: Biden shocks his presidential primary rivals with stunning victories in 10 states on Super Tuesday, putting him in the driver’s seat for the Democrat presidential nomination. At least 25 people are killed after 13 tornadoes strike Nashville area.

Democratic presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden, his wife Jill Biden (l.) and sister Valerie Biden Owens attend a Super Tuesday event on March 3 in Los Angeles. (David McNew/Getty Images)

 

The Dow Jones Industrial Average plunges more than 2,000 points.

March 11: The WHO declares coronavirus outbreak a pandemic. The NBA suspends its season after Utah Jazz center Rudy Gobert tests positive for coronavirus.

Harvey Weinstein is sentenced to 23 years in prison

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Tom Hanks announces he and wife Rita Wilson tested positive for coronavirus.

March 12: The Dow Jones Industrial Average falls more than 2,300 point after the U.S. bans travel from the Schengen Area in Europe.

Major League Baseball suspends spring training and announces season will be delayed because of coronavirus. The NHL and Major League Soccer suspend seasons. PGA and LPGA tours cancel several upcoming events. Broadway shows are suspended.

March 13: President Trump declares coronavirus a national emergency.

Breonna Taylor is shot and killed by police in Louisville.

Breonna Taylor was shot to death in her home. (Handout) 

March 15: New York orders public schools closed.

March 16: The Dow Jones Industrial Average falls by 2,997.10, the largest single-day point drop ever, amid the ongoing coronavirus outbreak.

Bars and restaurants in New York are ordered closed.

March 20: Worldwide coronavirus death toll passes 10,000.

Tom Brady signs contract with Tampa Bay Buccaneers after 20 seasons with New England Patriots

Gov. Andrew Cuomo issues stay-at-home order for New York.

March 24: The 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo are suspended until 2021.

India and United Kingdom go into lockdown. 

Trump tweets that the “cure” cannot be “worse than the problem itself” and calls for country to reopen on Easter Sunday.

New York passes 20,000 coronavirus cases.

March 26: British Prime Minister Boris Johnson diagnosed with coronavirus.

Global cases pass 500,000.

The U.S. passes China and Italy in number of cases and passes 1,000 deaths.

March 27: House and Senate pass coronavirus relief and stimulus bill which includes expanded unemployment benefits and cash payments to those eligible.

The USNS Comfort arrives in New York City. (Luiz C. Ribeiro/for New York Daily News)

March 31: New York passes 75,000 total coronavirus cases.

U.S. passes China in number of coronavirus deaths.

April 2: Number of coronavirus cases worldwide passes 1 million. More than 6.6 million workers file for unemployment in the U.S.

Working refrigerated trucks were seen parked outside a makeshift morgue outside Bellevue Hospital in Manhattan on March 31. (Luiz C. Ribeiro/for New York Daily News)

Failed containment efforts quickly gave way to mass lockdowns. Within weeks, New York became an international hot spot, with 799 people losing their lives in one 24-hour period in early April.

 

April 4: President Trump says “What do you have to lose?” in regards to taking hydroxychloroquine to treat coronavirus.

April 5: White House recommends people wear masks while in public.

April 6: Boris Johnson hospitalized because of coronavirus.

April 8: Bernie Sanders drops out of presidential race, clearing the way for Biden to win the Democratic nomination.

April 10: The U.S. becomes the first country to report 2,000 coronavirus deaths in a single day.

April 13: IRS begins sending stimulus checks to Americans.

President Trump's name is seen on a stimulus check issued by the IRS to help combat the adverse economic effects of the COVID-19 outbreak. (Eric Gay / AP)

April 15: Armed demonstrators protest Michigan’s coronavirus lockdown measures. 

 

April 24: U.S. passes 50,000 total coronavirus deaths.

April 27: U.S. passes 1,000,000 total coronavirus cases as worldwide total passes 3,000,000.

May 5: Video showing Ahmaud Arbery’s killing is leaked.

This image from video posted on Twitter May 5 shows Ahmaud Arbery stumbling and falling to the ground after being shot as Travis McMichael stands by holding a shotgun in a neighborhood outside Brunswick, Ga., on Feb. 23. (AP)

May 7: Gregory and Travis McMichael and charged with murder in Arbery case.

Department of Justice drops case against Michael Flynn who had pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI during an investigation conducted by Robert Mueller.

May 8: U.S. unemployment hits 14.7%.

May 15: Worldwide coronavirus deaths pass 300,000.

May 21: William Bryan, the man who filmed Abery’s death, is also charged with murder.

May 25: George Floyd is killed by a police officer in Minneapolis, sparking protests against police brutality and racial injustice. Protests, rioting and looting follow.

George Floyd died in police custody in Minneapolis.

May 28: Coronavirus cases in the U.S. pass 100,000

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One after another, the deaths fueled demonstrations in all 50 states amid a groundswell of support for the Black Lives Matter movement and reform of the criminal justice system.

Minneapolis Police Department abandons Third Precinct, which is burned down by rioters. 

A protester runs in front of the burning 3rd Precinct building of the Minneapolis Police Department on May 28. (Julio Cortez/AP)

May 29: CNN Center in Atlanta is damaged during protests over killing of George Floyd. Former police officer Derek Chauvin is charged with murder and manslaughter.

An estimated 6,000 Black Lives Matter protesters march over the roadway of the Brooklyn Bridge on Friday, June 19. (Gardiner Anderson/for New York Daily News)

 

Twitter places content warnings on posts made by President Trump encouraging violence against protesters.

A SpaceX Falcon 9, with NASA astronauts Doug Hurley and Robert Behnken in the Dragon crew capsule, lifts off from Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla. on May 30. (John Raoux/AP)

June 1: Protesters are cleared from Lafayette Park in Washington, D.C., with pepper spray and rubber bullets prior to Trump walking from the White House to a nearby church for a photo op.

June 3: Three fired Minneapolis police officers are charged with aiding and abetting murder for their role in George Floyd’s death.

June 4: Two Buffalo police officers are suspended and later charged with assault after shoving a 75-year-old protester to the ground, leading to the man’s hospitalization with a head injury.

June 5: Joe Biden reaches minimum delegate amount to secure Democratic nomination for President.

Many, including Trump, refuse to wear a face mask to curb the spread of a deadly virus.

June 7: Demonstrators pull down the statue of 17th-century slaver Edward Colston in England and throw it into a nearby harbor.

Protesters throw a statue of slave trader Edward Colston into Bristol harbour, during a Black Lives Matter protest rally, in Bristol, England, on June 7. (Ben Birchall/AP)

June 9: “Cops” is canceled after 31 years on the air

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June 10: The U.S. becomes the first country to reach 2 million coronavirus cases.

NASCAR bans display of Confederate flag.

June 12: Rayshard Brooks is shot and killed by police in a Wendy’s parking lot in Atlanta. The restaurant is burned down the next day. The shooter is later charged with murder and his partner charged with aggrieved assault.

This screen grab taken from body camera video provided by the Atlanta Police Department on June 12 shows Rayshard Brooks, right, speaking with Officer Garrett Rolfe in the parking lot of a Wendy's restaurant prior to being fatally shot by Rolfe. (Atlanta Police Department/Zuma Press/TNS)

June 15: Supreme Court rules employers cannot discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.

June 18: The Supreme Court rules in favor of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

June 20: President Trump holds sparsely attended rally in Tulsa after the event was moved to no longer occur on Juneteenth.

U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman, who was investigating Rudy Giuliani, is fired.

A supporter of President Trump waits for him to arrive for a campaign rally at the BOK Center on June 20, 2020, in Tulsa, Okla. (Evan Vucci/AP)

June 23: Former national security adviser John Bolton publishes “The Room Where It Happened,” a memoir about his time in the Trump White House which includes allegations of misconduct by the president. 

June 26: Whole Foods workers are sent home for wearing Black Lives Matter face masks.

A woman wearing a face shield prays at the Basilica de los Angeles in Cartago, Costa Rica, on June 28, 2020, amid the coronavirus pandemic. (EZEQUIEL BECERRA/AFP via Getty Images)

June 28: Coronavirus cases pass 10 million worldwide. 100,000 deaths reached in the U.S.

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July 2: Ghislaine Maxwell, the British socialite accused of plying Jeffrey Epstein with underage sex trafficking victims, is been arrested in New Hampshire.

July 3: Two police officers in Aurora, Colo., are fired after one resigns. The three had taken and shared photos reenacting a chokehold used in the death of Elijah McClain.