As Governor Beshear and his administration take on the coronavirus pandemic in Kentucky, they (and all of us) need to remember the Y2K paradox.
Remembering the Y2K crisis
The Year 2000 Problem, normally just called Y2K, was a world-wide issue in computer software related to dates; specifically, the use of two-digit years in code in order to save space. What would happen to that code and that software when we crossed into the year 2000 – would it work or would it fail, and if it failed, what would be the results of that failure?
I was working in information technology in the years leading up to 2000, and even though I did not remediate code myself, I was very aware of the problem. In fact, I gave some talks at that time to explain the problem to others.
Looking back, there are some facts about the Y2K crisis that are important to remember:
It was definitely a real threat. There were large financial systems, for example, that used the two-digit year to calculate interest. If you took out a mortgage in 2001, they would calculate the interest from 1901. There was software embedded in medical devices that would shut down the device if it had not been serviced in a certain period of time. When the internal clocked clicked over to 01/01/00, the device assumed it hadn’t been checked in 100 years and shut down. Not good if that equipment is in use in an ICU.
Organizations spent millions of dollars and thousands of hours to mitigate the threat. Retired COBOL programmers came out of retirement and made major bank to fix code they had warned about 30 years before. They had not been taken seriously, because surely code written in 1967 would not still be in use in 1997, right. (Uhm, wrong.) Companies set up Y2K project offices, tasked with finding and fixing every line of code that had a two-digit date, or figuring out a workaround.
Even as the effort was underway, people either said it was not a big deal, or made fun of it. There were any number of people, including famous personalities and elected officials, who blew off the threat as overstated. Others made jokes about it, and called those of us who were worried about it “Computer Chicken Littles.” (Sound familiar?)
When the flip to 2000 came and went with no major disruptions, the naysayers crowed that they were right. There was much fun made of the entire effort at mitigation, with most being some form of “See, we TOLD you it wasn’t a big deal.”
But of course, the reason it was not a big deal is because of all the decisions that were made and the work that was done to prevent it from happening. We saw the code; we knew what it would do if left untouched; we made a plan and took action; we prevented the crisis.
The Y2K Paradox
Now you can see the Y2K Paradox:
- The threat is real, but hard for some to grasp, so they become naysayers.
- Those who understand the threat expend effort to prevent or mitigate the threat.
- The effort succeeds; the effects of the threat are much smaller than they would have been.
- Because of the success of the mitigation, the naysayers assume they were right all along.
Governor Beshear and the Y2K Paradox applied to the coronavirus
Governor Andy Beshear, and all other leaders and elected officials, are facing a similar, but not identical, situation with the coronavirus: It is a significant threat that requires significant action, but unlike Y2K, it is a rolling crisis, rather than a one-point-in-time crisis, so we can see the outcomes in other locations.
But, even with that difference, Gov. Beshear faces the same Catch-22 paradox that the people dealing with Y2K faced:
- If he takes the action that is necessary, and that action succeeds in mitigating the damage, he will be accused of over-reacting and causing the disruptions for nothing.
- If he fails to take action and Kentucky is hit hard, he will be reviled for not acting.
Fortunately for us, Gov. Beshear and his administration are making the hard decisions and taking significant action. If their actions are successful, we will still see some impact, but it will not be anything like it would have been if they had listened to the naysayers and opted for small actions, or no actions at all.
But, when this crisis has passed, all of us citizens need to remember the Y2K Paradox, and realize that the reduced impact is not because there was no threat, but because the threat was mitigated by the leadership shown by our elected officials.
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