Pandemic is also an economic war

I wanted to have a respite from writing about the coronavirus; but, I soon found out that this is impossible for me. Every aspect of our life is now connected by some type of umbilical cord to the pandemic. I am referring to the economics and the economy, lifestyles and daily life, education and learning, recreation and travel, livelihood and work, national security and politics.

During this time, information is so crucial. Since we are all confined to our personal space and are full of anxieties, we are all dependent on media including social media. Unfortunately, it is impossible to discern truth from fake news. What is even worse is that social media is full of people who have no medical backgrounds but are suddenly pseudo health experts with their own remedies, theories and even suggested cures for coronavirus. This is in contrast to medical experts, with the proper pedigrees and biodata who are nearly unanimous in saying that this is an unknown virus; and, there is no known cure at this point.

Even institutions of global reputation are not always known to be correct. Even the World Health Organization has been wrong about this pandemic. Last Jan. 14 around two months before WHO declared COVID-19 to be a global epidemic it sent out this tweet:

“Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel #coronavirus (2019-nCoV) identified in #Wuhan, China.” I read a report that the WHO  “is now haunted by a tweet it sent earlier this year.” According to the South China Morning Post, the Chinese government reportedly knew the disease was spreading before the WHO tweet was sent.

The one thing that has changed dramatically is every person’s lifestyle. Perhaps, my biggest discovery in this area is the existence of “cabin fever” which I frankly never heard of before. I decided to do a little research after it was mentioned by a psychologist on television.

Cabin fever refers  to the “distressing claustrophobic irritability or restlessness experienced when a person or group is stuck at an isolated location or in confined quarters for an extended period of time. This is not a disease and there is no prognosis. However, cabin fever can suffer from certain symptoms that imitate fevers  or sickness.”

There are suggested therapies. Among them are daily exercise, exposure to nature and the sun, and mental exercises such as reading.  Regular social interactions with family and friends are also suggested.

Economic war

Even now, policy makers are very worried about the economic crisis that will be the result of a pandemic. Stock markets all over the world are in chaos; travel is a tiny fraction of what it used to be, global trade has slowed. All over the world, global leaders are bracing for severe unemployment and societal distress. Economies will need stimulus to recover from the economic effects of the pandemic. Ishaan Tharoor writes in The Washington Post:

“In Europe and the United States, governments across the political spectrum are now plotting vast sums of state spending and loans to shore up their beleaguered societies. Lawmakers in Washington wrangled Thursday over a mammoth stimulus plan that could add up to $1 trillion. Germany’s central bank has said it could lend as much as $610 billion to companies. Britain’s Conservative government criticized for its lack of preparation as the outbreak worsened, has proposed about $400 billion in loans and $35 billion in direct state aid to individuals and firms in need.

The French government proposed Wednesday about $50 billion in spending, plus $320 billion in loan guarantees as part of a new emergency budget. That marked a reverse from its controversial initiatives to loosen up the economy, indefinitely suspending earlier planned spending cuts and pension reforms.”

Paraphrasing French Finance Minister Le Maire, the world is not just facing a health war in the form of a pandemic. We are facing an economic and financial war which will be long and might even be violent.

During the 2008 financial meltdown, governments generally adopted a politics of austerity. However, the challenges of this pandemic are demanding a different strategy which includes massive state intervention. While most governments are planning financial bailout for corporations, there are similar demands to help workers. After the 2008 financial crisis even globalization’s defenders recognized the responsibility of governments to protect citizens from the whims of the free market.

There is now a growing appeal for enlarging the role of government in the economy, Pankaj Mishra writes for the Bloomberg Opinion. He has been tracing the world’s steady disillusionment with unfettered markets and globalization. He says: “We have been stumbling from crisis to crisis toward an enhanced savior role for the state...Today the coronavirus has elevated that responsibility into a life or death imperative. And as happened in the interwar era, the state’s deep penetration into the economic and social life to counteract a disaster is likely to endure.”

In the Philippines, where are we going to find the massive amount of funds necessary to stimulate the economy? The most important question is how is the government going to assist ordinary citizens especially those working in the informal economy so that the stimulus does not result in simply widening the scandalous wealth and income inequality now existing in this country?

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