How are you satisfying your urge to connect in these strange new times in which we find ourselves? What are you worried about? What will be the economic impact of the coronavirus? The social and cultural impact? These questions and more were the core of a special conversation between EconTalk host Russ Robert and Tyler Cowen in this bonus episode.
We’re all in this together, and we want to hear from you now more than ever. Please share these prompts with your friends, perhaps at your next Skype or Zoom coffee, as Russ suggests. We’d love to see your responses in the Comments. We know it can’t take the place of a face-to-face interaction, and most of all we hope you’re staying well.
1- What are you doing more of since the coronavirus struck? What sort of mental readjustments have you made to get yourself into a “quarantine state of mind?”
2- Why does Cowen think ought to have greater concern about COVID19 as a major worldwide event? To what extent has he convinced you?
3- How likely do Roberts and Cowen think a recession is in light of the virus? What sectors of the economy do they think will be hardest hit, and why? What sorts of government interventions will we likely see first, and how effective do you think they can be?
4- Roberts notes that private voluntary reaction to COVID19 has been rapid and impressive. What examples does he cite, and what examples can you add? (David Henderson recently pointed to one here, for example.) What makes Roberts more optimistic about the effectiveness of private, bottoms-up responses to COVID19? To what extent do you share his optimism?
5- What sort of responses to COVID19 does Cowen suggest as promising? With which did you agree, and why? What would you do if you were the “corona virus czar”? Would there be bail-outs? For whom? Should the state’s response be more palliative or stimulative? Explain.
6- What does Cowen mean when he says that a great deal of “organizational capital” is likely to be lost as s result of COVID19, and why does he believe that no fiscal stimulus can solve this problem?
7- Both Roberts and Cowen believe we can expect to see some shifting in our social norms. What larger cultural changes should we expect? Which are net positive? Net negative?
READER COMMENTS
miller
Mar 22 2020 at 5:27am
Most people that I’ve come into contact with seem determined to carry on in whatever way they can. Sure, life is getting a little more complicated in some ways, but I haven’t seen truly horrendous effects yet. I just hope that we can hit the reset button a little and change our culture. Most people in modern society are on autopilot most of the time. It seems like capitalism adapts pretty quickly to a change in circumstances, so that’s a plus. I’ve never really considered capitalism to be ‘the problem’, per se. But I’ve definitely been more and more concerned over the years at the way in which it gives people a one-tracked mind, which is getting rich and working for no apparent reason, just to ‘be productive’ or something.
To answer some of the questions:
I wash my hands more
COVID is a pretty big deal, obviously. No one disputes that. I just hope the outcomes are more positive than negative, but I’ve ALWAYS considered our modern society to be a ticking time bomb. Works well when it works well, but always seemed to be destined for catastrophic failure at some point, because of the outrageous amounts of needless complexity
Everyone is hyper aware of a recession, and most people probably are glued enough to their phones to understand that it’s having an effect in the service sector, as is obvious when going out and running errands. I really don’t know enough about how effective a stimulus will be, but at least it wouldn’t be permanent. Could be a chance to restore faith in our institutions to a degree, provided the stimulus isn’t a naked giveaway to any one group.
Businesses have seemed to be highly adaptable, excluding the government response. Most of them are finding ways to carry on and run their businesses. Online conferences have started happening more for me and food establishments are still running, but in more limited ways.
There are those who suggest that we should just let people draw on their checking accounts and savings accounts and run up their credit cards instead of a stimulus package. I think the ability of people to do that was already hitting a breaking point, so I don’t think it will work very well, not to mention I think it will have seriously negative effects in terms of populist backlash, as you could probably imagine.
Loss of organizational capital? Only if you evict people en masse and they lose their proximity to their previous places of employment. I don’t know how this will turn out. It remains to be seen, but I think that Tyler is a little alarmist here.
I already stated this above. Capitalism needed a timeout anyway. We have been bombarded for years on end with messages about how certain industries are so wonderful and how they mean everything in the world and how we should just worship everything they do, including sports and entertainment. A lot of people want to change our way of life in this country, as has been stated by the illustrious Chris Hedges in a recent Youtube video. Provided things don’t get completely out of control, it could be a golden opportunity to do things differently.
Robert
Mar 22 2020 at 7:51pm
We are at the onset of a media-induced economic recession.
Can we keep this in perspective and ask if the cost is worth the benefit?
34,157 US citizens died from flu in the 2018-2019 season per the CDC. 61,000 US citizens died from flu in the 2017-2018 season. 61,000 US citizens died and we shrugged it off as a bad flu season, and normal life went on.
The CDC estimates there were 60.8 million cases of swine flu in the US between April 12, 2009, and April 10, 2010. The Swine Flu killed nearly 12,469 people in the US and between 151,700 and 575,400 people globally.
But where was the panic? Could it be we had a different President then, and creating a recession was not in the media’s best interest?
Do you think it might have been relevant to report the ages and otherwise general health conditions of the victims of the Coronavirus? Especially since the deaths were very much skewed toward an older population?
Over 80% of coronavirus cases are mild to moderate — which ranges from having a fever and a cough to low-grade pneumonia. It might still be miserable, but you can heal up on your couch at home.
I know we live in a hype-culture, but there is no need to be wiping out people’s life savings in the stock market over fear mongering in the media.
Craig Jones
Mar 24 2020 at 2:53pm
Where are the far right voices defending the free market?
Where are the critics of helicopter money?
Aren’t we setting ourselves up for galloping inflation … any moment now?
Why isn’t the market falling over itself to resolve this pandemic??
Just asking …
Fred
Apr 19 2020 at 9:07pm
On January 5, 2015, you Russ had Greg Page, former CEO of Cargill, on the podcast. The idea of food security and comparative advantage was raised but not delved into. Perhaps the time has come to take another look at that topic.
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