On #coronavirus 1/ We have to listen to, and obey govt advice - but the price for doing that is to be able to scrutinise and question how the health/epidemiology is being processed by politicians...
2/ There is an apparent mismatch between the objectives of flattening the curve and doing almost nothing to shut down public events/schools - which makes more sense if you think it's a multi-year virus and need herd immunity... that was well explained by Vallance today...
3/ The legitimate space for debate is - given they believe </= 80% of us will get it - are the economic mitigation plans big enough and socially just. On statutory sick pay the answer is clearly no..
4/ So we need an amendment to the Finance Bill to extend SSP to all people of working age, including self-employed, zero hours and informal economy workers... it will cost a lot of money; if so that's the price of accepting an 80% infection rate...
5/ Where I really have little confidence is when it comes to the macro-economic management: here the "experts" are the Treasury neoliberals who think the state shouldn't intervene in the economy, and who thought austerity would make GDP grow...we have no duty to listen to them...
6/ If it gets bad, here's a minimum of economic contingency measures we'll need: state bailout/part-nationalisation of BA, Virgin, Easyjet; ditto various company pension funds; ditto parts of the auto industry...
7/ The UK is in a good place because it has an intelligent central bank leadership and is a monetary sovereign: there is a lot more room for QE, but we would have to accept partial/temporary "Japanisation" - and the QE would have to be more targeted...
8/ But ultimately neither fiscal nor monetary stimulus can override a combined physical slowdown and the secondary financial effects: you need state ownership, state direction, state bailouts - and you would need to borrow even to fund day-to-day spending...
9/ So there are two more legitimate attack lines on the government: austerity has eroded the resilience of the NHS and arguably destroyed it in both local govt and policing... we will pay now for a decade of austerity and mismanagment by the Conservatives (and Libdems)...
10/ And because austerity actually boosted government debt, and we never unwound QE, the room for fiscal and monetary intervention is now limited... Meanwhile...
11/ In an economy that is highly globalised by choice, we are exposed to two big risks: the USA's catastrophically politicised handling of the epidemic; and the Eurozone's stupid rules, which prevent fiscal stimulus - so even if we get it right, we're exposed to both of these...
12/ The emergence of nationalist neoliberalism - what I've called "Thatcherism in One Country" - will accelerate; cross border trade and travel may not revive as neoclassical economics assumes - just as finance pooled into national/regional areas after 2008...
13/ While the left doesn't need to give a running commentary on the epidemiology, we do need to say: (i) knowing how to use the state to organise, finance and direct a crisis response is an important skill - and many economists/civil servants oppose it on principle...
14/ (ii) in fiscal/monetary and industrial policy: timeliness and decisiveness matter - and if you're constantly worrying about whether this will dismantle your free market gravy train (it will) you won't act decisively....
15/ We just had a right-Keynesian budget with stimulus without redistribution ... the Tory crisis response will be the same: rich first, middle class next, some favoured constituencies next... and at the bottom of the heap migrants, homeless, refugees, people with disrupted lives
16/16 Finally a 7m strong TU movement and 580k Labour Party must be mobilised as a civil society organisation to mitigate the effects of this crisis - and treated as a partner by government, not the enemy within.
