1/24/2021 A return to normality?

No thanks, let’s build a better future | by Enrique Dans | Enrique Dans | Medium

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A return to normality? No thanks, let’s build

a better future
Enrique Dans
Apr 9, 2020 · 4 min read

As some governments begin to talk of a phased lifting of the lockdown and a

return to normality, perhaps we should be asking ourselves just what normal
should look like.

If one thing is clear, it is that this return to normal will be anything but the
normal we knew before. In the absence of a truly safe, effective and proven
vaccine or treatment for the disease, we must balance two variables: on the one
hand, the need to continue to control the spread of the pandemic and to

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the antibodies to deal with the disease. On the other hand, there is the desire
and the need to resume productive activity, to get our economy back on track.
Even as we try to pick up the pieces, an economic crisis the like of which we
haven’t seen in a century is about to hit us.

Trying to speed up the return to economic activity could be a big mistake that
will only trigger further expansion of the disease. In a country like Spain, deeply
dependent on tourism, the post-coronavirus scenario is even more frightening.
In this new phase, having begun to stop the spread the virus it is tempting to
think about an early return to normality, but we must be careful about simply
isolating some segments of the population and therefore concealing the true
extent of the disease.

So what kind of normality do we want to return to? When an emergency reveals

the vulnerabilities of our society, trying to ignore them and go back to where we
were before is a recipe for the next disaster.

The first fundamental question is therefore whether we, as a society, are capable
of thinking about rebuilding our economy and our productive activity on a
different basis. This is a respiratory disease that according to a recent Harvard
study poses a greater threat to people exposed to high levels of pollution, so
therefore, as we come out of lockdown to find a much cleaner world, we should
have the maturity to take measures to prevent, a return to the previous
normality.

Speeding up the transition to clean energy, reducing harmful emissions or

bringing forward the phase-out of internal combustion vehicles would be the
way to show that we have learned something from this crisis, and that we can
prepare for another, much bigger, closely related crisis which, in fact, generates
many more deaths every year: the climate emergency. A Green New Deal-style
model of economic recovery as advocated by the Democratic Party is essential,
all the more so because we know that clean energy is already cheaper than fossil
fuels and that this transition can therefore not only create jobs but also be done
in a way that makes economic sense. If we can paralyze our entire economy

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constructive way in order to solve our most existential crisis, the climate
emergency?

But reconstruction is not only about energy or emissions: we should also

consider how to incorporate into companies all that we have learned in recent
weeks with regard to working from home. Sure, we have done so as a result of
an emergency, but we have shown that teleworking is perfectly feasible, and
that it could alleviate many of our cities’ traffic and pollution problems.

We also need to think about the kind of systems we will need, in the event of
another crisis, to ensure the economic subsistence of all, not only of those of us
who are lucky enough to work in companies that have maintained their activity
and, consequently, our salary: instead of conditional subsidies, we will have to
consider systems of unconditional basic income, with that third word, in-con-di-
tion-al, as a guarantee that no one will instrumentalize the arbitrary granting of
subsidies for other purposes. Taking what we invest in conditional subsidies and
distributing it among a population that will, to a large extent, will simply pay it
back at the end of the year in the form of taxes is something that, in the light of
emergencies such as the one we are experiencing, makes much more sense.

Soon, the coronavirus crisis will be in the rearview mirror. But the really
important question, really, is whether we will be able to take advantage of it to
learn something, to solve our most important problems as a society. Back to
normal? No, thank you. We’d better start asking ourselves how we can improve
that normality and build a better future.

(La columna en español, aquí. La meta-columna en mi página, aquí)

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Basic Income Coronavirus Climate Change Challenge Sustainability

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