https://www.brookings.edu/events/bpea-fall-2020-covid-19-and-the-economy/
If it’s been a bit since you first read this, maybe re-read:
(1) This is a tremendous amount of information. Much of it is history you may not be familiar with. You are not expected to spend a long time with each reading – you should look at every reading (video, etc.) and spend real quality time with only a few.
One good approach might be to think of one “big narrative” that you found especially interesting or important or challenging – one big idea that you had not heard of before, or that you thought of in a new way, or that you have changed your mind about, etc. Reflect and write about this.
And then also reflect and write about one smaller point – one detail, one piece of the story, one smaller item that has real meaning or importance larger than what we might think at first.
This should be done by Thursday night (Friday, this week) – the two essays should total approximately 400-500 words (that is, you will post short essays of 200 words and 200 words – not 400 and 400)
(2) Reply to two or more of you classmates. Engage them in their argument – how you agreed or disagreed; how they enlightened you by taking a perspective you had not considered; how they brought together ideas that you hadn’t thought of bringing together; how they used the same approach as you but came to different conclusions, or took a different approach than you did but came to similar conclusions; or any other reflections you have.
Your replies should be posted by Sunday night. You probably want to address at least two or three of your classmates. Your replies (two or three or whatever) should combine to total approximately 300-400 words – so, 100+100+125, say – not 300+300+400).
By now, you should be familiar with our process here. Maybe take a few extra moments to really offer thoughtful mini-essays this week. Remember, no readings and no mini-essays next week
The assignment is a reflection assignment for the article. Please just write a 250 word reflection and with the remaining 300 words, please answer the following comment made by my classmates:
Chris:
1. One thing that I found interesting about the response to COVID-19 was how unequal the governments response to the crisis was, and how the pandemic itself served to highlight and exacerbate existing crisis in American society. In a way I think that COVID allowed for Americans to see which of their public systems were failing in a much more significant way. The pandemic also allotted us to see the cross cutting impacts of wealth inequality and political disenfranchisement that have been occurring and growing in the United States for decades. In particular, communities of color who were hit harder by the pandemic highlighted the very real impact that lack of affordable healthcare and high rates of obesity have had on these communities, which are issues exacerbated by a significant racial wealth gap. With these issues laid bare there still has been little substantive effort to address the problems or change the racialized systems of power that exist within the United States. The relief programs pushed by the federal government have widely failed to address these racial gaps in their effective coverage, and actually in certain circumstances have exacerbated problems. This is addressed during the Brookings discussion of the effects of COVID, which ultimately left me with a pretty pessimistic prediction for the future of the US federal government’s ability to address crises going forward, particularly when it comes to reckoning with the racial gaps in a significant portion of their policy.
2. Another element I found interesting about the pandemic was the political polarization that occurred, and as referenced in “one virus, two Americas”, the impact this had on the governments ability to respond to the pandemic adequately. I found this issue in particular fascinating, as it poses important questions on the nature of social responsibility and the social contract we all enter into as citizens in a democracy. The political polarization also worked to shape huge political shifts over the course of the pandemic, it can be argued that without the polarization from COVID, there may not have been a January 6th or at least violent insurrection to a different extent. I think the real interesting question is how a democracy grapples with the issue of individual freedoms in a time when voluntarily limiting those freedoms would be in everyone’s best interest. Ultimately at the beginning of the pandemic, if there had been adequate mask wearing and real social distancing hundreds of thousands of death may have been avoided. Of course, the restrictions which many decried as a violation of individuals freedoms were only allowed to stay in place for so long. I think it would be incredibly interesting to see a world (or maybe even a mathematical model of such a world) where compliance with relevant COVID related restrictions had been 100%, I suspect it would be really sobering how many lives we would not have lost collectively.
Syeda:
Hello everyone!
1. My overall thoughts from this weeks readings/videos are that it seems Western countries think they can solve everything, until they realize democracy/capitalism is not always the answer, and they recede. For example, the readings and video featuring Bill Clinton about Mexico show how the intentions were to have mutual relationship with unstable countries to make them stable and democratic, but instead sent them into a crisis that also is part of the reason for the boom in the narcotics industry. Furthermore, the COVID readings, (especially “The Pandemic of Unknowns”), show how the Western countries with money were able to buy up all the vaccines and resources needed because of their ability to broker deal, giving them priority access to treatments since they provide funding for research and manufacturing. One of the articles also noted how 40% of the world’s population have yet to receive their first dose, meanwhile we have so many open appointment slots now.
2. I enjoyed Ashish Jah’s “One Virus, Two Americas,” not only because of the content itself, but because it felt like such a throwback reading all the facts and figures they presented. The way we quarantined then and were very cautious is no longer a thing – people are slowly losing masks and forgetting to pack hand sanitizer.
In the article, they talked about states that were more scientifically accepting (Rhode Island, DC, MA, and other generally blue and Northern states), were able to better limit the spread of the disease because of the their ability to create more testing sites, have more access to test kits themselves, and also partnered with organizations to provide grants to citizens who needed to quarantine. I immediately thought that perhaps this could have also been part of reason why other states were not providing all these resources and ignoring health and safety protocols. I’ve been looking up lists of states with the healthiest economies and it makes me conflicted on what to think of this all. The lists are jumbled (I linked them below), as in there are COVID-safe states near the bottom of the list, like Rhode Island around 30-35, and then states like Utah or South Dakota ranked above (one list ranked Utah at no. 1). My thoughts initially were that maybe since it was a funding issue as the federal government did not provide enough resources so the unsafe-COVID states were unable to provide these resources, but looking at these lists, it seems definitely more of politicians of a state trying to maintain their economy by keeping it open regardless of the hit on human health.
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/economy (Links to an external site.)
https://wallethub.com/edu/states-with-the-best-economies/21697 (Links to an external site.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_GDP (Links to an external site.)
Lauren:
1. Going into our readings this week, I found the lengths we would cover in the different crises fascinating. For this first part of the response, I want to talk about the reading “One virus two Americas”. This reading was fascinating to me and it was interesting seeing the pandemic and the vastly different responses of states and the federal government put into words. The experience of living through the pandemic and witnessing firsthand how there was no plan from the federal government was terrifying and very telling of the administration we had in power at the time. I am personally from Texas and I was there at the start of the pandemic. Our state response was also very bad and our governor did not listen to the science which led to our cases rising. Many of my family members got COVID because of the horrible way COVID was handled at the national level and the state level. It was interesting to read about our country’s response because in other countries you did not see things like this happen where different parts of the country had different protocols. As far as I am aware other countries in the world handled it at the national level and had a cohesive strategy to fight the pandemic. Our response is seen as a failure and I think that is justified. I think a big part of that is because of the decision to leave everything up to the states.
2. Something that interested me while reading about the Mexico crisis and the 2008 PowerPoint was the idea of “contagion”. I had no idea about the concept of “contagion” and how it was possible for economic stress in other countries to have an effect on us over here in America. Learning more about this made me realize the reasonings for a lot of questionable decisions on our country’s part for getting involved in other countries’ economic issues. There are still a lot of times when I don’t agree with us getting involved in the business of other countries but reading that made me learn more about how it works on an economic scale. Particularly with the Mexico crisis, I would not have expected the peso dropping in value to have catastrophic effects on U.S soil but after reading more about the crisis and the American intervention I learned that it was actually quite a big deal.
A example for a response can be this:
Hi Christopher, I agree with your viewpoint that democracies do seem to have an issue voluntarily limiting movements when compared to countries like China with heavy-handed tactics. However, I may have a different view on the prevention of excess deaths. Many of those in the early phases of the pandemic stem from inadequate protection in long-term care homes, which itself has been suffering for years due to rounds of government budget cuts prior to the pandemic. A large number of these homes have been bought by for-profit corporations owned by consortiums and staff have been grossly underpaid for years. While mask-wearing and social distancing are important, it only reduces the transmission of the virus to an extent. The real issue is using privatization as a way to reduce spending.
