I had a very enlightening conversation a couple of
weeks ago with a friend of mine, someone who is significantly to my left
politically. We were talking about the same topics everyone is talking about these
days: the coronavirus pandemic, our government’s response to it, and the ever-present
specter of a reopening economy. But what made the conversation so enlightening
was not that either of us learned anything new about public health or macroeconomics,
or even that the two of us agreed that having to choose between the two was a
false dichotomy. What was enlightening was that we, as two politically distinct
individuals, could agree on anything at all when discussing these things.
As I struggle to take in the news each day (as I’m
sure all of you do too), what worries me most is not the fact that the
coronavirus has already killed more Americans than the flu did all of last year
or that we still don’t fully understand how the virus operates on the human
body. Rather, I am most frightened by the fact that America’s toxic political
culture—in which we as a people are divided sharply along partisan lines, with
each camp existing in a contained, parallel universe that operates with a
different baseline of truth and reality than the other camp’s—has extended its
cancer-like spread beyond purely political matters and now dictates how the
American public is processing a literal global pandemic. This is, for painful
lack of a better word, dangerously unhealthy.
We are not going to be able to recover easily—or perhaps
ever—if we as a nation cannot agree on whether the virus is real, if it
is dangerous, if the experts have our best interests at heart, and if we should
want to minimize the loss of life from this worldwide threat. As a person who
leans strongly libertarian in my politics, I sympathize with the reaction of
many on the political right to the strict and pervasive lockdown orders issued by
governors all over the country. It all happened so swiftly and with such rhetorical
force, accompanied by constantly shifting projections, goals, and deadlines,
with very little in the way of satisfying explanations. Such abrupt and heavy-handed
state action is galling and offends basic conservative notions of autonomy, deliberation,
and the consent of the governed. But none of that automatically means it was
wrong, or that it is in our best interest to ignore it. Just because you have a
philosophical objection to your governor using emergency powers to keep you out
of restaurants and hair salons doesn’t mean you are doing what’s best for you,
your children, and your neighbors by disobeying it. In fact, it might mean that
there is an actual emergency—one so novel and unexpected that even people who
are in the best position to understand it didn’t immediately know how to properly
respond to it. And if that’s the case, then we as laypeople certainly
don’t know what’s best.
And therein lies the dangerous assumption underlying
so much of the anti-lockdown rhetoric. Those who want to rush to reopen America’s
economy seem to think that medical experts (especially those working for the
government) don’t really know what’s best for us or, if they do, that they don’t
have the best interests of ordinary citizens at heart. Again, I am not devoid
of sympathy with this view. Our “expert class” has betrayed us time and time
again: they told us there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq; they told
us that the housing market was healthy in 2007; they told us Donald Trump could
never be president. But when they’re telling you that by leaving your homes and
assembling in crowded places you are increasing the spread of a deadly disease,
do you want to take that risk and assume they’re wrong? Do you really want to
believe that medical doctors have suddenly abandoned their oaths to do no harm?
Are you truly willing to believe that our government has elected to ravage our nation’s
economy to serve some elaborate hoax? Are you blind enough to dismiss as coincidence
the fact that the only people downplaying the effects of the virus are those
with a political incentive to do so?
But I’m not writing this post just to wag my finger at
the discontents who want haircuts. I also take umbrage at my more liberal
friends who dismiss concerns over the economic effects of the pandemic as a “conservative”
talking point. This couldn’t be farther from the truth and only exacerbates our
country’s destructive political divide. Gun-toting protesting man-children
aside, voicing concern about the economy doesn’t mean you’re a domestic
terrorist and certainly doesn’t mean you want to sacrifice grandma to the stock
market. Indeed, as so many of my liberal friends were fond of pointing out before
this crisis came around (but are notably silent on now), the economy is more
than the stock market. (Indeed, we don't even need to send people back to work for stocks to rise.)The economy is your friend who drives for Uber to pay
rent and your neighbor who works at a nail salon and your cousin who prefers to
buy her gluten-free flour at Kroger instead of Whole Foods. Our economy is
fueled by everyday Americans who work hard and spend their money at ballparks, movie
theaters, and restaurants.
And these well-meaning government lockdowns have the
mortifying potential to make all of those things disappear forever. Every day,
I am filled with existential dread over the plight of the world-class
restaurant scene in my adopted hometown. It is not an exaggeration for me to
say that I very well may have already eaten at each of my favorite restaurants
in Richmond for the last time. Businesses that rely on mass gatherings of
people to generate paper-thin profit margins—live theatre and restaurants
especially—simply cannot survive even a few more weeks of our current status
quo. The Nordstrom where I used to work has already closed permanently. J. Crew
filed for bankruptcy last week. All of these closures (and I assure you, there
are a staggering amount yet to come) will mean lost jobs, lost tax revenue, and
ruined livelihoods. Twenty million Americans lost their jobs in April. The
jobless rate is approaching Great Depression levels. And we’re still in the
early stages. The long-term effects will be catastrophic, and no sector of our economy
will be spared. Smaller and less prestigious colleges and universities will
close, movie viewing will become an exclusively home-based activity, and
millions of jobs will simply never come back.
The worst part is that I don’t think enough people who
are making policy decisions (and those who are so quick to condemn concerns
about our economy) understand just how bad this will get if our current state
of affairs continues for much longer. There will come a time when we must ask
ourselves the coldly utilitarian question of which option will cause fewer deaths:
keeping everyone in quarantine or opening things back up. This isn’t as simple
as the train-track problem from your freshman ethics class; there are millions
of people on both sides of the fork. And regardless of the answer, our
government has a responsibility to spend whatever amount of money is necessary
to minimize the number of shuttered businesses and lost jobs. Because no lockdown
is worth it if there isn’t an economy to reopen once it’s over.
And so we find ourselves in a uniquely dangerous moment,
facing disease, death, and worldwide economic depression at a time when we have
no faith in the institutions that must help us through this crisis and no faith
in our fellow Americans who must get through it with us. If we can’t find some
way to step back, take a hard look around us, and realize that we really are in
the same boat, that we really are at our best when we care about one another,
and that we have to pull together and act as one nation to survive this, then
we’re doomed. For some time now, the American people have been teetering on the
edge of a cliff, inching ever closer to the status of a failed body politic. Turns
out it might just be an invisible virus that gives us that last nudge into
oblivion.
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