The very real economic pain being felt has produced great pressure on government at all levels to loosen the restrictions taken to forestall virus spread. However, as also already noted, government restrictions are not the only factor generating business closures. The virus itself caused plant closures and major disruptions in the meat-processing supply line. Even without action by government, the very same industry sectors would almost certainly be experiencing comparable or even more severe disruptions as both customers and employees fell prey to the disease or altered their personal behavior to avoid it. Perhaps most importantly, the number of cases, hospitalizations and deaths from COVID-19 would be exponentially higher without restrictions in place. This is not merely an abstract conclusion from some academic model. It can be seen with the naked eye in the experience of locations that were unable or unwilling to enact restrictions before the virus had already taken hold. In forecasting the effects of the pandemic and of efforts to mitigate it going forward, it is important to differentiate between the short-term crisis period when the virus is still spreading actively, necessitating more significant control efforts, and the long-term recovery period when the acute phase of the crisis has passed and the economy is recovering from the disruptions while trying to adjust to a new equilibrium in the face of structural changes that are likely to be permanent. During the short-term, acute phase, government actions, the course of the pandemic and public reactions to both will be the dominant factors affecting economic performance. In the long-term recovery period, more typical economic patterns will eventually control and more typical government actions and consumer behavior patterns will once again resume. However, the resumption of more normal patterns will continue to be influenced by the after effects of the crisis measures and by the permanent changes in government policy, business operations and consumption behavior that will be the pandemic’s legacy. The short-term, acute phase is assumed to continue until the Spring and Summer of 2021, as previously discussed. During that time, economic indicators will be directly affected by the ebbs and flows of the virus itself and by changes in the mitigation measures, looser or stricter as, where and when needed. After that time, the economy will enter a long-term recovery phase driven primarily by normal economic principals and patterns. In considering the length and character of that phase, examination of past patterns is informative but not a guarantee. No past pattern, not the Spanish Flu, not the Great Depression nor the Great Recession, nor any other previous economic or public health fluctuation can provide a clear model for the current crisis. There has never been the precise combination of pandemic severity, governmental policy, financial interconnection and personal mobility present in this economic and health disaster. In that sense the coronavirus is novel in more ways than one. However, evaluation of past crises to determine lessons that can be learned from whatever limited areas of commonality can be found is a necessary and appropriate starting point.
∴ PROGNOSIS
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