It is a horrifying absence of political imagination to prefer letting millions die to, say, trying an appropriately sized basic income and mobilizing the economy to surge health resources for 3-6 damn months.
— Ezra Klein (@ezraklein) March 24, 2020
Our choices are not mass economic deprivation or mass death.
I can't believe we have to clarify this but a scenario where the hospital system collapses and a million Americans die is also a scenario where the economy is very, very bad
— Leah Greenberg (@Leahgreenb) March 24, 2020
The choice is between:
— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) March 24, 2020
- a very hurtful major recession caused by social distancing, managed by stimulus
or
- a economic collapse caused by the breakdown of our health system due to millions of deaths, tens of millions of hospitalizations, that cannot be managed by stimulus
Take care of the sick, and for others who will be damaged economically in the coming months, and make it easier to allow them to pay their bills. The overindebted corporations and Wall Street hedge funders can wait till later to find out if they get help in surviving.
America can still be great, and we can still get through this mess. But we need to choose better, and we need to choose better decision-makers.
Lmao.
ReplyDeleteAmerica has never been great.
A shithole through and through.
I think we did OK from about 1933-1965. Ended the Depression, won World War II, regulated the economy to end the extremes of "boom and bust" and had a great postwar expansion, cut poverty, established Social Security and Medicare. We even started the wheels in motion to put a man on the moon.
DeleteThe 50 years after that? Not so good. And the choices haven't been so good. And the leaders haven't been so good.