After the health crisis comes the economic crisis. Therefore, political bodies kept emphasizing not to take excessive measures. Balancing lives versus money is tough. But what if this economic crisis could function as an economic catharsis?

The lockdowns, the quarantine life, the measures to flatten the curve, they all were chosen deliberately on the thin line between saving lives and saving the economy. It is a tough choice, especially if an economic loss might eventually result in a lost life as well.

But here we are now, after weeks and months of lockdown, ready to pump up the economic curve after the Covid-curve has been flattened in some countries; while others are still fighting the virus with increasing losses.

But where do we go from here? How can we rebuild our economy, recover our jobs, get back to work and resume business-as-usual as before? How do we go back to normal? Those questions are raised, but are they the right questions? Do we have to recover our jobs, or create new jobs; get back to business-as-usual, or create a business of the future; go back to normal or reinvent whatever normal should be?

Economy Before Corona

Seldon do we question normal, until it isn’t there anymore. Seldon are we aware of the present elements, until they are missing. Seldon do we take the time to stand still and reflect about the rat race we are running, until some force pushes our lives on hold.

There, in the vacuum of time and incentives, in the absence of the normal, we find a frame for reflection.

Question marks were put not only at our health system, our education system, and our personal lives, but as well at the economic system we live in. Becoming an observer watching at the sideline of the high-speed train our society was, we were finally able to spot some stains from the outside.

The economy we had to safe from Covid-19, while saving people from it, turned out not to be as shining and glittering as we might think. Our economic system, not only based on economic growth, but on economic overgrowth, was not sustainable anyways.

It wasn’t sustainable in terms of economy and ecology.

The big financial crash in 2008 already showed the vanity of our virtual economy in which not only housing prices, but loans and other financial structures were a hollow bubble, of which the question not was if it would implode, but when. Shining and glittering from the outside, but as fragile and air-filled on the inside, as a soap bubble.

Moreover, this economic system drove a bigger wig between the extreme wealthy and the extreme poor, while forcing the middle class in an unsustainable split eventually to slide off in one or the other category, mostly the under category.

Not only was the system not economic, and social unsustainable, the greed for growth resulted in an unsustainable ecologic situation. Not only is this system depleting our resources, and destroying what is left of nature, it is filling up nature with an increasing pile of waste, in land, sea, and air.

Economy in Times of Corona

So, yes, Corona came and forced our economy on its knees. In the countries were governments could, they jumped in and provided financial incentives for employees and employers; yet, some countries didn’t have this financial wiggle room. The thin line between saving lives or saving the economy was easily crossed for them, with people preferring to die of Covid-19 instead of of starvation.

A cruel choice no human being should ever be forced to make.

Economy After Corona

As soon as the curve was flattened, and Covid cases dropped, the push to open up the economy grew. In all countries, the economy was the next one in line to take the full attention of governments. Covid has resulted in many job losses, in economic hardship and in a slowed-down economic growth.

If we want to get back on the same economic track as before, we take a lot of risks. Not only to get a new spike of Covid, but as well to return to this unsustainable business-as-usual scenario that wouldn’t serve people, planet, nor profit in the long term.

But, there is a solution. What if we use this opportunity of economic hardship to get on board of a new way of economic living and thinking, which will not only help us getting out of this post-Covid economic crisis, but as well out of these pre-Covid economic, ecologic, and social crises?

In next articles I’ll explore several aspects of our economy that could benefit from the Covid episode, turning the crisis into a catharsis, and paving the way for the economy of the future, starting from today.

 

This article is part of the series of Hope in Times of Corona. Read

1. How this too shall pass
2. how this times of self-isolation should not mean loneliness,
3. how you can contribute to this battle, 
4. how gratitude lights up the dark,  
5. how united we will stand strong
6. on the most util strategy in awake of a crisis 
7. how I got blown of my feet as well, but caught by many caring hands, 
8. how being calm can get us through the storm.
9. about Love in Times of Corona
10. how to discover your own talents 
11. why we need stories to hold on to 
12. how you can be creative and innovative.
13. how to spend your mot valuable assets in times of Corona.
14. how to listen to the sound of silence. 
15. How breath taking Corona really is.
16. discover the other freedoms Corona has shown us, 
17. about the new-born freedom Corona gave us.
18. about another way to exceed your personal bubble.
19. about the position of nature in this entire story
20. about nature bouncing back
21. about the crucial choice between resilience and resistance
22. about the game to play
23. about star gazing in dark times
24. About looking for Meaning
25. About how Music Connects
26. about what Easter and Corona have in Common
27. About the Shark and the Turtle
28. About the Irony of Distance
29. Why to Hold on
30. Fake News
31. about The Big Unknown we live at
32. about Feeling Alive
33. About turning obstacles into opportunities
34. about what the Birthday of my nephew learned me about life 
35. About where we should go from here?
36. About coping with incertitude
37. About the Great War and the Great Pandemic, and we should not forget
38. about history’s most important message, echoed by corona
39. How one country could rule them all
40. About how to prevent the next Green Pandemic 
41. about how we are experiencing a new episode of our history books
42. about when the poppy flowers
43. about what’s in a number
44. masks off, how a friend in need is a friend indeed
45. What’s Next. after we flattened the curve?
46. how will our personal story look like in a post-corona world?
47. why we should never let a good crisis go too waste.
48. How Spring can happen in Autumn
49. How to unlock the lockdown
50. Why education matters
51. How we can give meaning to the meaningless deaths. (rethink health care)
52. The remarkable marketability of health, or not?
53. the remarkable rewards of health
54. The queeste for global health care 
55. Health Heroes
56. Pains and Gains 
57. Solidarity 3.0
58. Work-Life Balance
59. Home sweet home
60. Real Connections
61. Leadership 3.0
62. gratitude 3.0
63. Respect 3.0
64. Humanity 3.0
65. Change Management

Or wait until tomorrow, when I’ll shine another light on yet another positive corner of this dark time.