Michael Barone, Washington Examiner: Will post-coronavirus America see a post-war boom, or will people just hunker down?
On my daily walk down a side street, I saw a restaurant with a diagonal cross made of adhesive tape on its sign. Gone was the notice that it would open for takeout; now it looked to be closed for good.
Although I’m aware that most restaurants go out of business within a few years or even months, I felt a certain sadness. The owners and staff lost their jobs and perhaps their dreams, through no fault of their own and for reasons they couldn’t have anticipated just a few weeks ago.
I’m guessing that they’d like to go back to that time now, as most of us would. I have been thinking about this amid news reports that social isolation and other measures have made sufficient progress against the virus.
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WNU Editor: Certain industries are definitely going to be experiencing hard times for a few years. The airline industry. Tourism. Sport franchises. Anything that will involve large gatherings of people. The hospitality/restaurant industry is facing a massive shake-up. Commercial real-estate is kaput. And then there is the politics and the policies that certain governments are going to pursue. I live in Canada, and I am confident that the policies that will be pushed by the government will benefit some industries, while harming other parts of the economy. The Canadian government's antipathy to the oil industry comes to mind. The same can be said about the U.S.. I am confident that President Trump will continue to pursue the same economic policies that helped the economy boom for the past three years. Will a President Biden pursue the same policies. Definitely not. Bottom line. We are in uncharted waters right now, and it is going to take more than a year to have a better understanding on where all of this is going.
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