Government cannot cure coronavirus. They can however damage global supply chains and limit travel and commerce as people trie to mitigate infection.

“Stimulus spending cannot and will not repair disrupted or ruined supply chains or closed restaurants or put production lines back in operation a minute sooner than demand for goods and services dictates.

“Public health has long been a playing field for fear and calculation, giving intrusive government even more laws that sit on the books, waiting to be invoked by the next microorganism to catch the public’s attention. Those laws include a nearly unlimited power to quarantine people suspected of exposure to infectious diseases.

Coronavirus will leave behind a residue of laws, spending, and precedents for future government actions. That’s because of what Higgs calls the “ratchet effect,” by which the aftermath of each crisis sees government shrink a little, but never back to its pre-crisis status. “Thus, crisis typically has produced not just a temporarily bigger government but also permanently bigger government.

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