The President needs to ensure that emergency action will no longer be prolonged, fully act after invoking the Defense Production Act, and actually command the private sector to produce all the necessary medical equipment, medicines, and supplies necessary to care for the virus victims and keep healthcare personnel safe. On April 2, an order, which came in the form of a presidential memorandum, directed six companies to produce ventilators: General Electric Co., Hill-Rom Holdings Inc., Medtronic Public Limited Co., ResMed Inc., Royal Philips N.V. and Vyaire Medical Inc. Other companies need to be encouraged or commanded to support the war against COVID-19.
An essential action is for the President to issue nationwide stay at home and physical distancing orders, and the wearing of protective antimicrobial facial coverings or masks to stem the spread of COVID-19, and prioritize free testing availability to every person so that the number of those infected does not overwhelm our nation's hospitals and medical staffs.
System Reform
Second, as we conquer this pandemic and push forward, we will need to put into place a reformed monetary and tax system designed to facilitate building a future economy and society that provides equal opportunity for EVERY citizen to participate as owners of productive capital assets. Together we can achieve universal general affluence, based on our core values of fairness, respect, kindness, equal opportunity, courage, persistence, resilience, accountability and justice -- values that can unite us.
The bottom line is that American prosperity must be inclusive, with equal opportunity for EVERY citizen to gain ownership stakes in the corporations growing the economy and to share profits and productivity gains across the economic spectrum. We must include non-managerial and managerial workers, current shareholders, workers not employed in corporations and non-employed citizens -- of every age.
We must now reform the system and prevent those at the top of the income and wealth scale from exclusively benefiting from economic growth at the expense of the vast majority, and see to it that EVERY citizen, including all workers, enjoy the fruits of economic growth as we, following our triumphal containment of the virus, build an economy that can support general affluence for EVERY child, women and man.
One thing is certain, we have the opportunity to affect necessary system reform before the disruption has a permanent negative effect, and to embrace the development of tectonic shifts in the technologies of production to grow our economy responsibly and sustainably, and protect and enhance our environment so that EVERY child, woman and man can enjoy a healthy and prosperous future.
Aggressive Action
There are calls for aggressive action by the federal government to legislate stimulus packages and print new money funded by what would be the most expansive borrowing our country has seen since World War II. Effectively, the federal government will print trillions of dollars to provide disaster relief.
Emergency income supports required in the immediate NOW should not become part of the permanent system and should be recognized as redistributive expedients to be ended as soon as possible after the COVID-19 crisis is abated. Not government but non-monopolistic market forces in which EVERY citizen should participate as an owner should determine the amount of money in the system.
The directive is to bolster economic production in a climate in which businesses are unable to open or function fully and people are unable to work, the result of a mandate from the government that has restricted or halted significant economic activity. Unfortunately, under such conditions there necessarily would not be new growth of our productive manufacturing capability.
The hope is that the disease will be controlled and contained, and no further surges will arise while treatments and a vaccine for COVID-19 is developed, tested and disseminated. Then, along with rapid testing and selective quarantine, restrictions can be lifted and economic activity will resume. Still, we should expect the American consumer to be cautious in engaging outside the home, and restoring consumption norms will be gradual and measured.
Further, the impact of any prolonged downturn of the economy could result in permanent small business closures on a large scale and even entire industries -- any business that cannot survive long without customers, and whose cash on hand and revenues are small to begin with.
Economic stimuli in the moment must focus on emergency government spending and worker income restoration to stimulate investment and consumption. Once the pandemic ends, however, we must immediately shift to long-term systemic reform. The priority must be to create capital ownership estates for EVERY citizen. In the interim, planning for systemic reform and execution is essential and mandatory.
While policy makers and aware citizens know that unlocking the economy will be a difficult and painful process, no one knows exactly what the post-COVID-19 economy will look like.
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