Re: <nettime> Should use mobile phone data to monitor public health

[Felix Stalder <felix@openflows.com>]

On 20.03.20 10:32, Andreas Broeckmann wrote:

> But: if a major economic problem at the moment is that people have
> to pay their rent, or service the credits and mortgages they took
> out, why does the State, under these severe circumstances, currently
> make such an effort to help people pay tribute to capital, rather
> than suspend these obligations?

I think most of the current interventions are aimed at stabilizing
the system and preventing a cascade of breakdowns, but this requires
a cascade of interventions. So, the first intervention is to "flatten
the curve" by reducing social interaction.

The means to do so is to close venues, non-essential shops, introduce
restrictions on mobility etc. However, this starts a cascade of
economic breakdowns, with people losing jobs and other forms of
income. Pretty soon, businesses will go bankrupt because revenue dries
out. This will set in motion another set of breakdowns, as people and
companies are no longer capable of paying their rent, their utility
bills, their credit rates etc. This time, what breaks down is basic
infrastructure (imagine the utility company goes bankrupt), and
financial system (because of escalating bad debt).

So, the goal seems to be put the stop of this at the earliest possible
moment. Flatten the curve seems to be essential, that's the consensus
(even the US and the UK are doing this now), so the immediate knock-on
effects on businesses and incomes are unavoidable. The current
policies -- from extended forms of "Kurzarbeit" (does that exist
outside the German-speaking world?) to simplified unemployment
claims, direct payments to self-employed and gig-economy workers, to
"helicopter money" handed out everyone -- all seem to be designed to
protect these deeper infrastructural levels of the economy.

Of course, at these deeper levels, capital is concentrated heavily,
so there is class dimension to it, but I presume there is also a
recognition that the deeper you go, the more expensive it gets and the
more extensive the effects of a breakdown would be.

So, in my view, there is very little we can do about immediate crisis
policies -- anyway, they change extremely fast and largely without
public input -- but to prepare for the battle into what shape we want
together put the broken pieces once we reach this stage.

And there, in terms of economic and fiscal policy, the interest of
capital will be austerity, and the interest of the 99% will be new taxes
on the super rich and the financial markets.

All the best. Felix


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