Eleven reasons this crisis will not push people into the arms of socialism

Will coronavirus make Britain more socialist? It is a perfectly legitimate argument: it will be difficult to step back from the vast increase in the size and power of the state this crisis has apparently necessitated, and there is precedent (the aftermath of the Second World War) for emergency measures to remain longer than they are required. But there are also reasons to think the opposite will happen. Here are 11.

First, there will be no money. We have near-bankrupted the country in order to stave off economic collapse. Once this crisis is over, will there really be an appetite for yet more debt-fuelled spending the nation cannot afford? I suspect the public are more sensible than they are given credit for. Second, we have accrued so much debt precisely because we want there to be businesses left once the pandemic is over. Paradoxically, the state has grown so as to ensure it can step back when the emergency has passed.

Third, for younger generations in particular, this will be the first time they have been encouraged to make risk-based decisions about their own lives: many are scared of the virus; others will feel empowered by the responsibility it places on their shoulders to act sensibly.

Fourth, the lockdown has brought into focus how arbitrary and ridiculous some rules and regulations

It has shown just how much more effective the private sector is at responding to emergency situations than the state

really are, as well as the state’s enforcement of them.

Fifth, this crisis has shown how much more effective the private sector is at responding to emergency situations than the state. Sixth, although we are rightly praising NHS workers for their heroic efforts, and there appears to be zero chance of reform of the system that has let them down so badly, we have also seen how much better other (non-socialist) healthcare systems, like Germany’s, have performed. And seventh, while the teaching unions appear to be in the ascendant, once schools reopen, their hubris will be their undoing: their interests are not aligned with those of parents and children.

Eighth, while the furlough schemes are free money, and plenty will be enjoying the enforced break, it is also the first experience many will have of the purposelessness of life without work. Friends recount their anxiety at their lack of control over their own future. Ninth, we are also beginning to see evidence of fraudulent and unfair misuse of furlough: it has the public’s support as an emergency measure, but the Leftist dream that it could be the basis of a universal basic income looks vanishingly unlikely.

Tenth, people’s ambitions haven’t changed. For all the talk of the lockdown tilting individuals away from consumerism and the pursuit of wealth, the evidence for this is paperthin. Just as likely we will see an explosion of pent-up demand for the things we have been denied.

In any case, 11th, we will be poorer: individuals and the country will need money, and fast, and that could open the door to pro-growth policies that would have been unthinkable only months ago. Or at least we can hope.