The Pandemic Isn’t Ending, It’s Just the Beginning of Global Disorder & Depression
The comments below are an edited and abridged synopsis of an article by Charles Hugh Smith
Governments know that global economies, including those of the US and China, were fragile before the coronavirus arose; why else the panic-stimulus and panic-repo policies in the pre-pandemic months of 2019?
But the biggest denial campaign masks the fragility of the global economy. The only thing keeping it from imploding is the belief and confidence of the masses that everything is going well, so keep on borrowing, buying and speculating.
While limiting the spread of the virus gets the headlines, maintaining confidence in the system is just as important.
The key dynamic in recessions and depressions is confidence. Once that goes, all bets are off. Loss of confidence is like loss of faith or credibility: They can’t be restored overnight. But confidence doesn’t just evaporate; it’s replaced by uncertainty, anxiety and fear.
Chinese authorities hid the epidemic to save face, but their lies and desperation are destroying what little international credibility remained after their attempt to save face blew up. Instead, they’ve lost the credibility they once had.
As for the Chinese people, how must it feel to know that political optics matter more than your health and well-being?
The more authorities try to mask reality to maintain confidence, the more they destroy credibility, confidence, trust and faith. Once these are lost, the loss of confidence is self-reinforcing.
Depression isn’t just an economic number. It’s a self-reinforcing loss of confidence. Quarantining 400 million people won’t stop the pandemic. The Chinese economy can’t grind to a halt and affect nothing else in the global economy.