Everything is
economically well!?

We are currently experiencing the highest level of unemployment since the Second World War, and many self-employed people are fearing for their livelihoods. What is behind this? And can there still be an (economic) happy ending?

Crises are part of humanity. We have not been immune to them in recent decades either. Many of them, especially the most media-effective ones, were of an economic and sectoral nature. We remember 2008, when the collapse of Lehman Brothers triggered a global economic and financial crisis. Six years earlier, the dot-com bubble finally burst and less than 30 billion euros of the 235 billion stock market value of the "new economy" remained in September 2002. The Nemax 50 share index launched on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange in 1999 plummeted, as did the hopes and expectations of the internet and the digital economy. Today, the real estate and financial markets are booming and we can no longer imagine the global economy without Microsoft, Facebook, Google, Amazon and Apple.

What makes the current coronavirus crisis fundamentally different from the two examples mentioned above is that the resulting economic crisis was triggered by a viral pandemic. It only developed into the biggest global economic crisis since the Second World War as a result of socio-political measures, i.e. secondary effects. In economic terms, this origin is both good and bad. Bad, because the current crisis has no purely sectoral effects on the economy and - the longer the measures have to be maintained - will extend to all sectors. Good, because it is not an economic crisis per se and most global economies, and Austria in particular, have grown steadily since 2016, including falling unemployment rates.

What we can learn from the past for the immediate future is that the economy will pick up again once the measures have ended and the employees who have now been laid off will gradually be needed by companies again. It is clear that the time horizon of the return to economic capacity utilization pre-corona will correlate with the duration of the lockdown-like measures. When we will experience this recovery will be directly related to affordable medication (step one) and a globally available SARS-CoV-2 vaccine (step two). The WHO is being vague about the timetable for research. A globally available and clinically tested medication is not expected before summer 2020, and a vaccine probably not until the end of 2021 at the earliest.

The most important question for me, apart from "if" and "when" the economy will pick up again, is what we can learn from the current exceptional situation? In other words, how we can use the crisis as an opportunity to come out of it even stronger and enriched by new experiences. Crisis situations require creativity and courage from individuals. Creativity in turn promotes innovation. Innovations are the driving force behind overcoming crisis situations (more quickly).

Governments could derive specific insights from the question of how sensible it is to outsource system-sustaining goods, such as medical products, to Asia for economic reasons.

Every day, we now learn what childcare workers and teachers achieve and what value nurses, doctors and other system administrators have for us as a society. The financial and social improvement of nursing staff will come by 2030 at the latest, just like the unconditional basic income. But perhaps a lot sooner now. However, we do not "owe" this to the coronavirus, but to the ongoing digitalization and automation of economic processes. The current crisis is only acting as an accelerator here.

Work / life balance: Many people are experiencing what it feels like to live and work closer to family again. Digitalization gives us unprecedented freedom in terms of time and space, which we don't fully appreciate during the crisis. But we probably will afterwards!

This phase is an extremely positive time for the environment, which thanks us for the greatly reduced mobility. Reduced mobility that does not, however, restrict communication with colleagues and business partners. This is mainly due to ZOOMization and the availability of sophisticated video conferencing tools in conjunction with widespread broadband Internet.

Can we derive new and economically realistic scenarios from the points described above in order to fulfill the 2030 climate protection program? And can we as individuals and economies derive values from this that will give us all a better, more liveable and healthier life?

In my work as a consultant and keynote speaker for trends and innovation management, I start every project and every presentation with the psychological aspect. In my experience, a person's attitude is crucial to how they experience a crisis and what they make of it. Only by adapting a positive brainset - accepting the changed framework conditions - can we even see and use the opportunities and development possibilities that present themselves.

So if we want to seize the crisis as an opportunity as individuals, entrepreneurs and economies, it probably doesn't help much to mourn the past "normality", but rather to transfer the positive insights and seized opportunities of this phase into the post-corona period. And yes, it hurts to be torn out of your comfort zone. It hurts to fall over and over again like a toddler trying to walk for the first time. But it will all be worth it in the end. When we have learned to walk upright!