The Economist USA 03.21.2020

(avery) #1

14 The EconomistMarch 21st 2020


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Letters


A world turned upside down
Schumpeter (March 7th) con-
nected the coronavirus crisis to
the lesson of “resilience and
adaptation” offered by the
strike on the London
Underground in February 2014.
Shaun Larcom, Ferdinand
Rauch and I analysed the strike
and found that the partial
closure of the network forced
many commuters to experi-
ment with new routes. For
many this resulted in shorter
travel times; they continued to
use the new routes after the
strike, thus generating a
lasting benefit.
The current global experi-
ment with alternative work
arrangements (less business
travel, increased teleworking)
might also bring long-term
gains to businesses. There is
another benefit. The covid-
crisis has brought about mass-
education on hygiene. School-
children are being taught how
to sneeze responsibly, touch-
ing one’s face is becoming
frowned upon, and proper
handwashing techniques are
enjoying their 15 minutes of
fame. Although covid-19 might
unfortunately be here to stay, it
may also change social norms
(elbow bumps instead of hand-
shakes) and improve hygiene
habits. If those changes stick,
we may see fewer cases of flu
and other infectious diseases.
Going forward, this could
improve health outcomes and
lower associated costs.
Joseph Schumpeter taught
us to embrace disruption.
Although the covid-19 crisis is
making this very challenging,
at the moment it is preferable
to embracing people.
tim willems
Washington, DC

Another lasting effect may be
the reinvention of the office.
Schumpeter noted that firms
may now find it is better to
encourage remote working,
given how inefficiently office
space is used. Big British and
American companies pay on
average $5,000 per employee
in annual rental costs, though
just half the desks are used
during working hours. The
potential benefit to companies

is clear. Yet it is less clear
whether employees would
share equally in those benefits.
It may be prudent, from the
point of view of employees’
wellbeing, to reflect before
implementing long-term
remote-working policies.
Feeling part of a shared
institutional culture can be
meaningful and motivating.
Flexible working may cut
commuting times and improve
the work-life balance, but
working remotely reduces the
valuable face-to-face connec-
tion between employee, col-
leagues and company. It would
be a shame if flexible working
were weaponised against
employees for the sake of
saving on office costs.
patrick kelly
Chief executive
Mizen Group
New York

Working from home could
result in staff forking out
thousands in extra costs. An
office employee who works a
40-hour-week for, say, 46
weeks a year will spend an
extra 1,840 hours at home.
Think of the additional cost for
heating and lighting a house
that is otherwise vacant during
the day, not to mention pow-
ering a computer during that
time and running a printer
(ink, paper). Firms also provide
extensive itsupport. What
happens if your personal com-
puter breaks down? Is that a
company cost or individual
cost? Then there are the small
items such as stationery, coffee
and, dare I say it, toilet paper
that are provided at the office.
margaret o’brian
London

The problem with China’s
success in using surveillance
methods such as facial recog-
nition and colour codes to
tame covid-19 is that this could
legitimise the extensive use of
profiling tools (“Code red”,
February 29th). One can easily
imagine how massive surveil-
lance and limitations to funda-
mental rights like privacy
could become the new norm.
Desperate times call for des-
perate measures, but democ-
racies face the dilemma of

solvingseriousproblemsand
atthesametimeprotecting
privacy,covid-19ornot.
asbjornammitzbollflugge
phdfellow
DepartmentofComputer
Science
UniversityofCopenhagen

Central-bankstaff
I readyourshortpiecenoting
thehighstaffingnumbersat
Europeancentralbanks
(“Labourhoarding”,February
22nd).Pleaseconsiderthat
apartfromthecorefunctions
relatedtomonetarypolicy,
banknotesandcurrency
management,thesizeof
centralbanksvariesdepending
whethera singleinstitution
alsohandlescoinage,printing,
payment-systemsupervision,
public-debtmanagement,
economicsurveys,statistical
collection,bankingresolution,
andthesupervisionofbank-
ing,insuranceandmarkets.
Thenthereisfinancial
consumerprotectionandthe
dutiesrelatedtonewchal-
lenges,likefintech.
Forinstance,whencompar-
ingstaffinglevelsatmost
Europeancentralbankswith
theFederalReserve,you
shouldaddstaffatthefdic,
occ,sec,ncua,naic,and
others,andoftheregulatory
authoritiesineachstate.Allin
all,thisraisesthecentral-bank
staffperinhabitantintheeu
andAmericatothesamelevel.
thierrydesanois
President
StandingCommitteeofEuro-
peanCentralBanksUnions
Paris

Judges in Hong Kong
The consequences of Boris
Johnson restricting the power
and independence of the judi-
ciary in Britain may be more
far-reaching than the erosion
of a safeguard against
unchecked executive power
(“Boris v the judges”, February
22nd). The principle of judicial
independence in Britain
underpins the legal systems of
some former British colonies,
in which authoritarianism is
more appropriately described
as a feature rather than a ten-

dency. The weakening of judi-
cial independence in Britain
may thus have a knock-on
effect of undermining judicial
independence in other places.
For Hong Kong, the recent
appointment of the heavy-
handed Xia Baolong as director
of the Hong Kong-affairs office
signals Beijing’s tightening
grip on the city’s administra-
tion. A decline in Britain’s
judicial independence may
stoke concerns of opportunis-
tic attempts by Beijing to di-
minish the power of Hong
Kong’s judiciary. Even though
judicial independence requires
judges to be partial only to the
law, Beijing expressed in a
white paper published in 2014
that it is a basic political
requirement that judges in
Hong Kong be patriotic. When
Baroness Hale was appointed
to the city’s Court of Final
Appeal in 2018, it came as no
surprise that pro-Beijing law-
makers voiced concern about
her handling cases in which
national interests may be at
stake. If Mr Johnson has his
way, it may spell an unprece-
dented challenge to Hong
Kong’s independent judiciary.
justin bong-kwan
Barrister-at-law
Hong Kong

Digital plurality
Kudos to The Economistfor
sticking to using data as a
plural (“Data, data every-
where”, February 29th).
Although I don’t understand
why there is a grammatical
quarrel over this, I have found
myself for years having to
correct the young scientists
I’ve mentored. While we’re on
the topic, bacteria and sera are
also plurals, the singular forms
being bacterium and serum
(also media/medium, in con-
texts other than the media
world The Economistinhabits).
george cross
New York
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