We’re not in Kansas anymore, Toto.
By now we’ve all heard the phrase “the new normal,” which is a cryptic way to say the future won’t be normal, as we have known it to be, at all. Our lives have been disrupted — irrevocably, it seems, by a pandemic, climate change, racial injustice, economic crisis, a contentious election, and threats to democracy. We’re nostalgic for what we had and fear the new normal will be something worse. “There’s no place like home,” we think, terrified that we’ll never see it again.
You’re right, Dorothy, we’re not in Kansas anymore. But we don’t have to fall under the power of the Wicked Witch of the East. We can go home, bringing the clarity we’ve gained here in Oz about the social, political and environmental challenges we face. The new normal can be better than the old. And we don’t have to take Dorothy’s word for it. We can look to our own history for examples.
A new normal took place in response to the Great Depression of the 1930s. With an unemployment rate of over 20%, tens of thousands of people died of starvation. Gross domestic product fell by 30%. One of every five banks failed. The U.S. government responded with the New Deal, a series of programs and projects which stabilized the economy and provided economic relief to those most afflicted. The Social Security System was established.
After World War II, the world faced another new normal as all of Europe struggled to recover from ruined economies, destroyed cities, poverty and disease. In response, the U.S. provided $12 billion ($129 billion in today’s dollars) to rebuild war-torn regions, modernize industry, and improve European prosperity. The Marshall Plan aid was divided among the participant states on a per capita basis. Aid went to West Germany no less than to former U.S. allies. (Aid was offered to East Germany, Hungary and Poland, but rejected by the Soviet Union.)
The results of both of these interventions were overwhelmingly positive. When adversity reached a tipping point, bold governmental action tipped the energy of the U.S. and its allies toward opportunity and prosperity. It could have gone otherwise. After World War I, the Treaty of Versailles imposed harsh terms on Germany, creating economic hardship and fostering resentments that fueled Hitler’s rise.
Our tipping point is approaching. The election is the end of the beginning of the process. Let’s assume that the election provides a “victory.” As we look out at our new normal we see millions of people in pain: people separated from their children; people whose homes have been lost to climate change disasters; people whose family members contracted COVID and died alone; people subject to racism in its many forms, from subtle to violent; people who have lost their jobs and find themselves struggling to pay the bills. And people who, over the years, have seen their security and way of life eroding away as the jobs they once held moved overseas or gave way to technology. They find themselves stripped of livelihoods and of dignity, too, while the world moves on and ignores them.
Like the Marshall Plan or the New Deal, we will need to reach out to everyone and leave no one behind. We will need to reach out to the people we despise, whom we are afraid of, who are short-sighted and selfish.
This new plan will cost money and put the country into greater debt. Investments in job training, education, medical care, child care, a guaranteed income will threaten the economic sustainability of the nation. But like an ocean liner taking miles to reverse its course, we will turn the country around. Our lives will become stronger, safer, cleaner, and sustainable as public monies that have been diverted into subsidies and contracts for the 1% will be returned to the daily lives of all Americans.
It is certainly a risk, but wouldn’t it be riskier to do another half-baked effort like we have been doing in the old normal? Our time has come. Let’s create a new normal where we all live better healthier lives.
Kiffer Sikes is a resident of Northfield.