Mask up, shut up and get on with it!

The world is in a battle between health and wealth. From late February, health wisely had the political upper hand worldwide, as the Italian brush with the Coronavirus looked like a sick story line from a Quentin Tarantino movie. But now those concerned about jobs, business survival, economic growth and the wealth it can deliver are asking for a more balanced and less emergency approach to the beating up on the virus.

This week I interviewed one of this country’s most successful entrepreneurs and business growers who is about 38 years old and lives in what seems like the most Coronavirus-scared state in the country — Victoria.

I said to him that as soon as I can jump on a plane for Europe or the USA and not be locked up for 14 days when I arrive, or when I return home, I’m out of here. And I look forward to sipping my first glass of champers waiting for take-off! But my friend wasn’t of the same mindset and the thought of travelling was far from him mind.

This has been the impact of the media blitz that has paid off to give us one of the world’s best records on COVID-19 infections and related death rates. This was backed up by a Government stimulus package and a very positive central bank strategy, which has seen us listed by the Brookings Institute as having one of the three best economic rescue plans in the world!

But now we face two new obstacles. The first is how we open up again. The second is what is the possibility of a bad second-wave of infections that will force us back to lockdown and economic closures?

Let’s look at the German experience. They didn’t beat the virus as well as us but have opened up faster.

Germany began to relax some lockdown measures earlier this month, which allowed bars, restaurants, hair salons and retail stores to reopen their doors. Dw.com tells us that “the nation's tourism industry has received a boost as hotels and vacation homes have been told they can welcome guests once more — under certain conditions and depending on state rules,” the German website explains. “German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas and his counterparts in other European Union states have said that travel restrictions across the bloc could be lifted by mid-June.”

Yep, Europeans are serious about letting tourists loose on the Greek Isles, the south of Italy and other summer holiday haunts that we Aussies generally get stuck into around this time of year. Alas, that won’t be a 2020 memory we will reminisce about one day. So the Gold Coast, the Sunshine Coast, Port Douglas, Lorne, the Barossa and Margaret River will be booked out for the upcoming local holiday seasons.

I know a friend’s Airbnb cottage in the mountains has had three enquiries for the same weekend indicating a cabin-fever populace is desperate to go holidaying, which is great for improving the national psyche but also great for holiday destinations that saw their profits burned with the Christmas holiday’s bushfires.

Be clear on this: we need to take some calculated risks on opening up and getting back to work ASAP or else the 10% economic contraction for 2020 and 10% unemployment forecasts could come to fruition.

What does that mean to those of you reading this, whose job might be safe, whose interest rates are at emergency, historically low levels, and who hasn’t seen their business revenue slashed by 80%, which has turned annual profits into losses? Nothing. But to those who are the opposite of you, getting us back to normal Aussie economic life is crucial. However, as Franklin D. Roosevelt said in the Great Depression of the 1930s: “The only thing to fear is fear itself.”

Because the media has done a great job in scaring the pants off us, which has largely helped us play by the social distancing rules and become addicted to hand sanitizer, we now need the media to start rebuilding faith in the safety of Australia. This means politicians and especially state premiers have to get logical and smart. And if they need guidance from a business that has always been led by the smartest thinkers in the room, then they should get down to their nearest Apple store.

On Thursday, the queue outside was 100 metres long — helped by social distancing’s 1.5 metres (which is three pizza boxes in case you need help with measuring). Everyone in the store, with its huge glass walls, had masks on!

I thought that was a good sign that we were getting smart but then I saw security guards were handing them out as people got on the queue.

As I watched people buzzing around the Apple store, like normal, albeit with blue masks on, I thought if our leaders told us to “mask up, shut up and get on with it”, then we could get back to normal (sans masks) ASAP!

The rules could be simple:

• No mask, no public transport.
• No mask, no access to a shopping centre or shop.
• No mask, no riding in a lift.

Oh yeah, the recently created bush experts on the Coronavirus tell me that masks don’t work but the population of Hong Kong mask up at the drop of a virus hat, so let’s see how they did with the Coronavirus.

Here are the stats:

• Total infections — 1,067
• Total deaths — 4
• Deaths per million of population — 0.5
• Population — 7,491,423

The US deaths per million were 312, the UK 558, France 439, Spain 580 and Brazil 2,066. In countries such as Germany where they are more rule-oriented, the number was 102 and in many Asian countries where they mask up, the results were miles better.

Sure, there are other factors but if we were forced to mask up, shut up from whinging about being told what to do and get on with doing as instructed, then we will see normalcy come back faster than expected.

Importantly, that will not only mean better social outcomes, such as getting to watch footie at the ground if you wear a mask, it will also deliver a great economic dividend.

This week the RBA Governor, Dr Phil Lowe addressed the COVID-19 committee and made it clear that our better health outcome means our potential economic collapse could be less damaging that what was expected a few weeks ago.

However, he also inferred that we need areas such as construction and professional services to see normalcy come ASAP to ensure business investment follows to give us the better growth that some economists are predicting.

As an economist, I know how critical confidence (that translates into spending) is for creating economic growth and jobs. The longer we are kept scared like my entrepreneur mate and his potential customers, the higher the jobless rate will be.

A 10% unemployment rate could leave 1.2 million people without jobs, while a 7% rate would only hit 840,000. And given there were about 600,000 people out of work going into this Coronavirus crash, that’s not a bad result.

If it means I’m forced to mask up, shut up and get on with it, I would do it in a heartbeat! And now we need our leaders, who have seen their popularity rise with their actions to beat the virus, have the guts to tell us to mask up, shut up and get on with it! It will take a pretty gutsy leader to do this. But saving hundreds of thousands of people’s jobs is worth it.