Our nature is to deal with today, but also wonder what tomorrow will bring, which means we are already asking how our lives are being changed by the pandemic.
You have heard West Virginia COVID-19 Czar Clay Marsh and others refer to the global spread of the virus as a “Black Swan event.” That comes from Nassim Taleb’s book of the same name, where he identifies and explains unpredictable events that have severe consequences.
According to Taleb, Black Swan events have three characteristics: 1) The are out of the range of normal expectations. 2) They have a massive impact. 3) Afterward we create explanations to make it seem as though the event was predictable.
Black Swan events can be positive or negative.
One of the most recent examples of a negative is 9/11. The event triggered a war on terror, changed our perception of security and caused ripple effects around the world. In hindsight, we have rationalized to believe that we should have seen it coming, but no one could have predicted with any specificity what happened.
Taleb says the invention of the computer is an example of a positive. It allowed vast amounts of information to be stored in a small space, it enabled individuals to make complex calculations rapidly and changed the way humans communicate.
The current pandemic fits Taleb’s definition. It is out of the ordinary, it is having a global impact, and some are already rationalizing it by saying we should have seen it coming.
The immediate impacts are clear. People are getting sick and some are dying. Movement is restricted. Businesses are closed and some may not be able to reopen. The federal government is pumping trillions of dollars into the economy. People are told to keep their distance from each other and work from home.
What we don’t know, at least not yet, is what the long-term impact will be, but there is a fair amount of speculation.
For example, here and in many places around the world people greet each other with physical contact—a handshake, hug or kiss. Will people continue to keep social distancing even after the immediate threat passes?
Millions of people are now working from home. Will this accelerate the teleworking trend and even make many traditional workplaces obsolete? Will more education—K-12 and post-secondary—migrate to online?
How quickly will the economy recover, how many businesses will not survive the shutdown and what will replace them? Where will those laid off workers find new jobs?
How will international supply chains of essential healthcare items change, and can smaller or less-well financed hospitals survive after an extended period without profitable elective procedures? Will providers move more toward telehealth rather than in-office visits?
If this is truly a Black Swan event, and it certainly seems to be, these are just a few of the unknowns for the future.