The chapter What Should the Government Do? may not contain original ideas, but many of the recommendations would be of value to the budget-makers. His fear that вЂњthe growing inequality and unemployment is likely to lead to an increase in social and political instability and also crimeвЂќ is also widely shared. Sectoral analysis of our economy throws important light for the readers to comprehend what has gone wrong and what needs to be done in the context of the new normal. The author notices a clear divide between the roles of the public sector and of the private that this crisis seems to have brought to focus. But comments like вЂњfor policy-makers, the poor donвЂ™t countвЂќ or that migrants were coerced to return to cities indicate an inappropriate understanding of how a democratic government functions.

The handling of mass labour migration has indeed exhibited inadequacies of planning at the administrative levels, especially in the initial few days. Kumar betrays certain biases while criticising the policies of the government. These are familiar criticisms though not convincingly substantiated. In order to assess the Covid-specific impact, Kumar outlines the pre-pandemic scenario marked by anaemic growth, having been exposed to what he terms as the two shocks of demonetisation and GST implementation. This may seem to be obvious, but KumarвЂ™s line of argument based on facts and evidence provides a foundation for such a prediction. The acute distress of workers вЂњwithout a living wage and no savingsвЂќ on account of the lockdown has been highlighted.ДЄnalysing the macro-economic aspects of the post-lockdown period and drawing attention to the different lessons from the Chinese and US experience, Kumar concludes that with its large organised sector, IndiaвЂ™s recovery to pre-pandemic level will be much slower than in the US. вЂњвЂ¦ a village in an earlier era could continue life even if it was cut off from the rest of the world because the essentials were largely produced within.вЂќ In modern times, вЂњвЂ¦ a village or a city cut off from the outside will find it difficult to survive.вЂќ Kumar discusses every relevant issue such as the changing production structure, special problems encountered by the marginalised and the unorganised, disruption of supply chain, and the rising inequality consequent to globalisation.

He argues that during the Spanish Flu (1918-20), there was greater self-sufficiency. The book explains in clear terms why in todayвЂ™s economy, lockdown hits hard and what the aftermath has been after the lockdown was clamped in March 2020. Yet every effort has to be made at the individual, societal and governmental levels to defeat the disease and revive livelihood security and prosperity at the earliest. Therefore, the end timing of the disease remains uncertain. Scientific knowledge about the pandemic is still evolving, the efficacy of the vaccines varies within a wide range, and the hope of a cure is not in immediate sight.

Economic theorists and practitioners have been projecting a broad range of scenarios, depending on the assumptions made.

Black economy india arun kumar pdf