Last week I searched the grocery store, without success, for a brand of pretzels I knew had just gone on sale.
I asked the nice young man about the pretzels. “Those are on sale this week,” he replied. “We don’t have many so we took them off the shelves.”
Okay…I haven’t worked retail in 40+ years but I do recall that you can’t sell merchandise sitting in the stockroom and you make money by selling stuff, not hiding it.
On the other hand, that action reminded me of the way the State of Missouri handles Covid.
The New York Times recently carried two interesting and related front page stories: U.S. Covid Aid Prevented Rise In Hunger Rate (9/9/21) and U.S. Poverty Rate Falls To A Record Low as Aid Helps Offset Job Losses (9/15/21).
Both articles included impressive data and the typical on-point quotes from experts. The bottom line is simple. Efforts by the Trump and Biden administrations to help families buy food and pay bills took a lot of sting off the pandemic-related recession. The stimulus payments alone lifted a few million people out of poverty, at least for a bit. Food aid – especially benefits for school age kids – really helped at a time when families and food pantries struggled.
Meanwhile, let’s look at Missouri – the state where they take pretzels off the shelves.
The Department of Social Services imploded. They closed offices due to Covid. They couldn’t keep staff answering call center phones. Processing Medicaid cases virtually stopped. Distributing pandemic food stamps was haphazard. As I keep noting, nationwide the number of people on food stamps soared. In Missouri we never had that increase, and, today our utilization rate remains more than 20% below the national average – meaning a tremendous number of struggling families could be getting a lot more help.
Yes, we all got those federal stimulus checks. That helped, especially lower-income families. Then His Accidency, Governor Mike Parson, ended the extra unemployment benefits prematurely, preventing tens of millions of dollars from getting to hurting people. He claimed lazy people had to be forced back to work. Months later all the Now Hiring signs are still up and many sectors of the economy have yet to recover.
Remember, even with everyone pulling together beating a virus outbreak takes time. For example, the World Health Organization still works to eradicate polio in Afghanistan and Pakistan! [ https://pakobserver.net/japan-continues-to-support-anti-polio-drive-in-pakistan/ ]
I recently heard an expert on a Zoomer suggest that Covid will be a factor in this country till mid-2023. Pockets of unvaccinated Americans give the bug a great future.
So, here in Missouri what should we do?
First, put the pretzels back on the shelf. Sell every bag and work to get more. The need for every person to get vaccinated to save them and others must outweigh the selfish “right” of refusal. The state – and the governor – must lead.
Second, the state bureaucracy must be improved. Other states managed to get food stamps to millions of newly-eligible recipients at the height of the Covid response. Missouri at least needs to be average, even when that means a 20% jump in families helped! The unemployment system is broken too. Improve the technology, hire more staff and just get things done. As the research shows, helping people during a pandemic works.
Oh, I did find my pretzels at another store later in the week. Alas, then I encountered a mini-bagel issue.
Glenn