Peter Klein on a future world of "pandemic theater"

Actions by the Fed, by the Treasury, by Congress, by the President, that are really striking and distressing to people in extraordinary times can quickly become the new normal.  And I worry that, in a future age which might be constituted by all kinds of crises - real or imagined - the notion that bold, decisive action by the state is necessary to protect us and keep us safe is just going to become more and more part of peoples' expectations.

You know how we use the term "security theater" to describe all of these policies since 911, you know no liquids, more than 3 ounces, taking our shoes off and going through the corn house scanners and so forth.  Young people today have grown up in that environment and don't know what it was like to travel before 911.

I wonder what kind of pandemic theater we'll have to live through after this is all over.  Will you have to have your temperature taken by some TSA-equivalent worker every time you enter a public building?  Will there be random health checks?  I just worry that socially, culturally people are becoming more acclimated to a world in which the state controls the movements of persons and goods and the division of labor is retarded and so forth because it's just too dangerous to allow for a global division of labor.  And maybe I'm overly pessimistic on that score, but I think we need to be especially vigilant, those of us who care about liberty, and try to push back on those things in the months and years to come.

~ Peter Klein, "The Economics of the Shutdown," The Tom Woods Show, March 26, 2020