There is at least one good consequence of the covid-19 epidemic and of the economic hardship imposed on many people who have lost their source of income from the necessary mitigation (social distancing).
The good consequence is that lots of people now have gained much greater confidence that they are not alone in thinking that a) we need a fundamental change in our society's economic structure AND b) that such fundamental change is indeed POSSIBLE.
Before the epidemic mitigation, lots of people privately knew that our society's class inequality economic system (in which money is power and only a few have it) was a huge problem. But these same people had no way of knowing that MOST people--not just a tiny and hence powerless minority--felt the same way as they did.
But today, there is an obvious need for some kind of financial relief for people involuntarily out of work, in particular allowing them not to pay their rent and stay in their rented home, AND allowing landlords not to pay their mortgage and continue to own their property, AND paying everybody who is--through no fault of their own--unable to earn their income as before the money they need to live. And LOTS of people are talking about this. THE KEY THING IS THAT NOW LOTS OF PEOPLE ARE *SEEING* THAT LOTS OF PEOPLE ARE TALKING ABOUT THIS! If this keeps up then eventually people will gain the confidence (that they are not alone) required to take action to make the big changes we need in our society.
And what people are saying OUT LOUD should be done always, in one way or another, amounts to saying (implicitly if not explicitly) that we should make our society be closer to an egalitarian one that is based on the economic principle of "From each according to reasonable ability, to each according to need or reasonable desire with scarce things equitably rationed according to need." The egalitarian idea--implicitly if not explicitly articulated--is being talked about as never before.
Furthermore, the POSSIBILITY of making a fundamental egalitarian change in our society is, as never before, seen by lots of people now as a real possibility. Why? Because people are seeing the federal government politicians debating a TWO TRILLION DOLLAR relief bill of an unprecedented magnitude, and they're seeing unprecedented things on the agenda for serious debate--things such as allowing people not to pay rent and even not to pay mortgage payments! People are seeing that big changes are quite possible indeed.
What is needed is an explicit egalitarian revolutionary movement that knows what it is aiming for and won't be satisfied with anything less. Read about this at https://www.pdrboston.org/what-is-an-egalitarian-revolution .
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