ABSTRACT
From the general recommendations of the IMF, the analysis turns to specific policies at national-state level. Focused in the UK, it also draws from the EU and the US. The UK, and most EU countries, was aligned with IMF recommendations to do “whatever it takes” to preserve the economy. Indeed, in the void created by biosecurity, the state effectively became the economy; and the totality of its interventions aimed to preserve it as is — to mothball it — so that it emerges pristine when the pandemic ends. Yet, the UK departs from IMF recommendations in consequent phases. Its counter-cyclical expenditure in the “recovery” phase is modest, and consists of channelling public funds to private enterprise rather than service provision. Moreover, this phase is vanishingly small: the UK and the EU seek to disengage from economic “interventions” and return to the neoliberal trope of tightened fiscal policy and debt-reduction as soon as possible.
