The coronavirus pandemic is changing everything. Liberal partisans confidently predict the pandemic conveniently confirms their long-held beliefs about the need for a larger and stronger central government, with less discretion for local and state governments, much less private actors. They decry Trump for not setting one-size-fits-all federal policies on testing and reopening and belittle the ability of everyday people to make risk-benefit decisions for themselves. The Left argues the so-called self-evident need for a single-payer health system to test and treat millions who might otherwise infect others, especially as record-high unemployment rates threaten employer-provided health insurance. Though COVID-19 will certainly have long-lasting impacts, liberal pundits should temper their predictions with a dose of reality.

When confronted with large-scale catastrophic events, it is tempting to extrapolate short-term consequences in a linear fashion into the future. The short-term transformative changes they bring about appear to be even more consequential and permanent. Liberals see the temporary expansion of government welfare spending and police powers and assume a new permanent baseline has been set. Yet, whether due to resiliency, complacency, or inertia, people have returned to many of their preexisting habits after previous natural and man-made disasters.