Covid-19: Ending the tyranny of scale?

Scale became critical because of steadily increasing capital intensity that the new technologies engendered

Whereas China’s other exports had kept the global economy running for two decades, the virus it exported last December has stopped it dead in its tracks. Such a “sudden stop” has never happened before on such a scale, if ever.

Usually, it is either agg­regate demand or aggregate supply that fall off the cliff. This time, thanks to China, both have.

Of the many views that have emerged about the post-China-virus global economy, two deserve attention. This is because they have a special bearing on the way economic theory has evolved over the last 200 years.

One view says this is the end