Video Editor: Ashutosh Bhardwaj & Sandeep Suman
Other than the coronavirus lockdown, the keywords these days are — life, livelihood and economy. The Indian government has to tackle the coronavirus and take care of the economy simultaneously. However, India’s relief package for the less-advantaged people seems relatively minimal.
There is a dire need for a major package from the government of a direction on which they might act next. Meanwhile, let’s look at how other countries are handling the pandemic outbreak.
In order to save their countries from the virus and save the economy, the US has released a stimulus package — 10% of its GDP.
Germany has released 20% of its GDP to deal with the crisis. Britain, Canada and India have released 15%, 4% and 0.71% of their GDPs respectively.
Let’s also note that by just paying off the poor won’t fix the economy. For this we need to look at the richer countries as to what they are doing. They are giving direct cash, student loan, debt repayment protection, business interruption loan or guarantee through federal reserves.
Right now, banks are afraid to give loans until there is a clear indication from the government.
Small and Medium Enterprises are the worst affected due to the lockdown. Salaries need to be paid, there’s no income, they need to repay loans, they need to pay their taxes. SMEs are in desperate need of government’s help.
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