The Inequalities of Lockdown
The Briefing Room
BBC
4.8 • 731 Ratings
🗓️ 9 April 2020
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
What effect is the lockdown having across the country and population? David Aaronovitch examines which jobs have been lost, whose health is more at risk and whose education is most likely to suffer. Is the lockdown likely to increase inequality? And if it does, how might a government reverse that trend once normal life is resumed?
Contributors: Professor Angus Deaton from Princeton University, Professor Simon Burgess from Bristol University, Xiaowei Xu from the Institute for Fiscal Studies, Paul Swinney from the Centre for Cities and Miatta Fahnbulleh from the New Economics Foundation.
Producers: Kirsteen Knight, Darin Graham and Rosamund Jones. Editor: Jasper Corbett
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:08.1 | Welcome to the briefing room with me, David Oronovich. |
| 0:11.0 | So many rooms are virtual rooms these days, and the briefing room is no different. |
| 0:15.7 | It's a place where minds and expertise meet to deliver me, the presenter, and you, the listener, |
| 0:20.4 | the best judgment available in 28 minutes on a big topic of the moment. This week, the inequalities |
| 0:27.1 | of lockdown. How are different groups and places faring under this unique pressure? |
| 0:42.9 | It's been the longest three weeks. |
| 0:46.8 | Much of the economy has been shut down and daily lives transformed. |
| 0:47.8 | No school. |
| 0:49.2 | No meals out. |
| 0:50.5 | No pub visits. |
| 0:52.3 | No coffee shop chats. |
| 0:53.3 | No cinema trips. |
| 0:55.5 | No visiting granddad in the care home, no weddings, the list goes on. And we've been introduced to words and phrases that |
| 1:00.6 | would have been alien just a little while ago, self-isolation, social distancing, lockdown. |
| 1:05.9 | It's difficult for everyone. But perhaps not in equal measure. |
| 1:16.5 | That's what I want to find out this week, is the pandemic exacerbating social inequalities in health, education, earnings, access to public space even, and if so, will they last |
| 1:23.5 | when all this is over? |
| 1:25.6 | Step inside the briefing room, and together we'll find out. |
| 1:32.6 | First, health and a bit of history. Angus Deeson is Professor of Economics at Princeton University. |
| 1:39.4 | He's one of the world's foremost chroniclers of poverty, inequality, health and well-being, |
| 1:45.9 | and has won a Nobel Prize for his efforts. Professor Deeson, tell me about past pandemics, aren't they essentially |
... |
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