As a New York resident, I have witnessed lots of changes in our lives and the impact of neoliberalism on our lives ever since the outbreak of the pandemic. A pandemic causes labor shortages and a partial break in the production chain, which ultimately affects our daily lives. Empty shelves in grocery stores and soaring prices show us the changes and difficulties the pandemic has brought to our lives. The cost of living for many people has also increased. This is a kind of neoliberalism brought about by the impact of change. The scarcity of goods led to the increase in Costco, such as the shortage of paper towels at Costco. The price of vegetables in the supermarket. Originally, a couple hundred dollars could buy the necessities. Now we need to pay three or four hundred dollars to buy them. My friend once tried to buy a table from IKEA that met her requirements, but due to the pandemic, the table was out of stock, customs shipments slowed down, overseas products took a lot of time to get to the US, and prices went up. Therefore, it took her longer to wait and cost her more money to buy what she wanted. The cost of living has increased so that those of us living in New York who are affected by the epidemic are feeling the pressure from prices. The government is choosing to subsidize people in the face of their plight, such as the $1,400 subsidy, the amount of subsidy people will receive from things like the 1099g form, etc. This reminds me of Dickinson’s text about how the government is discriminating against poor people for graffiti problems on trains. The government doesn’t want to deal with the aesthetics of the trains, but the graffiti makes them have to deal with the trains, which is the same as the pandemic issue.
Hi,
Yes I remember when the pandemic first started everyone was extremely worried about losing their jobs. I remember going to the supermarket and the lines were like it was thanksgiving. Hand sanitizer grew exponentially in price because before it used to be about 7 dollars and now a bottle is like 24.
Overall, I think living through this pandemic has been a surreal experience. It’s something you know could’ve been handled so much better earlier on but the ball was just completely dropped. The anti-vax and anti-mask hysteria that spawned did not help this situation at all. Two years in and there still doesn’t seem to be an end in sight to this pandemic.
I like your perspective of neoliberalism when it comes to the pandemic and how people have limited access to things that were seemingly available for the most part before the pandemic. It goes to show how the lives of many people have changed in some way due to the pandemic and your take on neoliberalism.