in one simple punchy statement?

The pandemic is a tragedy.

But it is also a once in a lifetime

chance to rebuild better economies that

work for everyone.

All rich societies have been polarising for a good four

decades.

Around 1980 the good jobs that were plentiful and available

to a lot of people in the past disappeared,

in particular factory jobs.

Globalisation is not the big factor here.

Some factory jobs moved to Asia to other low-cost countries.

Many more were automated away.

And the clerical jobs that were lost to computers,

the retail jobs that were lost to online shopping,

those have little to do with globalisation and a lot

to do with technology.

Tax systems have not redistributed as much as

before.

Unions that often kept wages high

have been on the decline in one country after another.

Perhaps the worst effect of all these changes

is that entire regions have been left behind

because the new good jobs they tend

to thrive in the big cities, not in the smaller

towns and the rural areas.

The pandemic hit societies that were already fragile because

of this polarisation.

The people in low paid, low productive service jobs

are also most exposed to the disease

because they have to be physically present.

My hope is that the pandemic can be a catalyst for change.

In the past, the deepest crises have also

been opportunities for the greatest social improvements.

In the US the Great Depression led to the New Deal.

In Europe the shock of the second world war

produced the postwar welfare state.

We cannot resist technological change.

We need to embrace new ways of working.

We can do that by putting much more money

into skills, education, training to equip people for more

advanced well-paid jobs.

Rather than means tested benefits,

let's have a universal basic income.

We need to lower the burden of taxes on labour, on work,

cutting income taxes, payroll taxes,

any tax that creates a cost for hiring people into better jobs.

Instead, let's make up the revenue elsewhere.

Wealth has increased enormously over the last 40 years

and it's very unequal.

It's a good thing to tax.

The other thing we should tax is carbon emissions to help with

climate change and penalise polluting behaviour,

then redistribute that to the whole population,

so that you help the worst off.

We need to overcome rising regional inequality

within countries.

And the pandemic is an opportunity for that.

The shift to remote working, we have all experienced,

gives us a way to imagine how the most modern highest paid

knowledge jobs could be done from anywhere.

We have the tools and we have the policies to make economies

work better for everyone.

What we need is the political will.