How hateful rhetoric connects to real-world violence |
- COVID-19, the educational equity crisis, and the opportunity ahead
- Biden’s 100-day strategy: Under-promise and over-deliver
- An asymmetric defense of Taiwan
- Figure of the Week: COVID-19’s impact on debt risks in sub-Saharan Africa
- In contrast with Trump, Biden relies on disciplined surrogates to get his message out
- The importance of USMCA for the Biden administration’s economic and foreign policy
- The Johnson and Johnson vaccine pause and the challenge of risk assessment
| COVID-19, the educational equity crisis, and the opportunity ahead Posted: 28 Apr 2021 09:01 PM PDT By Heather J. Hough As the one-year anniversary of campus closures due to COVID-19 passed last March, nearly half of America’s children were attending schools operating remotely or open only on a hybrid basis. In California, more than 70% of students were attending schools that were fully remote. But spring brings new hope. Amid steps to ensure safe health practices and the acceleration of vaccinations, the rates of transmission have decreased from earlier peaks in the winter and students are beginning to return to school. While the return of students to campus is something to celebrate, it is essential to note that the pandemic and related prolonged school disruptions have and will continue to have a profound impact on the lives and learning of students. Due to inequitable access to health care, income inequality, and disproportionate employment in high-risk, "essential" jobs, low-income, Black, Latino, and Native American communities have borne the brunt of the pandemic, with dire health and economic impacts that hinder their children's educational opportunities and learning. It is difficult for children to learn if they are sick or hungry, or if they have family members who are sick or even dying. Some students have found themselves without a safe, stable place to live, lacking basic necessities, and disconnected from needed services and supports when schools—a primary avenue for public service delivery—closed for months on end. Making learning in the pandemic even more challenging, many of these students have lacked reliable access to the internet and computers. And working parents have often found themselves unable to stay at home with their children, sometimes leaving them without needed supervision and support. This has been especially difficult for children in the early grades who may not be able to independently follow directions or navigate online assignments, as well as for some students in upper grades, who may need support to stay on task and away from online distractions such as social media. These instructional support issues are only compounded for students learning English or those with special needs. Research by my organization, Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE), has documented how student learning has suffered during the pandemic, leading to growing equity gaps. One study showed significant learning lag in both English language arts and math, with students in grades 4-6 the most impacted. As of fall 2020, students in these grades were between 5 and 25% behind where they would be in a typical year. These averages mask serious differences between student groups. In most grades, low-income students are substantially further behind than higher-income students. And in some grades, lower-income students are falling behind while higher-income students' learning actually accelerated. Further, students learning English demonstrate substantially more learning lag than comparison students in nearly every grade in English language arts and in early grades for math. For example, on the MAP English language arts assessment, grade 5 students learning English are roughly 30% behind, while native English-speaking students are only 10% behind. Another study, with colleagues at Stanford, examining oral reading fluency in grades 1-3 found that in the spring of 2020, the development of reading fluency largely stopped. Students' reading fluency was again growing at normal rates by the fall, but the return to nearly average gains was not sufficient to recoup spring's losses. No growth in the spring and summer meant that in fall 2020, students in 2nd and 3rd grade had fallen about a third of a year behind where they should be in terms of expected reading development. These findings also show that students in historically low-performing districts are falling behind at a faster rate. In our studies and others like them, many students are missing from schools and assessments. We suspect some of the students that have missing data in our analyses may be disengaged or missing from school altogether. K-12 public school enrollment in California has dropped by a record 160,000 students (a 3% decline overall), a change about five times greater than the state's annual rate of enrollment decline in recent years. It is likely that students missing from our analyses have experienced even larger learning losses than those students observed, meaning that the equity impact of the pandemic is almost certainly larger than we estimate. As we move forward, we need to be particularly concerned for our youngest and oldest students. The biggest declines in enrollment are in the earliest grades, and preschool enrollment is down as well. Additionally, distance learning has been hardest for our youngest students, meaning that a large proportion of students are likely to start kindergarten and 1st grade very far behind. If these students in the early grades don't develop the basic skills they need, it may be difficult for them to access future learning. Additionally, older students have experienced more challenges around mental health, isolation, and disengagement, and with greater consequences. Across the state of California, there are troubling signs that high school students are not engaging with distance learning. In Sacramento City Unified School District, 10 times more students are significantly disengaged compared to last year. And in Los Angeles Unified, the number of Ds and Fs in grades 9-12 increased by 8.7 percentage points in the fall compared to the same time period last year, with greater increases among Black (23.2%) and Latino (24.9%) students. If educators don't work hard to get these students back on track, graduation rates will decline and inequities in college access and success will increase.
Our educational system in the United States was already highly inequitable and plagued by opportunity gaps in learning that have widened during the pandemic. Although we may see the light at the end of the tunnel on the coronavirus crisis, the educational equity crisis is just beginning. This unprecedented challenge requires unprecedented action. The good news is that new federal investments offer needed resources. California K-12 schools have received or are slated to receive roughly $28.6 billion in federal funds between spring 2020 and spring 2021 to address pandemic response and learning loss. About $129 billion in COVID-19 relief funds will go to K-12 schools nationally. This money must be used to catalyze a transformation in our education systems. While many are eager for a return to normal, the old "normal" was under-serving our nation's most vulnerable children and youth. As we respond to this public health and education emergency, we must build toward an education system that places equity at the center so that all students—and especially those most impacted by the pandemic and systemic racism—have the support and opportunities they need to achieve their potential. We can begin by nurturing student social and emotional well-being to support academic progress. But we must also go further to reimagine the very systems in which students learn. By redesigning schools to be restorative places—places where students feel safe, known, supported, and fully engaged in learning—we can lay the groundwork for long-term and systemic transformation. Such a system should prioritize relationships between families, students, and educators, address whole-child needs, strengthen staffing and partnerships between schools and community partners, and empower teams to rebuild and reimagine systems. This transformation must happen in every school and district in the country, and especially in those serving low-income students and students of color who have for too long been ignored. The new one-time federal funding for these efforts is critical, but local, state, and federal leaders should be planning now to improve and expand overall school funding in a way that provides sufficient funding for education systems and ensures the equitable distribution of funding to those schools and districts serving students with the highest levels of need. The old adage goes, "Never let a good crisis go to waste." The COVID-19 pandemic has laid bare the inequities in our society and in our schools, but the disruption in the status quo presents an opportunity to reimagine and rebuild our educational systems to better serve America's students.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now | ||||||
| Biden’s 100-day strategy: Under-promise and over-deliver Posted: 28 Apr 2021 08:58 PM PDT By Elaine Kamarck "I've come to talk about crisis and opportunity." Thus began President Joe Biden's first address to Congress given at the 100-day mark of his presidency. The hallmark of the Biden presidency so far is clear: under-promise and over-deliver. In December President-elect Biden announced that in his first 100 days in office 100 million shots would be administered to Americans. At the time it seemed like a dangerous, perhaps downright foolish, announcement. By March, America had met that goal and by the time Biden made his first address to Congress at the end of his first 100 days he could announce that over 220,000,000 shots had been administered. "Tonight I can say because of you, the American people, this vaccine has been one of the best logistical achievements this country has ever seen." Biden's accomplishment stands in stark contrast to his predecessor who often did exactly the opposite: over-promising and under-delivering. By October 2020, as the coronavirus raged, Trump had declared that it would be gone no less than 38 times! As vaccines increase, COVID deaths decrease, and Americans return to some semblance of normalcy, two questions loom: What's the secret sauce so far? Can Biden keep this up? The strategy so far is to speak softly and rarely and spend the time solving problems. This is not typical of the modern presidency. As political scientist Sam Kernell showed, in recent decades American presidents have spent a great deal of time talking and travelling, often at the expense of governing.[1] In its first 100 days, the Biden White House seems to have broken that habit. By concentrating on governing, Biden is taking the presidential model back to an earlier time where problem-solving mattered. Perhaps this change is driven in part by preference and in part because the traveling presidency is hindered by COVID restrictions. Regardless, the contrast with Trump could not be more stark. As Andrea Risotto discussed in a recent piece, Biden is content to let surrogates carry the messaging load. He doesn't feel that he has to dominate the news every day, and when he does speak it is to announce something he has done. The secret sauce then is that Biden actually knows how to govern. His experience stands in stark contrast to his predecessor who had no governing experience, but it also stands in stark contrast to the two other 21st century presidents whose federal governmental experience was thin compared to Biden's. Behind Biden's victory lap is governing competence. For example, confronted with a huge demand for COVID vaccines, Biden signed two executive orders early on invoking the Defense Production Act. These orders were critical to the ability of the vaccine manufacturers to get the raw materials and machinery necessary to expand production of the vaccine. Confronted with yet another, different crisis of asylum seekers at the southern border (many of them children), Biden assigned his vice president the job of dealing with the root causes of migration: the chaos, poverty and dysfunction in the Northern Triangle countries. He asked for federal employees to go down to the border and assist HHS in dealing with the children there. His budget request to Congress asks for money to hire additional personnel to deal with the huge backlog of immigration cases. This approach harnesses the government's ability to expand its capacity to solve a problem. Confronted with the nonstop crisis of police violence against people of color, Biden's attorney general has opened what's known as "pattern or practice" investigations into two police departments around the country—with the promise of more to come. Confronted with a climate crisis that requires action beyond America's borders, Biden enlisted former senator and Secretary of State John Kerry to persuade the world that the U.S. is recommitted to reducing greenhouse gases and convened leaders of the world to discuss what more could be done. But as successful as the first 100 days has been, Biden has his work cut out for him. The pandemic and the desire to be done with it gave him the opportunity to pass a massive rescue bill. In its wake, he has outlined two more enormous bills: The American Jobs Plan and the American Families Plan. They are expensive, totaling a combined $3.8 trillion. Already, powerful senators such as Joe Manchin (D-WV) are balking at the price tag. And Republican senators have returned to worrying about deficits, after a four-year vacation from such critiques. To pass these proposals, Biden has at least two strategies. First, he wants the rich and powerful to pay more. "Wall Street didn't build this country," he said tonight, "the middle class and unions did." As part of his plan to pay for much of his new spending, Biden announced that he will ask for $80 billion in extra funding for the IRS so that they can audit more tax returns for people making more than $400,000 a year. In the past decade, the audit staff of the IRS has decreased, as have the total of audits of taxpayers. And audits of high-income earners have decreased much more than audits of lower-income workers. As my colleague Bill Galston points out in a WSJ op-ed, it sounds almost too good to be true but if more wealthy individuals faced audits, the government could recover a big chunk of change—enough to help fund Biden's next set of proposals. And second, his plan emphasizes American jobs—jobs that will go to exactly the people displaced by globalization. In perhaps the most powerful statement of the evening, Biden said, "All the investments in the American jobs plan will be guided by one principle: buy American… American tax dollars will be used to buy American products and create American jobs." And he announced that even before passage of legislation he has limited the ability of his Cabinet to offer exemptions from the mandate to buy American. We are seeing a very different presidency than we have seen in recent years. Like others before him Biden has big plans. But he has the depth and breadth of experience to make them reality. Or at least that's what we've seen in this first 100 days. [1] See the excellent analysis in Going Public: New Strategies of Presidential Leadership.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now | ||||||
| An asymmetric defense of Taiwan Posted: 28 Apr 2021 01:15 PM PDT By Michael E. O'Hanlon In recent months, as China's threats against Taiwan have mounted, strategists and policymakers have been debating whether it is time for a change to the somewhat tortured method by which the United States has sought to preserve stability across the Taiwan Strait since the late 1970s. The current policy of "strategic ambiguity" seeks to keep everyone guessing as to whether America would militarily counter a Chinese attack on its much smaller neighbor. Washington's specific response would depend on how a crisis began and unfolded. That is because America has had multiple, sometimes conflicting goals—to deter China from attack, to preserve good U.S.-China relations, and to discourage pro-independence forces within Taiwan all at once. Some now favor discarding this elaborate balancing act in favor of an unambiguous commitment to Taiwan's security. There is just one problem with this way of thinking. A promise by America to defend Taiwan does not mean that it could defend it. That is especially the case if one considers a protracted Chinese blockade of the island, and imagines that the United States would try to break the blockade directly. Such an attack would employ China's quiet submarine fleet and perhaps some use of precision missiles. The goal would likely be to strangle Taiwan into capitulation, as Germany almost did twice against Britain in the world wars. Taiwan has just increased its military budget 10 percent, to about $15 billion a year, but it is dwarfed by China's total, which is more than fifteen times as great. At that level of investment, Taiwan may be able to fend off an outright Chinese invasion attempt with a "porcupine" defense featuring sea mines, anti-ship missiles launched from shore batteries and helicopters, and concentrated resistance wherever China tries to come ashore. But it would likely fare less well against a more indirect Chinese strategy. American advantages in fifth-generation combat aircraft and modern attack submarines would give the United States and its partners in the operation a significant edge in a campaign designed to break the blockade. However, China would clearly have the edge in geography; crucially, it also now possesses a fleet of very good attack submarines and a large inventory of precision-strike missiles too. The essence of the problem is that America cannot reliably find Chinese attack submarines before they get off one or more shots at ships, including possibly U.S. aircraft carriers, in the region. Worse, if they use long-range missiles against U.S. ships, then it may not be possible to find the submarines after such attacks. The only truly reliable way to counter the threat would be to attack the submarines in port when they refuel and rearm. In other words: the United States would need to attack the Chinese mainland, with all the enormous risks of escalation that could portend. The challenge is similar in regard to China's inventory of more than one thousand precision-strike missiles. They can be fired from many locations in southeastern mainland China against airfields, ports, and other infrastructure on Taiwan—and against ships at sea. U.S. missile defenses might be able to neutralize some. But in a saturation attack, and given the state of the offense-defense balance in regard to such missiles, many would surely get through. Again, America's likely recourse would be to search for and attack the missile launchers on mainland Chinese soil. Meanwhile, both sides would have strong incentives to take down or jam each other's satellites, hack command and control systems, cut fiber-optic communications cables, and otherwise seek to create mayhem in order to blind and cripple the adversary. It is distinctly possible the United States could lose thousands of sailors and other personnel in the course of such a conflict. That is why defense strategist and former John McCain aide Chris Brose reports that in Pentagon wargames over Taiwan, China often defeats us. Even if China started to lose such a war, given how strongly it feels about Taiwan, it would have powerful incentives to introduce the use of tactical nuclear weapons into the equation, targeting aircraft carrier battle groups and bases on Japan with these weapons. Just where this foreboding path would end is hard to predict. Countries at war tend to do irrational or escalatory things when the tide of battle does not at first go their way and when they consider their survival as a nation to be at stake. Losing Taiwan would go far towards invalidating the legitimacy of communist rule in China, as its leaders surely know. They would be extremely reluctant to accept defeat in this kind of war. There must be a better way. Strategist Bridge Colby has recently sketched out part of the right strategy with his call for a massive U.S. airlift effort to keep Taiwan afloat in the course of any such boa constrictor strategy by the People's Republic of China, modeled after the Berlin airlift of Cold War times. But also, America needs a better offensive campaign plan. The most promising strategy would center on all-out economic warfare against China. The United States should cut off all trade with China at the outset of any such war, and pressure U.S. allies to do the same. That strategy necessitates numerous preparatory measures now to increase America's collective resilience to such a scenario. In addition, unless the crisis is quickly resolved, the United States should consider using its military superiority in the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf regions to go after China's economic lifelines there, attacking shipping that is likely headed to Chinese destinations using U.S. attack submarines, long-range bombers, and other stealth aircraft based throughout the region. China gets half or more of its energy from the broader Persian Gulf and African theaters, so its vulnerability here is great. And because the crews of most modern ships number in the dozens, the human stakes here while serious are far less than in war that could quickly involve Chinese and Japanese territory. (Indeed, America should try to develop improved nonlethal ordnance to incapacitate ships without sinking them.) Even after these military attacks begin, the goal of course should remain a negotiated outcome. It is not credible to envision with any confidence a decisive, permanent military victory in any U.S.-China war—unless the two countries collectively wind up in Armageddon. And yes, the United States can realistically commit to this kind of strategy now. That will especially be the case if it continues to reduce its collective western dependencies on key Chinese exports, like rare Earths, by stockpiling supplies and developing alternative sources. America and its allies are overdue in making such efforts. Thankfully, there is reason to think that U.S. collective insouciance is starting to end on the economic side of the ledger. Now, the Pentagon, along with the U.S. Treasury Department and the rest of the government, need to take advantage of this situation and develop a better integrated, asymmetric strategy for protecting Taiwan.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now | ||||||
| Figure of the Week: COVID-19’s impact on debt risks in sub-Saharan Africa Posted: 28 Apr 2021 01:14 PM PDT By Tamara White Earlier this month, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) launched its spring Regional Economic Outlook report for sub-Saharan Africa, in which it explores COVID-19's impact on debt accumulation in sub-Saharan Africa, among other themes. According to the report, public debt in the region has increased to almost 58 percent of its GDP, the highest it has been in 20 years. According to the report, , up from six countries just seven years ago (Figure 1). Notably, one-quarter of the region's GDP comes from these 17 countries, and eight of them are considered fragile states. Figure 1. Sub-Saharan Africa: Debt risk status for low-income developing countries eligible for the IMF's Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust, 2014-20
Source: International Monetary Fund. 2021. "Regional economic outlook. Sub Saharan Africa: navigating a long pandemic." (April), International Monetary Fund, Washington, D.C. As seen in the figure, while the number of countries at low risk of debt distress dropped during the pandemic, the number of countries at risk for moderate and high debt distress increased. This rise is due to increased spending—necessary for combating both the health implications and the fall in economic activity under the COVID-19 pandemic, write the authors. (For more on the balance between debt management and spending in a crisis, see Brahima S. Coulibaly's Foresight Africa 2021 viewpoint.) To address the challenge, the authors call for fiscal consolidation to help improve the debt footing in the region to one that is more sustainable—a recommendation they offered in the 2017 edition of the same report. Fiscal consolidation—periods of fiscal adjustment during which spending cuts are made or non-commodity revenue is mobilized to improve fiscal positions—is important when these countries are creating plans to move toward sustainable recovery post-COVID-19. They also write that the main challenge to fiscal consolidation would be creating more fiscal space. More specifically, they suggest that, depending on circumstances, governments looking to expand their fiscal space can look to tax policies that (1) increase the progressivity and coverage of personal income taxes, (2) eliminate distortionary corporate income tax exemptions and incentives, (3) increase the role of property and environmental taxes, and (4) broaden the value-added tax (VAT) base. (For more on strategies for effective domestic resource mobilization, see the policy brief, "Mobilization of tax revenues in Africa: State of play and policy options.") The IMF also highlights that transparency and good governance are key to the region's economic recovery. With the influx of loans and development funds, it is important for governments to be transparent and ensure that the funds given are going to the people who need it most. Already, they write, more than 60 percent of the countries have committed to publishing procurement information, almost 80 percent have committed to publishing information on beneficial ownerships, and all countries have committed to audits. (For more on stemming illicit financial flows in the region, see "New trends in illicit financial flows from Africa.") As for the future of debt relief, the IMF states that some countries in Africa will find themselves facing a difficult choice between debt repayment and essential health obligations that can be critical in a pandemic and afterward. The report suggests that as countries reach debt amounts that exceed their capacity to pay back, creditors should quickly agree on terms of debt treatment. (For more on calls for creditors to offer debt relief in the face of COVID-19, see "The unfinished agenda of financing Africa's COVID-19 response.") For more on debt in Africa, especially in the face of the COVID-19 crisis, check out these resources:
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| In contrast with Trump, Biden relies on disciplined surrogates to get his message out Posted: 28 Apr 2021 08:26 AM PDT By Andrea Risotto White House press secretary Jen Psaki's first press conference marked a significant change in tone from the previous administration. The Trump presidency was plagued by four years of escalating tension and deepening cynicism between communications staff and the media, often the result of mutual mistrust and the president's frequent attacks on the press. From his first days in office, former President Trump favored using his personal Twitter account over the tools available to his communications team, giving him total control over his message and a channel directly to his followers. Hours after Joe Biden was sworn in as the 46th president, Psaki took the first question of her first press briefing. Asked whether she saw her primary role as promoting the interests of the president or providing the "unvarnished truth" to reporters, she responded in part, "I have deep respect for the role of a free and independent press in our democracy…there will be moments when we disagree…but we have a common goal, which is sharing accurate information with the American people." Biden's senior communications staff made history as the first all-female communications team but that landmark will likely prove less memorable than the dramatic shift in strategy that has marked Biden's communications approach in his first 100 days. According to data by UC Santa Barbara's The American Presidency Project, the Trump White House bested itself in setting the record for the longest amount of time without holding a formal press briefing, when it went over 400 days without one. Stephanie Grisham, who spent eight months as press secretary for Donald Trump and became the first press secretary in history never to hold a formal briefing, told ABC News, "President Trump communicates directly with the American people more than any president in history. The fact that the White House Press Corps can no longer grandstand on TV is of no concern to us." Indeed, in the Trump White House, his press secretaries' briefings never proved very beneficial, perhaps most notably because the president preferred to be his own spokesman. Whatever views he shared on Twitter were far more likely to dominate the headlines than whatever a press secretary or another appointed official said. It is a stark contrast to Joe Biden's first months in office. Although he broke a century-old record by waiting seven weeks to give his first formal briefing, his staff hosted briefings every working day. There has been a great deal of conjecture over whether the decision to wait nearly two months for a Biden press conference was a result of wanting a major policy victory to announce or hoping to avoid a public relations gaffe. It may, however, be neither. It may be a sign that Joe Biden has empowered his communications staff and several disciplined spokespeople to deliver his messages for him, especially when they focus on his efforts to bring relief to the American people. "He’s the president, he’s got a lot on his plate. We have people fanning out every single day across different media to amplify his message," deputy communications director Kate Berner said in an interview with Politico. It does appear that the return to more traditional approaches in communications tactics is more comfortable for the press who covers the president, as the questions and criticisms of how the media should and did cover the Trump presidency have disappeared in the first months of the Biden presidency. Communicating amid crisis It is often said that, in a crisis, it is important to communicate early and often. Upon taking office, President Biden laid out a series of goals for addressing the COVID-19 pandemic, which had already claimed 403,000 American lives by Inauguration Day. One week into his presidency, a newly-created White House COVID-19 Response Team began hosting daily virtual briefings. Notably absent from these briefings was the president himself, in yet another modification from the prior administration—where former President Trump's off-the-cuff remarks were generally confusing and sometimes downright dangerous—as when he suggested the coronavirus might be treated by injecting disinfectants into the body. The COVID-19 Response Team briefings have been clear and matter-of-fact, following a pattern that includes senior health advisors sharing data and progress reports. A key member of the Response Team is Dr. Anthony Fauci, whom Joe Biden asked to stay on from the Trump task force as a chief advisor. Emerging as the most popular government official out of the pandemic, Dr. Fauci has remained a highly-visible spokesman, sharing updates everywhere from media interviews to late night talk shows to celebrity Instagram accounts. The administration's approach to the economic recession created out of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as its re-engagement on the world stage, including efforts to incorporate climate policies into every area of government, have presented numerous opportunities for getting proactive messaging out to the American people. In these areas too, the Biden White House has chosen to let surrogates do the talking. Reaching people where they are Although his predecessor was well-known for his Twitter presence up until the company permanently suspended his account, the Biden team has not sworn off social media, in large part because it remains a popular conduit to the American public. Research shows that most Americans get their news online and increasing numbers are getting it from social media. White House communications director Kate Bedingfield has confirmed that social media will be one way the White House communicates but, "You can expect that President Biden is not breaking news at 1 a.m. on Twitter." While President Biden's social media accounts have been unremarkable in the early days of his presidency, especially in comparison to his predecessor, it is worth remembering that as Vice President, Joe Biden became a semi-sensation, regularly featuring in viral and humorous memes. Will this approach work? How Americans get and share information constantly evolves, which means each new administration grapples with the best ways to spread its messages. It may seem quaint now to remember that it took until 2009, for example, for Barack Obama to become the first sitting president to appear on a late night talk show. Whether the Biden White House's approach to communications will prove to be successful remains to be seen. If the president's policies to address the current health and economic crises are successful, it may be in the administration's interests to have the president highly visible to claim the wins. It is also possible by then, the memory of Donald Trump's late-night tweets will have waned, and a majority of people will crave an American president back in the spotlight. On the other hand, if Joe Biden can deliver results to the American public, that may be what truly matters most when election time rolls around again.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now | ||||||
| The importance of USMCA for the Biden administration’s economic and foreign policy Posted: 28 Apr 2021 08:12 AM PDT By Joshua P. Meltzer In her confirmation hearing, U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai stated that "trade is like any other tool in our domestic or foreign policy. It is a means to create more hope and opportunity." With this in mind, President Biden has made clear that trade must improve wages and create higher-paying jobs for all Americans as he focuses on controlling COVID-19, restoring economic growth and employment, and expanding opportunity by investing in education, R&D, and infrastructure. In this respect, there is no more important regional trade agreement for the U.S. than the United States-Mexico-Canada trade agreement (USMCA). Why North American trade relations are so importantThe significance of USMCA is clear. Canada and Mexico are the United States' largest export markets: 23 percent of U.S. exports go to Canada and Mexico (versus 5 percent to China), over 70 percent of Mexican exports are sent to the U.S. and Canada, and 62 percent of Canadian exports are to the U.S. and Mexico. Trade among the countries provides key inputs into regional supply chains' value added (40 percent U.S. value add versus 5 percent China). This is particularly true in the auto sector, which dominates manufactured trade between all three countries. The importance of resilient supply chains has also been made abundantly clear in light of the impact of COVID-19, and as competition with China exposes vulnerabilities to relying on Chinese supply chains. The Biden administration has ordered a review of U.S. supply chains, with the objective of decreasing American dependence on Chinese production of critical inputs. Integrated North American supply chains could provide a viable alternative to Chinese manufacturing and allow some critical industries to move production closer to home.
A new beginningThe Biden administration has signaled that one of its priorities will be strengthening diplomatic relationships with America's traditional allies, including Canada and Mexico. Following Trump's "America First" approach, an early and visible commitment to strengthening the economic relationship between the three North American partners would be a welcome signal that the Biden administration will prioritize alliance diplomacy. The USMCA builds on the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which first integrated the region's economies when it came into effect in 1994, but also presents a new template for North American relations. USMCA was the first free trade agreement backed by the AFL-CIO labor union and it passed the Senate with overwhelming bipartisan support (89-10 compared with 60-38 for NAFTA in 1993). This support underscores the agreement's potential for rebuilding consensus on how to advance economic integration consistent with good jobs, growing wages, strong labor standards, and environmental protection. To maintain broad political support, however, the Biden administration will need to continually engage, both domestically and with partners in Canada and Mexico, to ensure USMCA is delivering on its promise. The USMCA sunset clause requiring joint review and agreement on renewal in year 6 of the agreement provides added urgency to getting the USMCA right. More than NAFTAUSMCA builds on NAFTA in ways that underscore how much international trade policy has shifted from a focus on tariffs to nontariff regulatory issues. In fact, USMCA largely keeps NAFTA's tariff rates, retaining tariff free U.S.-Mexico trade and including some further market access improvements with respect to U.S.-Canada trade. The USMCA addresses regulatory differences that create unnecessary barriers to trade. It also rebalances rights and obligations, rolling back some commitments, such as access to investor-state dispute settlements (ISDS), and strengthening commitments in support of labor rights, environmental standards, and small businesses. Stricter rules of origin for autos that require 75 percent local content (up from 62.5 percent under NAFTA) should also create incentives for domestic manufacturing, another potential win for workers. An early focus on implementation and compliance is neededHow the USMCA works in practice will be key to sustaining the high level of bipartisan support. The most immediate need is for all governments to fully implement and comply with the agreement. The Trump years undermined other governments' faith in U.S. commitment to the rule of law, which also undermined the business certainty these agreements are meant to provide. Indeed, the United States International Trade Commission (USITC) identified reduced investor uncertainty, highlighting the importance of compliance by all governments if the benefits of USMCA are to be realized. Strict U.S. compliance at home, combined with a willingness to use USMCA enforcement tools to address compliance issues in Mexico and Canada, can help restore faith in the U.S. government's commitment and signal that business can rely on the agreement when making decisions to trade and invest. The administration also needs to invest in making the agreement's many committees productive and dynamic, using these institutional mechanisms to give the effect of a living agreement. For example, a new Competitiveness Committee will bring together officials from the three countries to assess the implementation and identify scope for further integration to increase regional competitiveness. Furthermore, it creates opportunities for the partners to continually review and update their associated trade and investment policies—but only if governments meaningfully invest in the process. As noted, USMCA also includes a "joint review" mechanism, which calls for the three countries to come together every six years to identify where the agreement is succeeding and where it is falling short. The review mechanism was controversial during the negotiations, as critics worried it would introduce greater uncertainty and could be used as pretext for a government to pull out of the deal. Yet the ultimate impact of the review mechanism will depend on how governments use it: whether they approach it not as a chance to air grievances and threaten withdrawal but as an opportunity for ensuring the trade agreement is functioning effectively.
Ultimately, the U.S., Canadian, and Mexican governments should use USMCA as the backbone for a renewed vision of North American competitiveness, helping the three partners align their economic strategies and interests amid a shifting global political economy. Yet, such an outcome will not simply spontaneously emerge because the trade deal is in place. Rather, it will require ongoing commitment, attention, and (where necessary) adjustment from leaders. This is one of the reasons why we intend to closely follow the USMCA implementation over the coming years. The new USMCA monitoring, research, and engagement project at Brookings will track where the agreement is delivering and identify areas where improvements are needed. We will leverage our convening power to bring to the table key stakeholders—the U.S. administration and Congress, leading government officials and legislators in Canada and Mexico, business, labor, and civil society—on specific issues such as impact on labor rights and wages, support for digital trade, and how USMCA strengthens (or not) North American supply chains. We will monitor progress and present policy options for strengthening the agreement. At one of the first roundtables convened at Brookings earlier this month, senior business, academic, and civil society representatives from the U.S., Mexico, and Canada stressed the importance of USMCA for North American competitiveness, particularly amid a post-COVID-19 push to build more resilient regional supply chains. But they also noted some potential stumbling blocks, pointing to the need for increased government engagement. In the coming months, ensuring effective implementation and high compliance with the agreement will be critical and will require policymakers' ongoing time and attention. Former Secretary of State George Schultz used to compare diplomacy to gardening: Successful diplomacy requires continual tending, pulling weeds before they overwhelm the fertile ground. Trade relationships require similar attention from policymakers—checking in with partners, addressing irritants before they become lingering disputes, coming up with strategies to address new shared challenges, and building on the successes that create more hope and opportunity for all.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now | ||||||
| The Johnson and Johnson vaccine pause and the challenge of risk assessment Posted: 28 Apr 2021 07:58 AM PDT By Michael Feuer The stunning, some would say miraculous, scientific achievement that brought us vaccines against COVID-19 in record-shattering time hit a snag with news reports that some people who took the Johnson and Johnson injection experienced life-threatening thrombosis. On April 12 the FDA and CDC reported six cases of a "rare and severe type of blood clot" among the approximately seven million doses administered, and "paused" use of the J&J vaccine pending analysis of more data. The decision was quickly hailed as a legitimate, cautionary step. By April 14 there were two more reported cases, with one reported death. As the week progressed, with intensive review of the data underway, questions inevitably surfaced, including how the vaccine risk compares to hazards of normal life. For example, every year more than 38,000 people die in crashes on U.S. roadways, which translates to a rate of about 12 in 100,000, or more than 900 times greater than the odds of dying from the vaccine related blood clots. Roughly one in six Americans fall ill each year from foodborne pathogens, and 3000 die. We invest in programs to increase safety, but we wouldn't "pause" all driving and eating until the risks fall to zero. (Call-backs of selected cars to fix identified defects, and removing foods with known pathogens from grocery shelves, are more obviously justified because the risks are specific.) It is likely that such considerations influenced the FDA and CDC. In any case, when the hold was lifted 11 days later, the numbers had climbed to 15 reported cases and three deaths; the revised recommendation emphasized that the risk was still miniscule compared to the risk of not being vaccinated, but added a requirement that J&J attach a warning label. Many people were already skeptical about COVID vaccines: according to polling data from the week before the pause, unvaccinated Americans were split evenly about their willingness to be vaccinated. Although popular acceptance had begun to rise, thanks to efforts of responsible commentators, clergy, community activists, and of course the persistent pleas from the White House and public health experts, the pause and its cancellation likely added to the level of lingering doubt and may have hardened resistance. Concerns grew that abundant evidence of risk for not being vaccinated might be inadequate to calm anxieties among a sizable population. The episode provides a crisp reminder that risk assessment, though fundamentally mathematical, is more complicated. Human emotions, intuitions, and values constrain—or perhaps enrich—judgment that would otherwise be based only on cold hard statistics. Knowledge of the laws of probability is often not sufficient to motivate what might be viewed as "correct" decisions: even top government epidemiologists, acting "out of an abundance of caution," chose action that seemed at odds with the underlying data. But the impulse toward zero risk tolerance is not surprising. In Spring 2002, the eminent economist and game theorist, Thomas Schelling (who won the Nobel prize a few years later), recounted how a friend, coincidentally an expert in probability theory, would not leave home until the sniper in suburban Washington who had already killed ten innocent victims was caught. As Schelling wryly noted, once the sniper was stopped his friend went back to driving on his usual routes, thereby increasing his chances of violent death by orders of magnitude. Clearly, something other than the simple analytics of probability intervened in this person's "rational" decision making; it most likely influenced the pause decision by FDA and CDC scientists too. What can be done to counterbalance the tendency among many people, including scientific experts, to veer toward risk-minimizing choices that may produce unintended negative consequences? In the J&J case, those consequences included, perhaps most obviously, that people might postpone or forego vaccination altogether, the effects of which could be catastrophic. But are we ready to impose a level of risk-aversion or risk-acceptance, based on mathematical computation, that may run counter to people's comfort levels? Are we ready to install the equivalent of a mathematical "veto" over the advice of our elected and appointed officials? We expect scientists at the CDC and FDA to exercise judgment informed by data—but would not want them driven exclusively by data. Good leaders are not robots: we rely on their instincts and values as well as their expertise, and often must tolerate decisions and recommendations that transcend or, in some cases, may even seem to defy, empirical evidence. We value transparency and honesty, and should applaud leaders who, as in this case, clearly have the public interest at heart and were willing to amend their initial decision in the light of new evidence. The question is not whether they reached an ephemeral "optimal" solution, but whether their decision was based on sufficient and appropriate deliberation. The challenge to policy makers was formidable, and with the labeling requirement they sought a delicate balance: between emphasizing the low level of risk and shifting ultimate responsibility for accepting it to individuals. Reminding the public that the danger is relatively low compared to many other routine activities hopefully will curb some of the understandable—albeit misguided—resistance to vaccines without proof of their 100% efficacy. Though imperfect, the compromise followed familiar precedent, e.g., the requirement that pharmaceutical companies label their products with known side effects. The rationale there, too, is that prospective users of various drugs are free to choose, hopefully with their physicians' guidance, whether to take the risk. Still, uncertain behavioral responses to complex messages suggest that even trustworthy information can produce additional risks (!). Which begs the question: are there situations in which the government should mandate what might be called the "correct" behavior? If Schelling's friend had been coaxed (or forced) out of his home, for example, there would have been a loud public outcry. And for good reason: government coercion would be difficult to justify unless it could be shown that staying indoors causes other people harm or hazard. But some externalities do justify coercive intervention: we prohibit smoking in elevators and levy fines for littering our roads and polluting our air and water. Resistance to mandatory wearing of masks provides a painful reminder of how difficult it is to enforce socially responsible behavior. On the other hand, whether the social good—for example, sending children back to school—justifies an intrusion into teachers' personal risk-aversion thresholds, is fraught with other legal and moral dilemmas. Under what conditions individual rights can be abridged for the sake of the social order is a familiar question, which the US and many countries are facing again because of the pandemic. Finally, I return to the nagging counterfactual. How many people who heard about the J&J pause decided to not get vaccinated at all? The FDA and CDC should be commended for sharing the data and making public health and safety the number-one priority. Still, it might have been prudent for them to weigh the possibility that some number of people, maybe thousands or more, would now choose to decline or postpone their shots, subject themselves to a greater risk of infection, and cause increased spread and surges of illness, hospitalization, and death. This possibility has significant international implications: the pause might have heightened anxiety in other countries regarding, for example, the AstraZeneca vaccine (which also raised alarm about potential side effects), with dire consequences especially in places where it’s hard to administer required double doses. (Advantages of the J&J vaccine, which also need to be integrated in the risk analysis, are its "one-shot" requirement and less expensive refrigeration.) Simply put, vaccines will save millions of lives globally—even if that outcome is not 100% free of side effects. How to specify the implied benefit/cost model is not obvious, and anyway its estimates would not provide a scientific basis for establishing the acceptable threshold, which in democratic societies is ultimately a political decision. At least two lessons from the J&J experience should inform a more comprehensive approach to risk assessment and policy, for COVID and generally: (1) Telling people the objective level of danger for any activity (flying, getting vaccinated, smoking) may not be sufficient to influence behavior, but imposing a risk threshold may violate norms of individual choice and ignore powerful emotional responses. And (2), although free choice can result in unacceptably high levels of social harm, the perceived benefits of stopping any activity need to be weighed against the costs of unintentionally inducing people to make even riskier choices. Science brought us vaccines, thank God. And science needs to focus on the biology of blood clots and other side effects we haven't yet experienced. But rational policy-making transcends medical science and demands attention to psychological, economic, legal, political, ethical, and other perspectives. The risks of ignoring those aspects of the problem are substantial. Many thanks to John Andelin and Dorothy Robyn for comments on an earlier draft, and to John Hudak and Christine Stenglein for fine editing.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
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