Will post-coronavirus America see a boom or will people just hunker down?

We’re not going back exactly to that normal life we remember. Even if restrictions are relaxed, many people will likely be reluctant to do things that seemed normal before — eating restaurant meals, fingering merchandise in clothing stores, attending mass events.

Governments’ powers to control people’s movements and restrict their behavior are, for good reasons, greatest in times of epidemics and wars. For that reason, many compare the limits and restrictions imposed in this and other countries with those during World War II. During what some people still call “the war,” the government shut down large parts of the economy and people were prevented from buying most consumer goods.

But there was this big difference: in today’s crisis, most people are typically confined to their homes. In World War II, millions of Americans were mobilized across the country and around the world. The coronavirus forces people to hunker down. World War II got them moving to places they otherwise would never have seen.