The International Monetary Fund (IMF) issued a warning about 2023, claiming it will be “tougher” than 2022. It seems the last few years have brought every variety of economic difficulties. A pandemic forced an unprecedented global lockdown. The nature of how we work changed, and workplaces are still adjusting to the rise of remote work. Governments borrowed or printed ridiculous amounts of money to subsidize struggling people and companies. As a result, governments worldwide are taking measures to combat record inflation numbers. Then there was a supply chain crisis, which proved that globalization has already taken over.
The word “unprecedented” is losing meaning when it comes to economic disasters, especially among young Americans. It’s true that each of the economic disasters that have happened since the Great Recession has been unique somehow. But for Americans born near 2000, life has been a whirlwind of unprecedented financial disasters.
2008 Had the Great Recession, which set economies worldwide back several years. Unlike previous non-violent economic disasters, the collapse from 2007-2009 hit many of the world’s largest economies. That set the stage for a collective approach in which world leaders collaborated to find a solution.
The Great Recession
In 2009, the G20 came together and reached a plan for a global approach to mitigating the crisis. Unprecedented times required unprecedented measures, and world leaders were collaborating in an effort to solve a non-war problem. That, too, felt unprecedented. Since then, countries have maintained their sovereignty but increasingly act as a committee.
Whether at the UN or G20 and G7 summits, world leaders have taken an approach that cements globalization over the last 15 years. The 2009 crisis revealed how intertwined world economies had become. In 2016, the UK’s Brexit movement saw a nation distancing itself from the globalization movement by leaving the European Union. Ultimately, it appears the United Kingdom is worse off since then, although Brexit was not the only setback in the last six years.
Global economic entanglement
When the pandemic had clearly become a worldwide problem in early 2020, world leaders, once again, sought a unified approach. Once again, young people were faced with an unprecedented, “once-in-a-lifetime” crisis. However, people born around the year 2000 had already been through a once-in-a-lifetime crisis in their early life. It seemed like the world was finally recovering from 2009, and now came more proof that global economies are deeply interconnected.
Even if the pandemic wasn’t enough proof, the supply chain crisis that resulted from the Suez canal blockage proved this. Trade routes halfway around the world from the US resulted in price increases and a shortage of goods for Americans. And now, as the IMF warns of a “tougher” 2023, it resounds worldwide because the world is experiencing post-pandemic inflation. The IMF appears to have a global vision for the future, but that’s not happening yet. Each country has its own degrees of inflation and is taking its own approach, but the crisis remains global.
The world is different
The changes technology has brought to the world, from social media to streaming, have also created an unprecedented level of intercommunication between global communities. For younger generations who grew up on social media, the word unprecedented has lost meaning because everything about the way we interact today is unprecedented. The world has changed, for better or worse, and we are now intricately tied.
Countries rarely manufacture their own goods anymore. Sure, to some degree, there is autonomous production. But every country relies on a global supply chain to keep up with the rest of the world. Perhaps we should stop feeling shocked at ‘unprecedented’ events and start realizing the world behaves differently than it did 15 years ago.
