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鈥淭o go back a little bit, Covid is possibly the first global event that we鈥檝e actually seen. One year after it really started, we are seeing all these vaccines. It is really quite incredible when you think about the scientific advancement, it has really been something quite extraordinary. But our systems of management globally of knowledge and health are weak and counterproductive and in adequate. I鈥檇 say they鈥檙e probably best described as unjust and incompetent. Let鈥檚 start with this whole question of patent rights. Right from the outset it became quite clear that it was hindering the fight against covid. From the early days if you remember N95 masks we鈥檙e a concern, then treatments like remdesivir, so it鈥檚 not only a vaccine issue. This was the basis for last years鈥� call for the Covid technology access pool, which was rebuffed despite widespread support. It was rebuffed by the advanced countries. It鈥檚 hard to imagine why this should be the case because such technologies for public health are massive and have positive spill over benefits. Moving now to vaccines, I think the system is even more inefficient when one considers the fact that many companies across the world received significant subsidies for vaccines. Estimates range from about $100 billion and in some cases the entire cost; Moderna and Johnson and Johnson vaccines that were paid for by a public set of money. Such is the case for having patent rights to allow for innovation completely disappears. Now the debate has moved, that it is not actually IP which is the restriction, it鈥檚 the ability to produce and manufacturing capacity. But remember eight months ago that did not exist in developed economies. People like the Moderna chief chemist said it takes about three to four months to actually set up these factories. What we should鈥檝e had was a massive transfer in technology to places that could actually do this, completely open access to technology of all sorts, and ramping up production on a sort of global war scale. That has not happened and is it鈥檚 still not happening because of these limitations and unfortunately despite India and South Africa making the case in the WTO and despite some better noises from the Biden administration we鈥檙e really not seeing much movement.鈥� 鈥� Arjun Jayadev

鈥淲hat I’d really like to see going forward is some sort of vision which is inclusive and forward-looking in the medium and long term about all these kinds of aspects welfare; health, education, environment. In the past, we’ve had a situation when we’ve looked at other countries which have made this transition to more advanced economies. They have always had some element of industrial policy thinking through how they actually going to shift their populations from low-productivity to high-productivity. Currently, I think we’re doing things with a hope and a prayer. Our growth models have fizzled out so far. What we’re looking for is something in the next three to five years which will be aimed at re-opening new markets, more inclusion, and really ensuring the wealth of a much much larger fraction of the population than we are currently doing.鈥� — Arjun Jayadev, Bloomberg “Jayadev, a professor of economics at Azim Premji University, said India has returned home this year after decades of failure in providing access to quality health care for a large part of the population. If there is a silver lining, then the crisis will give the country a chance to 鈥渂uild better,鈥� in the words of Jaydev. This includes at least three elements 鈥� an environment that is closely linked to health outcomes, with a medium-term plan to keep health and education spending at a consistently high level. 鈥� aimed at improving the quality of the environment and, finally, committed to support. one-third of these elements are something similar to a city employment program. The budget could also help immediately by universalizing the PDS and supporting revenues through direct remittances, Jayadev said. 鈥淥verall, short-term relief and long-term structural focus will help transition to a more inclusive and vital growth strategy that is missing in the current vision.” — Pallavi Nahata, Bloomberg

鈥渢he vaccines developed by these companies were developed thanks wholly or partly to taxpayer money. Those vaccines essentially belong to the people — and yet the people are about to pay for them again, and with little prospect of getting as many as they need fast enough. … mounting pressure from poor countries at the W.T.O. should give the governments of rich countries leverage to negotiate with their pharmaceutical companies for cheaper drugs and vaccines worldwide. Leaning on those companies is the right thing to do in the face of a global pandemic; it is also the best way for the governments of rich countries to take care of their own populations, which in some cases experience more severe drug shortages than do people in far less affluent places.鈥� — Achal Prabhala, Arjun Jayadev and Dean Baker

Inequality, in many ways, may be the biggest question of our times. And yet it is a topic that is still underexplored in conventional economics curricula.