How Do We Get America Back on Track? Goldwater Has a Plan

April 23, 2020

The COVID-19 outbreak has rapidly changed what our daily lives look like. In a matter of weeks, we’ve become experts on “social distancing” and “sheltering in place.” We’ve had to adjust to the new realities of remote work and distance learning. And there’s a big question now on everyone’s minds: How can America get back—back to health, back to our jobs, back to school, back to supermarkets and restaurants and stores, back to the life we used to know?

The Goldwater Institute is rolling out a comprehensive plan to put us on the right course to revitalize America—to put this crisis behind us and to help mitigate the impact of future pandemics. Recovery requires us to focus our efforts in three major areas:

1. Help find a treatment—and hopefully a cure. Obviously, at the center of this crisis is the need to get Americans healthy, to neutralize the public health threat caused by COVID-19. That’s why we need to help find a treatment—and hopefully a cure—for this deadly virus. We need to speed up the overly bureaucratic drug approval process to get innovative treatments to patients more quickly, and we need to ensure doctors have the most complete knowledge possible regarding potential treatments so they can deliver the most informed care to their patients. And we need to expand access to healthcare by doing away with anti-competitive laws and making it easier for doctors to work across state lines—or deliver care via telemedicine. Read more about our plan to expand Americans’ access to healthcare.
2. Ensure children receive the education they deserve. It’s not just adults who are affected by COVID-19: Kids’ lives have been greatly disrupted, too. But we can help—we can ensure children receive the education they deserve despite this crisis. By expanding school choice options, we can empower parents to give their children an education that meets their unique needs. Tools like education savings accounts (ESAs) are one way to give families needed flexibility. And by boosting transparency in K-12 education, parents can get a fuller picture about what their kids are learning in the classroom and make better decisions about their education based on that knowledge. Read more about our plan to ensure children get the education they deserve.
3. Jumpstart the economy and get Americans back to work. With rising unemployment numbers and businesses being forced to shut their doors for the time being, our economy isn’t looking very healthy these days. One of the needed steps on our country’s journey back to health is to jumpstart the economy and get Americans back to work. States must work to break down government-imposed barriers to work and speed up job creation by protecting ways to earn a living from home. And as always, the Goldwater Institute will continue to fight government overreach by stomping out cronyism and litigating in defense of workers, taxpayers, and entrepreneurs. Read more about our plan to jumpstart the economy.

“America is going through a challenge unlike any we’ve ever been through, a crisis that requires creative and innovative policies to help us recover,” Goldwater Institute President and CEO Victor Riches said. “Fortunately, the Goldwater Institute was made for times like these. Our comprehensive plan to recover from COVID-19 is the roadmap America needs right now, and it will not only help us emerge from this difficult time, it will also help ensure we’re better insulated from future pandemics that threaten our lives and livelihoods.”

Read Goldwater’s comprehensive plan to revitalize America and recover from coronavirus here.

Read Goldwater’s full ongoing coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic and recovery here.