REDUCE SEMESTER FEE: A RELIEF REQUIRED DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC by Saloni Gautam

INTRODUCTION –

“Earning a lot of money is not the key to prosperity. How you handle it is.”

– Dave Ramsey

In the current times where the whole world is fighting with a huge issue in the form of Novel Corona Virus or COVID-19, this quote of Dave Ramsey seems to be quite relevance. If we read the quote, the way of prosperity has been indicated in the way of utilization of money and when almost whole of the world is locked in order to prevent the global pandemic, the smart utilization of money is required.

The utilization of money in the present scenario, when almost every business is shut or running with the minimum of the human resources and the issue of employment can be said to be on hype even after this matter is resolved as the world will be facing financial crisis.

ECONOMIC ISSUE ON THE GLOBAL LEVEL – The pandemic crisis is challenging governments to implement monetary and fiscal policies that support credit markets and sustain economic activity. Various countries have asked for the help of International organizations due to the poor condition of their fiscal policies and economy.

Various international organizations are also taking steps to provide loans and other financial assistance to countries in need. These and other actions have been labeled “unprecedented,” a term that has been used frequently to describe the pandemic and the policy responses. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimated that government spending and revenue measures to sustain economic activity adopted through mid-April 2020 amounted to $3.3 trillion and those loans, equity injections and guarantees totaled an additional $4.5 trillion.

These all represent the gravity of the situation. Many experts on economic and financial matters have warned about the worsening condition of global economic and financial structure. Such as Kristalina Georgieva, Managing Director of International Monitory Fund (IMF), explained that “a recession at least as bad as during the Global Financial Crisis or worse”.

COMPARING PRESENT AND PAST – There have been incidents which have disturbed the economic affairs all over the world which is also the current situation. If we talk about the situations disturbing the financial condition on the global level, we see various events such as the Great Depression, the financial crisis during and after world wars, the recession period in 2008 were the major events.

If we compare today’s condition, then we can observe that this situation is much more serious than the conditions faced in the history of human kind. This condition is not only vital in respect of its unique nature of the disease, but also in respect of the kind of measures taken by the countries for the prevention of this disease. The worldwide lockdowns have not been observed in the entire history of mankind.

RELIEFS REQUIRED TO BE PROVIDED TO THE GENERAL PUBLIC – The governments of various countries are taking effective measures for taking care of the economy as well as the employment of the people. The hardships of businesses too cannot be ignored. Various governments have allowed the industries to work with the minimum human resources where the work cannot be continued without the physical involvement of humans. In other forms of businesses where the work can be continued without physical involvement of the human, they are still instructed to take the physical offices shut and to ask their employees to continue working from home.

While the industries are suggested to keep taking the work from their employees without calling them in physical offices and are also instructed not to remove any employee from work or cannot cutoff their salaries. The employees have been facing the monetary issues as the salaries are not being credited from their respective employers.

ISSUES FACED BY THE WORKING CLASS – The issue of money has intensified when the expanses of the people have increased but there is no source of income as the salaries are not being credited by the employers. This issue will further be intensified when the lockdown period will be over and companies will work for covering up losses suffered during the COVID-19 outbreak period. It is also to be kept in mind that as the companies will be focusing on reducing the expenses, many of the employees will be laid off and the salaries will be reduced.

Whenever such issue has came in front of the world, there were some or the other solutions present in order to keep the economies at least in the stable mode but when we talk of the Novel Corona Virus then it is also not certain that any vaccine of this pandemic will be discovered/ invented or not and if yes then in how much time.

People who are currently not receiving any salaries or they are unable to earn for their survival are dependent upon their savings. These savings cannot be said to be very helpful till the end of this issue.

ONE UNIDENTIFIED ISSUE – All these issues are not very new for any of the readers and these can be easily foreseen by any of these problems. But there is one more issue which is going to be arising soon as the new semesters will be started.

The universities have been taking a considerable amount of money as the fees of one semester. The average fee of the traditional universities can be calculated Rs. 60,000. Such a high amount can be burden-sum upon the working class of the society during this period of crisis.

CONCLUSION – The situation of Novel Corona Virus or COVID-19 is something which has been an unprecedented issue and as this is something which is grave than the situations of the Great Depression or the recession. This can be observed through the quote of Warren Buffett as given below:

“In the 20th century, the United States endured two world wars and other traumatic and expensive military conflicts, the Depression, a dozen or so recessions and financial panics, oil shocks, a flu epidemic, and the resignation of a disgraced president. Yet the Dow rose from 66 to 11,497.”

Warren Buffett

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) lost about one-third of its value between February 14, 2020, and March 23, 2020. This shows that present pandemic situation is much vital than all the issues faced till the date.

In such a time, when the people are fighting with the virus as well as the financial issues, new burden cannot be imposed upon them in the form of semester fee.