Has the year 2021 been a “lost” year because of Covid? And similarly 2020?

Certainly the rate of economic growth faltered. Yet, purely from this perspective, this was perhaps not such a bad thing.

No matter what gets said, efforts in Europe (and wherever else they are being seriously implemented) to launch measures meant to counter climate warming were going to usher in times during which brakes would have to be put on the European economy. Without any doubt, this would have generated political resistance across many social fronts.

As economic growth slowed down due to Covid, the burdens that followed or will be following in the wake of the “green” measures being launched were felt less... or got blurred in the burdens resulting from the anti-Covid programmes being rolled out. Meanwhile, the project to contain climate warming in Europe has been kept running... though it is falling behind on the datelines initially set for it.

Which is why on this basis, one can hardly label 2021 as a lost year. Or for that matter, the previous one.

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IS CHRIST A MYTH?

Should the narrative about the birth of Jesus Christ in a manger at the time that a census was being carried out in Palestine be considered a myth? A beautiful story that enthuses us with the season’s good cheer and one that therefore should be valued? Or should it be considered as a historical fact?

Beyond what the Christian Testament proclaims, from early writings by people who were not Christian it appears that Christ was indeed a historical person; or at least, in early times, there were people who gave witness to what he accomplished and experienced in his life. However, this evidence does not respond to the question as to whether his birth happened the way we celebrate it. Personally I doubt very much that that was how it happened, but then I see no reason why, independently of whether it is a myth or not, the Christmas story should not continue to be celebrated with the greatest commitment.

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THE EURO

Apart from the fact that we all feel much easier with the euro for it allows us to travel over a big part of Europe without the need to exchange currencies, is the euro as our national monetary unit, serving us well?                

Has the cost of Maltese exports risen, dropped, stayed the same as a result of the euro? Over the longterm, has it made us more or less competitive than we were with the Maltese lira?

Is it the case that the euro loaded us with enormous loans during the 2008-2010 financial crisis, since we were part of the euro zone? Or did the fact that we were members of the eurozone enable us to avoid much of the  fallout resulting from the crisis?

Did the euro serve to drive the Maltese economy towards financial services which depend a lot on the existence of the low taxation we charge, even as we close our eyes regarding how and from where the arriving funds have originated?

As of now, I still haven’t heard objective replies to these and similar questions.