A collection of experts threw out their ideas for a post-pandemic society during a webinar put on by the University of Illinois Springfield.
“The budget situation is not as rosy as people say it is,” said Ken Kriz (pictured), University Distinguished Professor at UIS. “When the state says it’s budget is balanced, there are a few things to keep in mind. First of all, the budget is just a plan. You always have assumptions in budgets. At the end of the year, we see what things really happened.”
“This pandemic is like a bookmark on our life,” said Ryan McCrady, president of the Springfield Sangamon Growth Alliance, an economic development organization. “I think we are going to refer to life before and after. And the customer value proposition has changed a lot. Customers are putting more value on the delivery point of the product or service due to the pandemic and due to the concerns about public health.”
McCrady says some parents – facing continued uncertainty over whether their children are in a classroom – simply give up and have one parent stay home, rather than attempt to secure child care.