Something to be hopeful about

As Autumn and darker evenings take their toll, I find myself reaching out for the funnier moments to cheer us through. Our Sanlam graduates seem to have done the trick this week – and hearing their thoughts on the future has managed to have me and the rest of the team back working at our normal pace and keen to be a part of everything they want to create. I asked Tom Little, our recent grad to share some of his thoughts on a (three month) career in lockdown.

PL: You started with us in August as a graduate, what has been the hardest adjustment to a career in the City?

TL: Keeping up to date with the latest news. I think we all want to turn off the news from time to time. I can’t help but get tired of the talking heads telling me that nothing will ever be the same, that I live in a lost generation or that something that’s been happening for months is still unprecedented… it’s a race to the bottom of the cliché barrel and can suck up too much emotional bandwidth if you’re not careful. Granted, they probably won’t, but I can’t help but hate the dour tone everyone seems to employ by default these days.

PL: That’s something I’m sure we can all relate to. What are you optimistic about?

TL: I think a lot of what powers our economy is in dire need of an overhaul. COVID-19 may end up having the same impact it does on the elderly and vulnerable on the Old Economy –especially the dirty energy that fuels it and the QE backed banks that pay for it all. The New Economy –digital commerce, gaming, cloud enterprises, healthcare, risk reduction, fintech, anything that lets you work from home– will inherit the soon to be cleaner and more efficient world. A brighter and greener future is possible, and one I intend to embrace.

PL: What about the day to day effect on people’s lives? This lockdown hasn’t been pretty, and it looks like it’s here to stay.

TL: You’re right. It is the worst self-inflicted recession in history. It’s self-inflicted because, rather oddly, this is what we wanted. We should take heart it didn’t reflect failures in the business sector, or an accident in leverage-prone sectors like finance and real estate. Politicians, advised by competent looking scientists in sharp suits or academics with beards, imposed it. And, overall, it is still seen as necessary. This alone makes Covid a strange economic phenomenon. But one thing’s for sure. Economic lockdown is not a permanent state and we will come out of this on the other side.

PL: So what are your hopes for the immediate future – how will our lives change when this is all over?

For now, I intend to comply, for the safety of myself and others, but I have my sights set on the other side. Brits love to throw off the chains of lockdown and anti-fun policies. Maybe it’s a tired trope, but it’s a fact of our nation’s history. I was listening to a history podcast about the restoration last week and the parallels were stark. What chance of a replay of the 1661 English Restoration, when the public rejected 12-years of puritanism, courtesy of Oliver Cromwell, and then adopted the ways of Charles II, a party loving monarch full of joie de vivre? Let’s hope that history repeats itself.