TIM HAZLEDINE: The deadweight of white collar drones

One of  the surprises delivered by covid is how little effect it seems to be having on output in the economy  (level 4 lockdown excepted).People have suggested this is because working at home is a good substitute for going to work. I have my doubts about this, but in any case, I am going to suggest a more radical possibility. It may be the disruption to what are mainly white-collar office jobs has had little effect on GDP because many, perhaps most, of these jobs don’t produce anything of value in the first place.These are...