One major difference between the Great Depression and the current situation is that the government has made it very clear that they will do whatever it takes to

One major difference between the Great Depression and the current situation is that the government has made it very clear that they will do whatever it takes to soften the economic ramifications of the pandemic. A huge contribution to the Great Depression was the government’s deliberate inaction. “Regarding the Great Depression...we did it. We’re very sorry...we won’t do it again.” - Ben Bernanke, 2002 Normally government intervention in an economic crisis is opposed by one of the two political parties, for whatever reason - often a desire to avoid rewarding “bad behavior” that led to the crisis in the first place. In this case, the only bad behavior was on the part of the government and their total failure to plan for this scenario, and so the entire political spectrum is willing to spend money in order to fix it. So I think there is optimism not just that the health consequences may not be as severe as was originally forecast, but that there is a path and political consensus for the government to manage the economic fallout as well.