US NEWS

Bill Gates analyzes the coming economic crisis

Bill Gates explains that the effects of the current economic situation, added to the health crisis, will cause a global economic slowdown in the future.

BRENDAN MCDERMIDREUTERS

The American software developer, businessman and philanthropist, Bill Gates, has said that the current the global economic crisis that is looming is a result of the war in Ukraine that started last February. Its effects of which that standout for him incude increasing inflation and consumer product prices, as well as higher gas and electricity prices.

The co-founder of Microsoft, who years ago warned of the possible arrival of a virus that would affect the entire world population, has been one of the protagonists during the health crisis of the coronavirus for his recommendations when talking about the pandemic.

Also see:

Coronavirus prediction

He stated in 2015 that the world was “not ready for the next pandemic” and that viruses pose the “greatest risk of global catastrophe” relative to other threats to humanity. At the TED2022 conference, he prompted the audience to pay closer attention to his advice on how to prevent another pandemic from wreaking similar havoc on society.

" When I was on this stage in 2015, I was one of many people who said we weren’t ready and we needed to get ready. We didn’t. The speech actually was watched by a lot of people. But 90 percent of the views were after it was too late,” asserted the multi-billionaire businessman.

Impact on the economy

During an interview on CNN’s ‘Fareed Zakaria GPS’ program, he explained that the current economic situation, added to the coronavirus health crisis, will have compounded repercussions, due to the fact that “government debt levels were already very, very high and there were already some supply chain problems.”

“So it’s, you know, likely to accelerate the inflationary problems that rich world economies have and, you know, force an increase in interest rates that eventually will result in an economic slowdown,” the creator of Windows said.

The Federal Reserve has already begun raising interest rates with three hikes in three months. The latest was a jump of three-quarters of a percentage point, the largest since 1994.

Likelihood of a slowdown in the future

This means saving like a pessimist, having a good economic cushion, one of his mantras when he was building Microsoft into the IT titan it is today. Despite his seemingly unshakeable confidence he made sure the company had enough cash in the bank to keep Microsoft afloat for 12 months in the event there was no revenue coming in.

Gates concluded with an obvious warning to society: “I’m afraid that the bears on this one have a pretty strong argument that concerns me a lot.”

Most viewed

More news