Michelle Goldberg: Trump’s calamitous coronavirus response

Last month, after analyzing figures on epidemics since 1960, The Economist concluded that people die at a higher rate from such disease outbreaks in authoritarian countries than in democratic ones, even controlling for income levels.This might seem counterintuitive. Autocratic societies have an easier time imposing strict behavioral limits than democratic ones; it’s hard to imagine Italy locking down Milan the way China closed off Wuhan. Without the messy deliberations of democracy, certai