As statesbegin the process of re-opening businesses, people are startingcontemplate how the pandemic will change public life—andpredictions of a new normal are rampant. This new normal includeseverything from protective legislation to new cultural norms;shaking hands, for example, will be a thing of the past. However,that new normal might just be a quarantine dream, according toChristopher Thornberg of BeaconEconomics.

"There are people saying that this is going to create apermanent change in consumer behavior. Why? There is not a newnormal," Thornberg, founding partner of Beacon Economics, tellsGlobeSt.com.

Thornberg is tossing out the predictions of a new normal basedon past pandemics and following behaviors. "Pandemics have beenwith humanity for as long as we can remember," he says. "We havebeen fortunate over for the last 40 years that for a brief periodof time public health got in front of it and all of the diseasesthat used to periodically rip through human populations had largelybeen subdued." During periods of disease outbreak, socialdistancing is common, but people have always continued living theirlives normally. "We have a long history of dealing with thesecircumstances, and history shows over and over again that peoplesocial distance when times are bad and then when things are good,they lived their lives again," he adds.