Welcome to the first issue of the STEP Journal in 2021. Although many will be pleased to see the back of the annus horribilis that was 2020, at the time of writing, it would be foolish to think that the dawning of a new year is going to have an immediate impact on the devastating effects of COVID-19.

In his world-famous novel Brave New World, Aldous Huxley wrote that ‘most human beings have an almost infinite capacity for taking things for granted’ and this is perhaps one of the most intense lessons of 2020. We were forced to face up to the fact that we cannot take for granted our freedom, our physical closeness to our families, our health systems or the people who work in them.

Those of us living in countries with robust health services might count ourselves fortunate, as might anyone who has not lost a family member to this dreaded virus. The scale of support provided by governments to try to shore up their economies has been unprecedented and is something that will remain on the balance sheet for those of us left to pick up the pieces, in tax and treasury terms, for some time.

Although the financial future is specifically addressed in our special feature on the future of tax in a post-COVID-19 world, it is clear that there is a shift towards taking responsibility for funding the costs of the pandemic. Wealth taxes are on the lips of politicians around the world, becoming a far more viable option than they may have been before.

But what else have we learned from the pandemic? Although January is traditionally the most popular month for divorces, the capital gains tax implications of which are discussed in Trisha Siddique and Helen Barnett’s article, it is worth asking whether absence has made the heart grow fonder for physically separated couples or whether lockdown-enforced closeness led to a bumper year for divorce lawyers. Elsewhere, Gina M Pereira TEP asks if we have finally learned to appreciate all that we have as philanthropy rises up many people’s agenda and we all try to ‘be kind’.

The most famous quotation of the pandemic (other than ‘you’re on mute’) has to be the one about us all being in the same storm, even if we are not all in the same boat. Some families have been devastated, others remain untouched. Some will have lost everything, others have had everything to gain. It remains to be seen whether we can retain all of the positive aspects the pandemic has brought us, like work/life balance, technological advances and greater tolerance and compassion for our fellow human beings, as we face the brave new world of 2021 and a return to what we hope approaches a kind of normality.