Hejs det hvide flag

I anledning af, at Italien og Spanien nu vakler på kanten af afgrunden, er her via Krugman en artikel i Economist, der sammenligner Depressionen og nu:

The gold standard had long threatened to destabilise Europe, thanks to a fundamental imbalance among the continent's large economies—Britain, France and Germany. France had huge gold reserves while Britain and Germany had meagre stockpiles. As a result, the latter two were often confronted by the need to tighten policy to fend off market attacks on convertibility, the process of which damaged their economies and contributed to market scepticism. As European economies like Austria and Germany flailed, America, Britain and France scrambled to assemble aid packages that might prevent a collapse, but these negotiations were inevitably characterised by petty disagreements and myopia, and the resulting aid packages were always too small and came too late.

Eventually, the system failed entirely, countries began abandoning gold, reinflating, and spending heavily on an arms buildup. The back of the Depression was broken. But it was too late to save Europe from utter catastrophe.

The European Union, and its single-currency extension, were forged in the decades following the war in an effort to make sure that war never again divided and savaged the continent. But strangely enough, in the effort to tie itself together, Europe imposed some of the same fiscal and monetary constraints that precipitated the collapse of the 1930s. And here we are, watching history repeat itself. Within a Europe riven by imbalances, the fiscal and monetary screws are once again being applied to countries with no hope of escaping their financial burdens. Markets are attacking, and efforts to salvage the situation through massive aid packages are emerging too small and late to matter. The pressure within the squeezed economies is building, and that pressure will find a release, one way or another. A Europe hoping never to repeat its historical tragedies has gone and blundered into institutions that make those same tragedies more likely. The European project, as it looks now, has failed.

Guld & Gæld, som jeg skrev om for lidt tid siden.

To protester: For det første er jeg uenig i, at euroen er det samme som EU. Vi kan sagtens køre videre uden. Men de mest fanatiske tilhængere, dvs. alle vores statsledere og overhoveder, mener det ikke. I dette som i meget andet kunne de jo tage fejl. Det kan også være de lyver for at holde den gående.

For det andet er jeg ikke sikker på, at euroens indførelse havde noget særligt med fred gennem sammenbundne økonomier at gøre. Jeg tror mest, at det var en 'hvorfor ikke'-idé, som så fik samme lag argumenter som alt andet smurt ovenpå. Der var angreb på den ene og den anden valuta, og det så ud til at være oplagt at lave en fælles valuta for at slippe for det bras. Så slap man også for at veksle, når man skulle på ferie...

Hvorom alt er: Det eneste, der kan løse hele problemet, er ECB, som bare skal trykke en fandens masse penge og betale alle eurolandenes gæld. Det vil de ikke; jeg er ikke engang sikker på, at de har lov. Euroen er derfor slået fejl, og nu er det bare et spørgsmål om tid, før den bryder sammen. Men som med en krig, der allerede er tabt, så skal ledelsen først overbevises og siden sluge sin stolthed, før den forhandler fred med fjenden. Imens dør folk i felten.