Doom of the Euro
What has four letters, begins with E and is slowly killing half of Europe?
Is the Euro the doom of Europe? I'd argue that they have more than just one thing pointing toward their doom. Unassimilated (and growing minorities), Multiculturalism, declining birthrate, heavy social spending combined with aging population, political fecklessness, weak military, protectionism, etc.
Loss of control of the currency is a dangerous thing. It's hard enough to control your currency with the global markets being what they are. The holding of debt by foreign nations is something that makes me queasy but ceding control to a supranational body with different interests than your own is a recipe for disaster.
Key excerpts:
The key refrain here is the loss of democracy. A prime difference between the European mindset and the American one is the idea of mobility. In America, social and economic mobility are limitless. Liberals will whine (or laugh) but it's true. We have people achieving the highest highs merely by their own efforts. In Europe, your station is dictated by your heritage. Your family limits your mobility either up or down. There is a phrase that pops up in conversation about not trying to "fly higher than your wings can power you". That is, "don't get too uppity".
One of my coworkers here is French. He knew he wanted to come to the US very early in his 20's. He saw the writing on the wall and knew that he was going to be limited if he stayed. He got a job with an American company and it took him 8 years to get moved to America. Now, he heads the department I work in and he reports to someone several levels above his previous manager.
The author points to the Euro as the latent doom of Europe but in effect, he's pining the blame on the loss of democracy which is a designed feature of the EU. Even if the Euro were to be abolished tomorrow, states have ceded so much soverignty to Brussels they would effectively be under the same level of control.
In my estimation the best thing the EU could do would be to restructure itself as something more like the Commonwealth. Lowered trade barriers but retained soverignty. Labor mobility and low tarriffs. That is the only way they can effectively compete with the American market. They won't however. They have too much domestic industry they need to protect from cheaper markets like central Europe and Turkey.
Is the Euro the doom of Europe? I'd argue that they have more than just one thing pointing toward their doom. Unassimilated (and growing minorities), Multiculturalism, declining birthrate, heavy social spending combined with aging population, political fecklessness, weak military, protectionism, etc.
Loss of control of the currency is a dangerous thing. It's hard enough to control your currency with the global markets being what they are. The holding of debt by foreign nations is something that makes me queasy but ceding control to a supranational body with different interests than your own is a recipe for disaster.
Key excerpts:
The Iraq invasion, disastrous though it has been, may not go down in history as the greatest political blunder of the past decade. That dubious honour will probably belong to an event most people still regard as a triumph: the creation of the euro.
What we see in Eastern and Southern Europe today are the consequences of the EU’s transformation from a union of democratic countries into a sort of supra-national financial empire in which the most important decisions affecting EU citizens are no longer subject to democratic control.
In Italy the Government is on the brink of collapse because of Signor Prodi’s insistence on implementing tax increases and budget cuts demanded by Joaquín Almunia, the EU Economic Commissioner, under the terms of the Maastricht Treaty. In Hungary, the riots began a month ago because the Prime Minister showed his contempt for democracy by publicly admitting that he had “lied, morning, noon and night” about the tax increases and public spending cuts that he had promised Señor Almunia before a recent election — and after the election was over, he naturally felt that his promises to Brussels were far more important than the ones he had made to Hungarian voters.
At some point the people of Europe will realise that there is something rotten in a political system that leaves them forever in the world economy’s slow lane — and which cannot be changed by any democratic process, regardless of how people vote.
The key refrain here is the loss of democracy. A prime difference between the European mindset and the American one is the idea of mobility. In America, social and economic mobility are limitless. Liberals will whine (or laugh) but it's true. We have people achieving the highest highs merely by their own efforts. In Europe, your station is dictated by your heritage. Your family limits your mobility either up or down. There is a phrase that pops up in conversation about not trying to "fly higher than your wings can power you". That is, "don't get too uppity".
One of my coworkers here is French. He knew he wanted to come to the US very early in his 20's. He saw the writing on the wall and knew that he was going to be limited if he stayed. He got a job with an American company and it took him 8 years to get moved to America. Now, he heads the department I work in and he reports to someone several levels above his previous manager.
The author points to the Euro as the latent doom of Europe but in effect, he's pining the blame on the loss of democracy which is a designed feature of the EU. Even if the Euro were to be abolished tomorrow, states have ceded so much soverignty to Brussels they would effectively be under the same level of control.
In my estimation the best thing the EU could do would be to restructure itself as something more like the Commonwealth. Lowered trade barriers but retained soverignty. Labor mobility and low tarriffs. That is the only way they can effectively compete with the American market. They won't however. They have too much domestic industry they need to protect from cheaper markets like central Europe and Turkey.
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