This is a just-world way of thinking. Those peripheral countries were irresponsible, people say. They should be like the Germans! So the proposed solution is to fix their economic problems, grow some responsibility, and act the way fiscal conservatives want them to.
This is an old way of thinking--it's popped up every time there's been a recession coupled with a fiscal crisis. The results have almost always been bad.
The Euro crisis is macroecon 101. The periphery cannot manage their money supply to match demand. So you get deflation, unemployment, sticky-price stagnation, capital flight. People who knew their economics could have called this as it happened. Many did. Many were calling it when the Euro even began.
It's true that those with unstable debt situations have suffered more, but it's not caused by having an unstable economy, it's caused by having an unstable economy while on the Euro. "Fiscal responsibility" will only make things worse. The respective stories of Euro and non-Euro countries should make this obvious--consider Iceland, who suffered a debt crisis that caused their entire financial system to fail, yet are expected to recover better than the Euro periphery.
I do not like your line of thinking. It's moralizing in an odious way. Even worse, it's wrong.
DOWNVOTERS: please express your disagreement by telling me what's wrong with this post. I believe everything I'm saying here is factually correct. I furthermore think that this line of false moralizing, alive in the minds of central European politicians, is a major part of this crisis and a major cause of the resultant suffering. I will not run from it because I rubbed HN conventional wisdom the wrong way.
cynicalkane: I suspect many readers here agree with much of what you wrote, but nonetheless feel the tone of your comment doesn't quite meet HN guidelines: http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
This is an old way of thinking--it's popped up every time there's been a recession coupled with a fiscal crisis. The results have almost always been bad.
The Euro crisis is macroecon 101. The periphery cannot manage their money supply to match demand. So you get deflation, unemployment, sticky-price stagnation, capital flight. People who knew their economics could have called this as it happened. Many did. Many were calling it when the Euro even began.
It's true that those with unstable debt situations have suffered more, but it's not caused by having an unstable economy, it's caused by having an unstable economy while on the Euro. "Fiscal responsibility" will only make things worse. The respective stories of Euro and non-Euro countries should make this obvious--consider Iceland, who suffered a debt crisis that caused their entire financial system to fail, yet are expected to recover better than the Euro periphery.
I do not like your line of thinking. It's moralizing in an odious way. Even worse, it's wrong.
DOWNVOTERS: please express your disagreement by telling me what's wrong with this post. I believe everything I'm saying here is factually correct. I furthermore think that this line of false moralizing, alive in the minds of central European politicians, is a major part of this crisis and a major cause of the resultant suffering. I will not run from it because I rubbed HN conventional wisdom the wrong way.