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Spain could be the next European economy brought down by German-led mismanagement of the euro-zone crisis. It need not turn out that way. But it surely will unless Chancellor Angela Merkel and her political allies inside and outside Germany acknowledge that no country can pay off its debts by suffocating economic growth.
Austerity, the one-size-fits-all cure prescribed by Ms. Merkel, is not working anywhere. After weeks of misleading calm, and despite huge injections of liquidity by the European Central Bank, countries are slipping back into recession, unemployment is climbing and deficit forecasts are worsening. Bond markets are especially jittery about Spain and Italy, two of Europe’s largest economies.
Spain is already wracked by a depression-level unemployment rate of nearly 25 percent (and approaching 50 percent for those ages 16 to 24). But it is in for even higher levels of misery under the austerity budget that Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy unveiled at the end of March, after the European Union rebuffed his pleas for more fiscal flexibility in the face of a worsening recession.
Mr. Rajoy’s budget is supposed to slash last year’s deficit of 8.5 percent of gross domestic product, to 5.3 percent this year and then 3.0 percent in 2013. The targets are likely unreachable, even if he rigorously keeps to his punishing budget. The most optimistic official estimates forecast the economy to shrink by nearly 2 percent this year. And the more Spain’s G.D.P. contracts, the more tax receipts drop, requiring even steeper budget cuts. It is a destructive, ever downward cycle.
Each of Europe’s struggling economies has different problems, calling for different remedies. Spain, for example, has one of Europe’s lowest public-sector debt levels. But it does need to work off the private debt that went bad when its housing bubble burst and its weakened banks turned to the government for support. That swelled deficits to levels that cannot be sustained indefinitely. But attempting to bring them down too quickly in hard times could backfire, as Mr. Rajoy recognized when gloomy economic forecasts earlier led him to ask for a more realistic 2012 target of 5.8 percent of G.D.P. instead of the previously agreed 4.4 percent.
Instead of acceding to his sensible request, European finance ministers imposed a new target of 5.3 percent. Bond markets quickly figured out that Spain is unlikely to meet those targets. So lenders bid up interest rates for Spanish debt, making the target even more unrealistic.
With no good way to achieve the numbers, Mr. Rajoy has proposed a number of bad ones, like cutting back on the public investment needed to improve economic competitiveness and worker retraining funds needed to lubricate labor market reforms. He has now proposed a second round of deep cuts targeting schools and health care. Shortchanging tomorrow’s work force to pay for yesterday’s housing bubble makes no economic sense.
These damaging cuts could have been less severe if the European Union had heeded Mr. Rajoy’s plea for greater short-term budgetary flexibility. They could be avoided if Ms. Merkel and her misguided partners would finally recognize that restoring the competitiveness of Europe’s economically weakened south requires more investment in reform and growth and less obsessive targeting of short-term deficit arithmetic.
yo_mich escribió:Qué le ha dado ahora a los Estadounidenses por hablar y/o sacar noticias sobre españa?hummm me huelo algo y malo.
Enanon escribió:yo_mich escribió:Qué le ha dado ahora a los Estadounidenses por hablar y/o sacar noticias sobre españa?hummm me huelo algo y malo.
llevamos años saliendo en sus noticias
faco escribió:pues en la noticia le hecha parte de la culpa de la situación actual a Merkel y dice cosas bastante interesantes, de las que muchos están de acuerdo, pero que los políticos parecen no ver. Y finaliza arramplando con Merkel y los lideres europeos, apelando a que nos dejen de asfixiar y que nos den más flexibilidad...
unkblog escribió:faco escribió:pues en la noticia le hecha parte de la culpa de la situación actual a Merkel y dice cosas bastante interesantes, de las que muchos están de acuerdo, pero que los políticos parecen no ver. Y finaliza arramplando con Merkel y los lideres europeos, apelando a que nos dejen de asfixiar y que nos den más flexibilidad...
Lo que yo digo, que los "4 hundidos" de Europa tendríamos que decirle a Merkel y amigos "hasta aquí hemos llegado". Ya verías tú como serían más flexibles, más que nada porque como caigamos los 4 vienen detrás por cojones
unkblog escribió:faco escribió:pues en la noticia le hecha parte de la culpa de la situación actual a Merkel y dice cosas bastante interesantes, de las que muchos están de acuerdo, pero que los políticos parecen no ver. Y finaliza arramplando con Merkel y los lideres europeos, apelando a que nos dejen de asfixiar y que nos den más flexibilidad...
Lo que yo digo, que los "4 hundidos" de Europa tendríamos que decirle a Merkel y amigos "hasta aquí hemos llegado". Ya verías tú como serían más flexibles, más que nada porque como caigamos los 4 vienen detrás por cojones
kyubi-chan escribió:Que el Estado entró en crisis por salvar la deuda privada no es nuevo.