Tale članek Charlesa Wyplosza (Graduate Institute, Ženeva) o nesmiselnem ubijanju Grčije s strani EU, bi si morali prebrati vsi verniki “hard way” austerity politike, ki jo zganja Nemčija. Wyplosz preprosto pove, da delno znižanje in zamenjava dolgov Grčije do zasebnih investitorjev z dolgom do javnih institucij (EU), ki so sicer nižje obrestovani, nikakor ne more delovati in da bo dolg Grčiji na ta način samo še naraščal. Aritmetika je preprosta. Grčija je v začaranem krogu, za nov, cenejši javni dolg sicer plačuje samo 3% obresti, toda ob negativni rasti BDP seveda razmerje javnega dolga do BDP samo še bolj narašča. Šok terapija trojke ne deluje, zato tudi vse njihove napovedi kazalcev popolnoma udarijo mimo. Grčiji mora EU odpisati del dolgov ali pa jo spustiti iz evro območja. Sicer jo bodo izstradali do smrti. Kreditov pa še vedno ne bodo dobili odplačanih.

Moralizem tukaj samo ubija. Tako kot je ubijal Nemčijo po prvi svetovni vojni. In bi Nemčijo ubil tudi po drugi svetovni vojni, če ji ne bi odpisali polovice dolgov in če ji ZDA ne bi pomagale z Marshallovim planom, ki je pomagal postaviti na noge nemško industrijo. Le tako se je Nemčija lahko postavila na noge in le tako (ob rasti) je bila sposobna vračati dolgove.

Naturally, official forecasts are predicting that nominal growth will exceed 3 percent by 2015. Perhaps it will, but since the start of the crisis such forecasts have proved little better than wishful thinking, as the accompanying table shows. It aligns European Commission forecasts at the time when the two existing Greek bailout programs were adopted, with actual outcomes. The gap between plan and reality is enormous and has erred consistently on the side of optimism.

The commission’s growth forecasts were important, because they were used to design the Greek bailout programs and the associated conditions that the government in Athens was required to meet. Greece’s failure to meet program targets partly originates in the unrealistic nature of the forecasts, which the IMF has now recognized.

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After two decades of misery, Japan has decided to go for inflation, and the world is cheering. By now it should be clear that bleeding a country is not the smartest way of establishing fiscal discipline in the euro area, either. It is true that debt relief could prove contagious, but the answer to this objection is: “Yes, and so it should.” Greece is not the only euro area economy saddled by an unsustainable public debt.

Greece needs a debt relief package soon or its only option will be inflation, which means leaving the euro area. Even if this is a pessimistic view, it is a very real risk. Merkel must now weigh that risk against the political cost of reversing herself.

Vir: Charles Wyplosz, Bloomberg

(Mimogrede, Charles Wyplosz je profesor ekonomije na Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies v Ženevi in skupaj z Richardom Baldwinom soavtor knjige The Economics of European Integration, ki je najbolj široko uporabljan učbenik v Evropi za področje evropske integracije. Tudi sam ga uporabljam pri predmetu Evropski monetarni sistem)