Europa moet niet naar Obama luisteren

Nieuws | de redactie

24 juni 2010 | Obama adviseert Europa om stevige bezuinigingen op te schorten. Dit advies is “economically unreasonable, politically inappropriate and demonstrates a profound lack of understanding of European realities,” aldus Ann Mettler, executive director van de Lisbon Council. Zij schrijft dit, namens de onafhankelijke Brusselse economische denktank, vandaag in de Wall Street Journal.

With the debt crisis pressuring the economy, Europeangovernments have responded by introducing significant expenditurecuts and tax increases in order to rebalance their budgets. Bycontrast, the US administration opts for a massive expansionarypolicy in order to ensure a fast recover from the recent financialcrisis while calling upon the EU governments to do the same. Theidea behind this deficit spending is to increase governmentexpenditures to stimulate the economy in times of crisis and thensave more money later on once the economy is booming again.

Ann Mettler, executive director of the Lisbon Council, stronglyrejects US claims that European financial austerity endangers theeconomic recovery. Mrs. Mettler states that in the past Europeangovernments have never managed to implement a reasonable deficitspending policy by saving more in times of economic growth whichthen led many nations to pile up unsustainable amounts of debt. Theageing of the EU population places an additional burden on futuregenerations having to repay the debts created now. Mettlertherefore concludes that the current political support for budgetcuts places an extraordinary opportunity to get the Europeaneconomies back on track increasing investors’ confidence in the EUand enhancing competitiveness in the long run.

U leest haar volledige ingezonden artikel uit de Wall StreetJournal hier.