Campos, F. N. & Coricelli, F. (2015) “Why did Britain join the EU? A new insight from economic history“, VoxEU Organisation, 03 Φεβρουαρίου. Britain eschewed EU membership in the late 1950s but changed its mind in the early 1960s, only to be rebuffed by Charles de Gaulle. Membership came only in the early 1970s. This column argues that, among others, Britain joined the EU as a way to avoid …Read More
Dehousse, R. & Rozenberg, O. (2015) “There has been a substantial drop in EU legislative output since 2010“, LSE EUROPP, 03 Φεβρουαρίου. A common argument made against the European Union by Eurosceptic politicians is that the EU creates a burden on citizens and businesses by producing too much legislation. But how much legislation does the EU actually produce? Renaud Dehousse and Olivier Rozenberg present data on both the raw …Read More
Krugman, P. (2015) “Who’s Unreasonable Now?“, The New York Times, 02 Φεβρουαρίου. OK, so as I understand the latest from the new Greek government, Yanis Varoufakis is saying that he and his colleagues don’t care what happens to the headline value of the debt — if you want to claim that there has been no write-off, OK. What they want instead is substantive but not outrageous relief from the …Read More
Beck, Τ. (2015) “Groundhog Day in Greece, VoxEU Organisation, 02 Φεβρουαρίου. The Greek-Troika conflict is roiling markets, boardrooms and cabinet offices around the world. Crises are best solved by recognising losses, allocating them and moving on, so the biggest risk, this column argues, is that a compromise kicks the can further down the road. As the can rolls on, the scenery becomes politically and socially less attractive – fuelling …Read More
Moumoutzis, K. (2015) “Is SYRIZA just another Greek party that does not know what to do?“, Europe on the Strand Blog, 01 Φεβρουαρίου. Less than a week after SYRIZA’s (Coalition of the Radical Left) electoral victory, uncertainty regarding the newly formed Greek government’s economic policy has increased. In a statement emailed to Bloomberg News, Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said: ‘we need time to breathe and create our own …Read More
Stearns, J. & Deen, M. (2015) “Greece Asks ECB to Keep Banks Afloat, Tsipras Pitches Deal“, Bloomberg Business, 01 Φεβρουαρίου. Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras began the hunt for allies against German demands for austerity as his week-old government appealed to the European Central Bank not to shut off the money tap. Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis said his country won’t take any more aid under its existing bailout agreement …Read More
Mitchell, B. (2015) “Germany has a convenient but flawed collective memory“, Bill Mitchell Blog, 02 Φεβρουαρίου. There is a lot of discussion at present about the historical inconsistency of the German position with regard any debt relief to the Greek government. Angela Merkel has reiterated over the weekend that there would be no further debt relief. Why she is now a spokesperson for the Troika that does not include …Read More
Wren-Lewis, S. (2015) “We already have a simple and conventional story to explain the weak recovery“, VoxEU Organisation, 30 Ιανουαρίου. The anaemic recovery from the Global Crisis and the downward trend in real interest rates since 1980 have revived interest in the idea of secular stagnation. This column argues that if the US, UK, and Eurozone had not pursued contractionary fiscal policies from 2010 onwards, the recovery would not …Read More
De Grauwe, P. (2015) “Secular stagnation in the Eurozone“, VoxEU Organisation, 30 Ιανουαρίου. Nowhere in the developed world is the secular stagnation more visible than in the Eurozone. This column explains this phenomenon with asymmetric external balances within the Eurozone. Southern counties had accumulated current-account deficits and became debtors when the Crisis hit, whereas the northern ones became creditors. The burden of the adjustments has been borne almost exclusively …Read More
Moring, A. (2015) “Lessons from the crisis – We Europeans face a historic choice: either we further develop Europe as a single political entity, or we recede from the limelight, The European Magazine, 30 Ιανουαρίου. In her latest op-ed, The European columnist Juliane Mendelsohn rails against the “dysfunctional euro” and the flawed European project that “the market inevitably pushed us into.” She links her arguments to the call for …Read More
