Wednesday, June 29, 2011

On EU and world dynamics: 9 spare thoughts

These are some spare thoughts - observations re the systemics and on-going dynamics in Europe and the world:

1) EU & Eurozone: Integration, convergence and cohesion: Maybe the future of Europe depends on the possibility that the rest of the Europeans become more "Mediterranean".

2) The only way the Eurozone will get a central finance ministry, as some propose, is if there is a Eurozone political union, ie a whole government cabinet and PM. No more unsound European architecture. In my book, fiscal union means an EU (or EZ) federal "IRS", so it has to be part of political union. No way around that!

3) The EU public must realise that w/o full union their countries become economic colonies of China, India, the US (if it not completely bought up by China soon) etc. Instead, some of their leaders are "flirting" with the leadership of China. China wants to keep Euro alive and, what is moire, expensive so that the Eurozone keeps importing its products en masse! China & Japan should do away with formal & informal barriers to entry into their markets by US or EU firms, otherwise WTO trade rules are somewhat of a joke. And the exchange rate of the Euro vis-a-vis the USD, the Yuan etc destructive for the Eurozone economy, even Germany's IMO.

4) What would have happened with either the German industry had exported heavily to the PIIGS or German finance had invested heavily in PIIGS bonds, instead of both?

5) Do you really want to reduce the prices of PIIGS exports & tourism to make them more competitive? Then why not help them avoid the cut of the middlemen, at least in intra-EU business?

6) The EU needs one single "agency: to manage all funding projects in the EU not just transport & energy, in line with a new Strategic Plan (not the EU2020).

7) It's OK to limit global economic migration or even movement of people but not OK to limit global migration of capital? Solutions to the crisis include EU full union and/or regionalisation (ie de-globalisation) of global finance.

8) Why are industrial producer prices so much higher in NL & Belgium compared to Germany and France? Who is now "exporting" inflation, in the form of very high industrial producer prices, to the Netherlands and Belgium?

9) Who will move to political union (IMO inevitable): a) The EU27 b) An EU26 c) The Eurozone d) The Europlus23 e) other?

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