Una propuesta razonable

Hans Wener Sinn es un economista alemán que por sus propios vericuetos se ha hecho euroescéptico. Lo que dice aquí me parece razonable, más razonable que la cerrazón de los gobiernos del euro, empezando por el suyo. Por lo menos habla de reestructuración o quitas de deuda y un régimen monetario transitorio a la Bretton Woods, lo que a mí me suena bien. Que eso suponga que luego... Lo que venga luego será mejor que lo que puede venir con el régimen actual. Flexibilidad frente a la rigidez total impuesta anti democráticamente. Quizás algún detalle es discutible. Pero no empecemos a discutir por los detalles. Empecemos por acordar la bases.

The euro itself is responsible for this debacle. During the first several years after the EU’s Madrid Summit in 1995 officially launched the move toward a common currency, too much capital was steered into southern Europe, creating an inflationary credit bubble there. An inordinately lax regulatory environment proved lethal, encouraging northern European banks to pad their balance sheets with southern European government and bank bonds. When the bubble burst, it left in its wake woefully expensive economies that had lost their competitiveness.

Europe should now use the calm between the storm fronts to rethink the European currency union from the ground up. The effort to create a European equivalent of the dollar and impose a fiscal union on top of it, despite the absence of a common European state, is bound to fail. It will turn member countries into debtors and creditors to each other, stoking even more animosity.

The fundamental requirement for functioning monetary and fiscal unions in Europe is the establishment of a United States of Europe, with a real parliament that gives all citizens equal representation, together with a common legal system. Above all, the success of the European peace project requires a common army and a common foreign policy – that is, a genuine, long-lasting mutual-insurance union based on reciprocity in ensuring security and stability. Those who try to anticipate such a common state with a fiscal union will never achieve their goal...

... First, a debt conference is needed, with creditors of the southern European governments and banks forgiving part of the debt. The creditors relinquishing part of their claims must include public entities, first and foremost the ECB, that have now largely replaced private lenders.

Second, eurozone members whose path to regaining competitiveness through price and wage reductions is too long and grueling, and whose societies risk being rent asunder by the necessary imposition of austerity, must temporarily exit the monetary union. The pain of exiting should be cushioned with communal financial help, which would not be necessary for long, because a devaluation of the new currency would quickly restore competitiveness. In fact, a “breathing eurozone” that permits – and regulates – exit and re-accession should be clearly stipulated. Europe needs a system that is halfway between the dollar and a fixed-exchange-rate system like Bretton Woods.

Third, this breathing currency union must include hard budget constraints on its members’ national central banks. Specifically, a ceiling must be set on local money creation by establishing the obligation to settle balance-of-payments imbalances with gold or other comparably safe means of payment.

Finally, bankruptcy regulation for countries is essential in order to make it clear to investors from the outset that they are taking on risk. This is the only way to avoid the destabilizing credit flows that drove southern Europe to ruin.

Me parece al menos más razonable que lo de ahora, con el riesgo creciente de que nos topemos con otro choque recesivo antes de haber salido apenas del anterior. Porque, imaginen otro golpe en nuestros molidos costados, con todo el pescado sin vender, y la deuda sin pagar.