Yes, indeed, come on, Italy, you can do it, I always put my faith in you, and if you succeed then you will have achieved the miracle of proving, for the first time ever, that this blog was dead right in one forecast! I have said on several occasions that my pound sterling was on Italy to be the catalyst for the breakdown of the euro and Ambrose E-P indicates in an article in The Telegraph that the time might not be far off.
No less than the Italian President, Giorgio Napolitano, himself, has spelled it out by warning that:
“widespread social tension and unrest” in 2014 as the Long Slump drags on.
Those living on the margins are being drawn into “indiscriminate and violent protest, a sterile lurch towards total opposition”.
His latest speech is a veritable Jeremiad. Thousands of companies are on the “brink of collapse”. Great masses of the working people are on the dole or at risk of losing their jobs. Very high rates of youth unemployment (41pc) are leading to dangerous alienation.
“The recession is still biting hard, and there is a pervasive sense that it will be difficult to escape, to find a way back to full growth,” he said.
Of course, President Napolitano has no useful suggestions to make as to how Italy can avoid the rapidly approaching disaster. He was, according to A E-P, a convinced Marxist in his youth who supported the Soviet Union in everything it did, until it collapsed, of course, and then he switched his enthusiasm to the European Union in general, and to the euro monetary system in particular, so you can see the man is obviously as thick as a plank!
However, A E-P thinks there will soon be a concerted move by the Med states, led by France, to use their numerical and quite legal powers to over-rule Germany by insisting that the European Central Bank behave, well, like a central bank which will give Frau Merkel the heebie-jeebies!
The plates, they are a-shiftin'.
'Do it, Italy'!
The Blessed Ambrose has always argued that Italy is not in trouble because of some stereotypical Mediterranean shiftlessness, but quite specifically because the euro means that it's trading in the wrong currency.
Posted by: dearieme | Wednesday, 18 December 2013 at 00:20
And of course, DM, that applies to most of the Meds. What folly our politicians lead us into! But have you noticed that none of our Brit euro-fanatics has had the grace to apologise - with the exception of that economist a few days ago?
Posted by: David Duff | Wednesday, 18 December 2013 at 08:43
XX After years of painful cuts, Italy’s foreign aid program may be turning a corner in 2013. Under its new cooperation chief, the country is planning modest aid increases and a series of reforms, suggest documents seen exclusively by Devex.
DGCS wants to spend a total of roughly €273 million this year ($363.7 million), including €18.3 million toward existing multiannual commitments, as well as €163 million next year and €159 million in 2015. Some 90 percent will be channeled into aid projects, the rest will go toward operating costs; 57 percent will be devoted to bilateral projects, 43 percent to multilateral interventions.
https://www.devex.com/en/news/new-year-new-course-for-italian-foreign-aid/80179
XX
They can fuck RIGHT off with their "hard up" stories!!
Posted by: Furor Teutonicus | Wednesday, 18 December 2013 at 11:31
France now has a vested interest to ally itself with the med countries as under Hollande who RedEd admires so much and wants to emulate when he enters no 10 in 2015 has totally destroyed it's economy. I also have a prediction that 2014 will be the make or break year for the euro and the EU if only because it is the centenary of that other great European catastrophe WWI. The latter being the more likely outcome in my view. There are of course other indicators that the euro at least will go tits up the main one being keeping the euro is not sustainable for many countries that currently have it. It was apparent to any sane rational person that from the outset of the euro crisis all the med states should have dropped out. It would have been painful but recovery would have been far more easily and swiftly attain and a euro crises will not come back perpetually to haunt them as it surely will if they do not drop out even now. Now that Merkel has sorted out her coalition she can put her eye back on the euro crisis ball hampered now however by her left wing coalition partners who have rung concessions from her that are going to increase German Labour costs and reign back some of the austerity measures. So what Merkel does in the next few weeks and months is going to determine the fate of the euro and EU as she is restrained now her past performances cannot be a judge for her future ones. 2014 I believe is going to be a very interesting year and quite possibly a number of events are going to occur that could not have been predicted by anyone and may not be ones we are going to very much like.
Posted by: Antisthenes | Wednesday, 18 December 2013 at 14:04
"They can fuck RIGHT off with their "hard up" stories!!"
Could you translate that into German, FT, I feel sure Madame Merkel would find it very useful in the year ahead!
You are absolutely right, Antis, the whole notion of a common currency without fiscal integration is more than just a nonsense it is madness. Also, I suspect you are right in suggestion that the catalyst, when it comes, will come from an unexpected quarter.
Posted by: David Duff | Wednesday, 18 December 2013 at 14:12