Thomas Piketty: “Germany has never repaid.”

[Lithos]

Last edited Mon Jul 6, 2015, 02:42 PM - Edit history (1)

In a forceful interview with German newspaper Die Zeit, the star economist Thomas Piketty calls for a major conference on debt. Germany, in particular, should not withhold help from Greece.

https://medium.com/%40gavinschalliol/thomas-piketty-germany-has-never-repaid-7b5e7add6fff

On Edit: Fixed Link

[daleanime]

1. K&R.....

[AllTooEasy]

3. BULLLSHIT. Germany already helped Greece twice.

How many times, and how much money, should Germany and the rest of the IMF blow on Greece before we liberals get off their case? The IMF is far more generous than me. You get ONE chance to blow my money.

[Nitram]

4. Imposing austerity on Greece as the price for a bail out was a guarantee...

...that the Greece economy couldn't recover, and they'd never be able to repay the debt.

[willing dwarf]

6. Germany has benefited from the formation of Euro like no other country

Read this for more details: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-01-10/germany-reaped-most-economic-benefit-from-euro-mckinsey-2010-study-shows

[Gore1FL]

13. Let's try it without attaching poison pills to it. n/t

[cprise]

14. Who has taken a haircut on Greece's debt?

Greek pension funds, and who else? The rest is loans (temporary).

[jeff47]

2. To fix the URL, replace the @ with a %40

https://medium.com/%40gavinschalliol/thomas-piketty-germany-has-never-repaid-7b5e7add6fff

[bemildred]

5. Greece creditors will gain nothing from toppling Europe-lover Yanis Varoufakis

---

It appears that Euclid Tsakalotos will take over as finance minister. Another brilliant economist - educated at St Paul's and Oxford, with a Celtic wife - he has earned a reputation as safe pair of hands since becoming chief negotiator in the debt talks.

He is a man who keeps his outward emotions in check. Mr Tsakalotos will not be calling anybody a terrorist.

But be careful what you wish for. If the creditors think that he will be a push-over - more willing to accept terms that fall short of genuine debt relief - they are likely to be disappointed. He is comes from the radical Marxist wing of Syriza, and shares little of Mr Varoufakis's European idealism.

Scratch a little and you start to discover a eurosceptic who never wanted Greece to join the euro, indeed who already foresaw with remarkable prescience in this paper in 1998 that EMU would not bring about the convergence of the core and peripheral countries. He was miles ahead of the amateurs religiously touting the benefits of EMU.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/11720907/Greece-creditors-will-gain-nothing-from-toppling-Europe-lover-Yanis-Varoufakis.html

[KoKo]

7. Good Read... and this bit of warning at the end re: Consequences

Evans-Pritchard:

He also maintained the line - genuinely in my judgement - that Grexit would set off a political chain reaction and is therefore just as much a threat to the EMU Project as it is to Greece itself.

"I do believe if Greece was to leave, the eurozone would break up because it changes a monetary union into a hard-peg."

The crucial point is that EMU is an "irrevocable promise" that no country will ever devalue again. Once that is breached, financial markets will not lightly believe in the pledge again.

"People are wrong to say there's not much contagion now but that's not how it is going to work, maybe months later, in the following country in crisis. I fear that if it all breaks up we could then move to the kind of 1930s nationalist reactionary politics and the hegemony of the nasty Right," he said.

The difference is that Mr Varoufakis once loved 'Europe', and still cannot stop loving it. Mr Tsakalotos was never a believer in the first place.

[appalachiablue]

9. +1 Heed the Warning.

[Igel]

10. Did they topple him?

One of the first casualties of war is truth.

War is just politics by other means.

Therefore, one of the first casualties of politics is truth.


No, it's not as rigorous as it could be. One should rule out that the "other means" is what kills truth in wartime. However, F --> T is T.

[bemildred]

11. An excellent question.

i think it is safe to say that he was not reluctant to go.

[cprise]

15. +100 Great post!

[Depaysement]

16. Well done

Good article.

[appalachiablue]

8. K & R. Thomas Piketty is brilliant and he rocks! How Germany went to the Allies in 1953

about their debt burden, and it was cancelled and some of it deferred is what Thom Hartmann has been saying for 6 months or more.

K & R

Germany: is it really do as I say, not as I do?

[okojo]

12. Germany has repaid in leaps and bounds...

A stable Germany has remain incredibly important for stability in Europe. Germany's economy helps with the whole point of a stable EU and a stable Euro.. As much as Germany from 1870 to 1945 been disruptive to outright destructive to Europe and caused the deaths of millions. Germany has learn that integration with their former enemies, (mainly France) is essential for a prosperous Germany and likewise Europe..

Yes, the Euro and ECB control gives Germany huge power over the EU, but they have given much much more in return to other countries. mainly stability, stable markets and trade..

Germany's debt and chaos after the Second World War had to be address, given how important the FRG's economy was for Europe, and Germany had to produce in order to trade and get foodstuff they needed to import from other countries. An unstable Germany post Second World War would had lead to an unstable France, Benelux nations and even Switzerland...

Germany and the EU has to give some debt forgiveness to Greece, besides some sort of loan package. However, Greece can't continue its antics that are doing more than hurting the Greek Economy, it is literally killing people, with the shortage of medical supplies, salaries for health care workers, and economic chaos..

[Zipgun]

18. I agree with your point, but I have one quibble. Germany was not to blame

for "The Great Game" or any of the other European rivalries and conflicts. It was merely one of the players, up until the rise of Hitler, and they all must share the blame. (Nazi Germany is another matter, and that's on Germany) The excessively punitive reparations placed on Germany after WWI and the economic collapse that followed it are much more France's fault than any one else's.

[senz]

17. So glad Piketty is weighing in on this. I trust him.