Anyway, I digress! The point of this comment was to highlight that Prof. Niall’s lectures are about austerity. As the BBC News reports,

“Governments should be more honest about the size of their debts and young voters would be wise to get politicians to pay them off as soon as possible, says economic historian Niall Ferguson in the first of his BBC Reith Lectures.

The critics of Western democracy are right to discern that something is amiss with our political institutions. The most obvious symptom of the malaise is the huge debts we have managed to accumulate in recent decades, which – unlike in the past – cannot largely be blamed on wars.

According to the International Monetary Fund, the gross government debt of Greece this year will reach 153% of GDP. For Italy the figure is 123%, for Ireland 113%, for Portugal 112% and for the United States 107%.

Britain’s debt is approaching 88%. Japan is the world leader, with a mountain of government debt approaching 236% of GDP – more than triple what it was 20 years ago.

Now, often these debts get discussed as if they themselves are the problem, and the result is a rather sterile argument between proponents of “austerity” and “stimulus”.

I want to suggest that they are a consequence of a more profound malfunction.”

Full text is here http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-18456131

Tthoughts, Patrice?

Bonjour Jacques!
L’austerite’ ne veut plus rien dire du tout, comme programme economique. C’est, de plus en plus, de l’arnaque pure et simple.

Prenons le cas de l’Italie. L’Italie, nous dit-on, doit faire dans l’austerite’. Les gens communs doivent se serrer la ceinture, ils sont trop gras.
Pourquoi se serrer tant la ceinture? Les riches payent 35% de moins d’impots qu’ils devraient. Cela est maintenant sur, car on a des statistiques prises au bord des routes, en arretant les gens qui roulent avec des voitures cheres genre Ferrari, Porsche, etc. Des controles fiscaux immediats sont fait par Internet. Ces controles ont ete faits en pas mal d’endroits (Cortina, Rome, Toscane, etc.)

Ce qui se passe c’est que les gens avec des professions liberales trichent massivement. Tout au moins en Italie. Du coup tous les impots sont payes par les salaries.

Je connais des Allemands qui roulent sur l’or: profession liberales. Toutes leurs depenses de luxe sont consideres comme des depenses deductibles d’impots. Officiellement, ils gagnent tres peu, mais ils roulent sur l’or, de part le monde, comme des eminences. Une grande partie du Mittelstand allemand vit comme cela. En attendant, pas de salaire minimum en Allemagne, et l’etat force des centaines de milliers de serfs a travailler pour un Euro par heure. Oui, UN.

Revenons a l’Italie: l’Italie n’a pas de deficit primaire (a la difference de la France). Donc pourquoi l’ Italie doit-elle payer de plus en plus les banques? Simplement parceque les banquiers veulent de plus en plus d’argent pour “rembourser” des emprunts qui montent a il y a 30 ans. Bon d’accord les banquiers sont tres gourmands et doivent payer les politiciens (voir le richissime frere de Sarko) et tous leurs copains plutocrates qui tirent toutes les ficelles.

Solutions:

1) donner a la Banque Centrale Europeenne tous les pouvoirs d’une banque centrale, et donner a tous les gouvernements europeens tous les pouvoirs de pays souverains, c’est a dire controle de leur monnaie, l’euro.

Si l’Allemagne n’est pas d’accord, elle peut toujours quitter la zone Euro. L’esprit Nazi, j’en ai deja soupe’. Hors de l’Euro, l’Allemagne crevera. (C’est pour cela que le Franc Suisse est maintenant bloque’ a 1.20 sur l’euro).
On va dire: l’Allemagne paye beaucoup pour sauver l’Euro: faux. Pure propagande. Merkozy payait, et paye, ses amis banquiers. Nuance.

2) refuser de payer les banquiers. Faire plus: les examiner, et les exproprier pour tous ce qu’ils ont vole’. Comme je disais il y presque un an:

http://patriceayme.wordpress.com/2011/09/14/to-save-the-world-please-default/

3) nationaliser toutes les banques qui font faillite, apres les avoir achetees pour un seul Euro.
4) interdire les derivees financieres, interdire les pseudo banques, areter les contrevenants comme faux-monaieurs.
5) faire des banques nationales

Une question curieuse: pourquoi Sarko a laisse’ tellement tombe’ la France? Pourquoi n’a t-il pas remarque’ les grandes manoeuvres Allemandes a temps?
Sous Sarko le production industrielle a baisse de 20% par rapport a la Grande bretagne, et l’Allemagne.

Mais tu as raison, cela va saigner.

Le systeme des preteurs doit cesser. L’Argentine les a flanque’ dehors il y a plus de 10 ans. L’Argentine. J’ai pas vote Le Pen, mais la Bleue Marine elle a raison de ce cote’ la. Quant a l’Allemagne, elle veut poursuivre son arnaque le plus lontemps possible. La Suisse vient de condamner BMW a payer 160 million Francs pour tricherie… Non respect des lois de la concurrence.

Apres la Grece, ce sera la France, faut pas se faire d’illusion. Le Figaro vient de calculer que de l’aide a la Grece un maximum de 10% va a …la Grece. Tout le reste va aux amis de Merkozy. Regardes les biens, Merkler et Sarkozy comme ils vont s’engraisser.

Et il y a pas que Le Figaro qui est arrive’ a cette conclusion. Le New York Times aussi. Et les chiffres sont evidents.

Pour le concept de Merkler:
http://patriceayme.wordpress.com/2012/05/19/merkler/

L’austerite en Grece. cela devrait s’eppeler avec 4 lettres: Nein
Et ce n’est pas aux Nazis de dire a la Grece qu’elle ne doit pas utiliser sa propres monnaie, Nota Bene. La Banque centrale Grec devrait imprimer tous les euros dont la Grece a besoin. C’est son droit. Qu’est ce que les Nazis vont faire? Re-envahir? Ce n’est pas leur droit. Il est temps que les allemands aprennent le droit international, ils semblent l’avoi oublie’ a nouveau. Et c’est pas 1940.

Il y 35% plus de jeunes Francais que de jeunes allemands, aujourd’hui, alors que les jeunes Allemands etaient le double en 1940.

I have also owned BMWs, and do have a very expensive one now. I got livid after what I learned BMW did in Schweiz, though (they got condemned to a 200 million dollar fine, in May 2012). First company ever so punished. I may want to reassess my ownership of a product from a criminal car company. Notice that Switzerland is not in the EMU, or the EU…

I wrote an essay a few months ago “Welfare State Fares Well” precisely lauding Schroeder, and Merkel’s policies. But one has the courage too to see that these were very plutocratic friendly policies (see Schroeder’s career now as a rich friend of Putin), and that Germany pulled a fast one on the rest of Europe. OK, the others should have noticed, granted, and do the same (Greek AVT is at 23% now).

Great Britain is most culprit of the present mess. If Britain was still in the EMU, France and Britain could push more on Merkel, and other pro-plutocrats.

In a European superstate, the weight of (France + Britain) would be twice Germany (and that’s even without using the strategic nuclear submarines, ha ha ha). Actually, all alone France will leave Germany in the dust, on present trends (+35% more young people in France; the most populous German age group is that of the old fossils in the 50-60 year old group…) As I said the Mittelstand success ought to be duplicated…

Greece is in a depression, 5 years running. It’s at least partly the fault of Germany and company. All the “aid’ was to the (French, German, British)banks. Kicking out the sick, or moribund, may be a very German thing to do for some, but I think force ought to be used against that kind of Germany. that’s not because I have antipathy to Germany, but because I have antipathy to Nazism.
PA

However, having thought about all that has been said here (with one eye on current events), is it not reasonable to interpret Merckel’s obstinacy as a determination to ensure that everyone else in the Eurozone allows her to create the 4th Reich by default (because the only option other than disintegration that she is allowing is full fiscal union)?

You often ask me, Patrice, what is it that British people fear from a European Superstate. Well, given your antipathy towards Germany, I fail to understand you asking the question. A European Superstate will be mean the creation of the 4th Reich without a single shot having been fired.

For the avoidance of any doubt, I agree with the leader of the Greek Chamber of Commerce who today came very close to endorsing the brinkmanship of the far-left Party there (when he said that whoever wins this election must insist on re-negotiation of parts of Greeks bail-out). This might appear to be in sympathy with President Hollande’s argument that austerity isn’t working (in Greece at least); but Greece should never have been allowed to join the Eurozone. It will take decades for it to pay off its debts and it may never do so. Therefore, just as they shoot crippled horses; Greece should be kicked-out of the Eurozone.

Having said all that, I still think that the UK’s shadow chancellor Ed Balls has absolutely zero credibility in criticising our Coalition government’s record of trying to reduce the record-breaking national debt that Labour accumulated by selling our gold reserves and bailing out banks that should have been allowed to fail.