France: Why Sure We're Willing to "Share" Our Sovereingty on Budgetary Matters

One criticism of the Europe Project is that you can't have a monetary union without the political union that makes a monetary union possible. You can't have Greece running up huge deficits while Germany sticks to its low-inflation, low-deficits position.

To have a monetary union, you'd have to have an actual sovereign European government, with genuine power to set policy continent-wide.

As the project collapses, they're finally realizing that. But rather than undo the monetary union, they're considering doubling down on the political one.

rance must agree to share sovereignty over its budget with its EU partners, French Budget Minister Jerome Cahuzac said on Tuesday.

He told BFM TV and RMC radio: "This is what we are talking about, budget solidarity in Europe which implies that not only that the French budget, but also the German, Italian and Spanish budgets be subjected to a review by all our partners."

He said: "This does not mean abandoning sovereignty, it is sharing."

He accused Germany of "imagining" inflation worries "everywhere."

I don't think Germany will go for this. Germany had an emotionally-wrenching experience with inflation in the 20s (and I imagine as WWII progressed) and they've made prudence their watchword since then. The strong mark was their national pride.

I don't think the Germans are going to let the Greeks set their budgetary policy. I guess we'll have to see.

posted by Ace at 05:38 PM

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