politics, economy and employment & labour
Social Europe is an award-winning digital media publisher that publishes content examining issues in politics, economy, society and ecology. This archive brings together Social Europe articles on the economy.
Western capitalism has few sacred cows left. It is time to question one of them: the independence of central banks from elected governments. The rationale for entrusting monetary policy fully to central banks is well understood: politicians, overly tempted during the electoral cycle to create more money, pose a threat to economic stability. While progressives […]
The euro rally on FX markets really begins to look interesting now: 1.2 on the Dollar, a level never experienced since January 2015, just before the ECB’s official announcement of its Quantitative Easing program. This year, the Euro has strengthened by over 14% against the US currency. A paradox lies between the lines: the Federal […]
A job is the best way out of poverty. This is a widely held belief among European policy-makers. Therefore, labour market reforms in European countries during recent decades focused on creating jobs. Yet, job growth was not supposed to be achieved by demand-stimulating economic policies but by supply-sided labour market reforms. ‘Activation policy’, at European […]
Climate change poses serious financial risks. Perhaps the biggest systemic risk is a disorderly transition to a low carbon economy. As noted in the Bank of England’s ‘response to Climate Change’, current forecasts suggest that to keep global average temperatures below 2 degrees, around two-thirds of current fossil reserves must be left in the ground. […]
Right at its 60th anniversary, the European Project is facing real challenges. The most obvious, perhaps, is the decision of the British people to leave the European Union. Not least because not only does this substantial discontent with the Project exist in Britain, but it is also present in other European countries. What are the […]
According to mainstream economic theory, globalization tends to “lift all boats,” and has little effect on the broad distribution of incomes. But “globalization” is not the same as the elimination of tariffs and other import barriers that confer rent-seeking advantages to politically influential domestic producers. As Harvard University economist Dani Rodrik frequently points out, economic […]
Inequality is usually measured by comparing incomes across households within a country. But there is also a different kind of inequality: in the affordability of homes across cities. The impact of this form of inequality is no less worrying. In many of the world’s urban centers, homes are becoming prohibitively expensive for people with moderate […]
What do I care about my chitchat of yesterday? The famous statement of German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer could well have been repeated by French President Emanuel Macron with his decision to initiate a postponement in introducing the European Financial Transaction Tax (EFTT). The EFTT should be of major interest for Macron as it is closely […]
As global capitalism advances through the second decade of the 21st century, three observations stand out: Deflation, i.e. collapse of all prices (inclusive of wages and interest rates) Stalled productivity growth Widening income inequalities and deepening of fragmentation and social exclusion. While the mainstream attempts to trivialize these as the new normal, the deflationary environment […]
The time of large SUVs is over: this is what experts in the automobile industry said in 2008, when the oil price was at its peak. Times can change very fast. The oil price fell sharply in 2014 and not much has changed since then. SUV sales in the US reached a new record in […]
Driven by the politics of resolving the Euro crisis, ordoliberalism has sparked great academic interest in recent years. To many observers, this school of thought explains Germany‘s approach towards overcoming that crisis and ensuring the Eurozone’s future stability. Much has been written about its influence on the new Eurozone macroeconomic governance regime but few attempts […]
Since the 1940s, the Left in most western European countries has relied on a combination of four strategies to tackle inequalities in the distribution of income and wealth. Firstly, the pursuit of full employment through Keynesian demand management. Secondly, state planning and nationalisation of the means of production. Thirdly, collective bargaining and the promotion of […]
