Social Europe

politics, economy and employment & labour

  • Themes
    • Strategic autonomy
    • War in Ukraine
    • European digital sphere
    • Recovery and resilience
  • Publications
    • Books
    • Dossiers
    • Occasional Papers
    • Research Essays
    • Brexit Paper Series
  • Podcast
  • Videos
  • Newsletter

Germany, Greece, And The Future Of Europe

Jeffrey D Sachs 21st July 2015

Jeffrey D. Sachs

Jeffrey D. Sachs

I have been helping countries to overcome financial crises for 30 years, and have studied the economic crises of the twentieth century as background to my advisory work. In all crises, there is an inherent imbalance of power between creditor and debtor. Successful crisis management therefore depends on the creditor’s wisdom. In this regard, I strongly urge Germany to rethink its approach to Greece.

A financial crisis is caused by a country’s excessive indebtedness, which generally reflects a combination of mismanagement by the debtor country, over-optimism, corruption, and the poor judgment and weak incentives of creditor banks. Greece fits that bill.

Greece was heavily indebted when it joined the eurozone in 2001, with government debt at around 99% of GDP. As a new member, however, Greece was able to borrow easily from 2000 to 2008, and the debt-to-GDP ratio rose to 109%.

When a country’s prosperity depends on the continued inflow of capital, a sudden stop or reversal of financial flows triggers a sharp contraction. In Greece, the easy lending stopped with the 2008 global financial crisis. The economy shrunk by 18% from 2008 to 2011, and unemployment soared from 8% to 18%.

The most obvious cause was lower government spending, which reduced aggregate demand. Public-sector workers lost their jobs, and construction projects ground to a halt. As incomes declined, other domestic sectors collapsed.

Another factor in Greece’s economic collapse is less obvious: the contraction of bank credit. As banks lost their access to interbank credit lines from abroad, they restricted lending and called in outstanding loans. Domestic savers also withdrew their deposits, fearing for the banks’ solvency and – thanks largely to German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble – for their country’s continued eurozone membership. Like shrinking aggregate demand, the contraction of bank loans had a multiplier effect, with growing financial fragility inducing depositors and overseas financial institutions also to withdraw credits and deposits from Greek banks.

In normal circumstances, economies overcome a debt crisis by cutting government deficits, shifting production from domestic sales to exports, and recapitalizing banks. The budget surplus and export revenues allow the economy to service its foreign debt, while bank recapitalization permits renewed credit expansion.

If the export boost is large enough and rapid enough, the earnings it brings largely offset the decline in domestic demand, and overall output is stabilized or even returned to growth. Spain, Ireland, and Portugal were all able to cushion their post-2008 slumps with a surge in export earnings. Remarkably, Greece could not. In fact, Greek export earnings in 2013, at €53 billion, were actually €3 billion lower than in 2008, even after domestic demand collapsed.

That is not surprising, for three reasons. First, because the European rescue packages did not recapitalize the Greek banking sector (the focus was on bailing out German and French banks), potential exporters could not obtain the operating credit required to support their retooling needs. Second, Greece’s economic base is too narrow to support a significant short-term increase in exports. Third, administrative, regulatory, and tax obstacles hindered the export response, especially as the tax increases in the rescue packages made it even harder for small and medium-size enterprises to grow and establish new markets abroad.

In my view, the policy response by Greece’s partners, led by Germany, has been unwise and highly unprofessional. Their approach has been to extend new loans so that Greece can service its existing debts, without restoring Greece’s banking system or promoting its export competitiveness. Greece’s initial €110 billion bailout package, in 2010, went to pay government debts to German and French banks. As a result, Greece owes an ever-larger share of its debt to official creditors: the International Monetary Fund, the European Financial Stability Fund, and, increasingly, the European Central Bank. While Greece’s debts to private creditors have been partly cut, this was too little too late, because it cannot even service its debts to official creditors.

Year after year, Greece’s creditors have promised that the bailout packages would bring about a meaningful rebound in output, employment, and exports. Instead, the country has experienced a depression comparable to the decline in output and employment that Germany suffered from 1930 to 1932, the years that preceded Hitler’s rise. Many Germans may despise Greece’s current Syriza government, which pledged to end the policy of creditor-imposed austerity; but four consecutive governments – center-left, technocratic, center-right, and left – have implemented it.

All of these governments have failed. Perhaps Antonis Samaras’s center-right government from 2012 to 2015 came closest to succeeding, but it could not survive, politically, the severe austerity that it was being forced to impose. Nor did Greece’s creditors do anything to help Samaras’s government out of its political bind, even though it was a government they liked.

To overcome an economic crisis, the creditor must be smart and measured. It is right to demand strong reforms of a mismanaged debtor government; but if the debtor is pushed too hard, it is the society that breaks, leading to instability, violence, coups, and pervasive human suffering. While the debtor loses the most, the creditors also lose, as they are not repaid.

The formula for success is to match reforms with debt relief, in line with the real needs of the economy. A smart creditor of Greece would ask some serious and probing questions. How can we help Greece to get credit moving again within the banking system? How can we help Greece to spur exports? What is needed to promote the rapid growth of small and medium-size Greek enterprises?

For five years now, Germany has not asked these questions. Indeed, over time, questions have been replaced by German frustration at Greeks’ alleged indolence, corruption, and incorrigibility. It has become ugly and personal on both sides. And the creditors have failed to propose a realistic approach to Greece’s debts, perhaps out of Germany’s fear that Italy, Portugal, and Spain might ask for relief down the line.

Whatever the reason, Germany has treated Greece badly, failing to offer the empathy, analysis, and debt relief that are required. And if it did so to scare Italy and Spain, it should be reminded of Kant’s categorical imperative: Countries, like individuals, should be treated as ends, not means.

Creditors are sometimes wise and sometimes incredibly stupid. America, Britain, and France were incredibly stupid in the 1920s to impose excessive reparations payments on Germany after World War I. In the 1940s and 1950s, the United States was a wise creditor, giving Germany new funds under the Marshall Plan, followed by debt relief in 1953.

In the 1980s, the US was a bad creditor when it demanded excessive debt payments from Latin America and Africa; in the 1990s and later, it smartened up, putting debt relief on the table. In 1989, the US was smart to give Poland debt relief (and Germany went along, albeit grudgingly). In 1992, its stupid insistence on strict Russian debt servicing of Soviet-era debts sowed the seeds for today’s bitter relations.

Germany’s demands have brought Greece to the point of near-collapse, with potentially disastrous consequences for Greece, Europe, and Germany’s global reputation. This is a time for wisdom, not rigidity. And wisdom is not softness. Maintaining a peaceful and prosperous Europe is Germany’s most vital responsibility; but it is surely its most vital national interest as well.

© Project Syndicate

climate finance,developing countries,$100 billion
Jeffrey D Sachs

Prof Jeffrey D Sachs is director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University and president of the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network. He has served as adviser to three UN secretaries-general and currently serves as a Sustainable Development Goals advocate under António Guterres.

You are here: Home / Politics / Germany, Greece, And The Future Of Europe

Most Popular Posts

Russian soldiers' mothers,war,Ukraine The Ukraine war and Russian soldiers’ mothersJennifer Mathers and Natasha Danilova
IGU,documents,International Gas Union,lobby,lobbying,sustainable finance taxonomy,green gas,EU,COP ‘Gaslighting’ Europe on fossil fuelsFaye Holder
Schengen,Fortress Europe,Romania,Bulgaria Romania and Bulgaria stuck in EU’s second tierMagdalena Ulceluse
income inequality,inequality,Gini,1 per cent,elephant chart,elephant Global income inequality: time to revise the elephantBranko Milanovic
Orbán,Hungary,Russia,Putin,sanctions,European Union,EU,European Parliament,commission,funds,funding Time to confront Europe’s rogue state—HungaryStephen Pogány

Most Recent Posts

reality check,EU foreign policy,Russia Russia’s invasion of Ukraine—a reality check for the EUHeidi Mauer, Richard Whitman and Nicholas Wright
permanent EU investment fund,Recovery and Resilience Facility,public investment,RRF Towards a permanent EU investment fundPhilipp Heimberger and Andreas Lichtenberger
sustainability,SDGs,Finland Embedding sustainability in a government programmeJohanna Juselius
social dialogue,social partners Social dialogue must be at the heart of Europe’s futureClaes-Mikael Ståhl
Jacinda Ardern,women,leadership,New Zealand What it means when Jacinda Ardern calls timePeter Davis

Other Social Europe Publications

front cover scaled Towards a social-democratic century?
Cover e1655225066994 National recovery and resilience plans
Untitled design The transatlantic relationship
Women Corona e1631700896969 500 Women and the coronavirus crisis
sere12 1 RE No. 12: Why No Economic Democracy in Sweden?

Foundation for European Progressive Studies Advertisement

The winter issue of the Progressive Post magazine from FEPS is out!

The sequence of recent catastrophes has thrust new words into our vocabulary—'polycrisis', for example, even 'permacrisis'. These challenges have multiple origins, reinforce each other and cannot be tackled individually. But could they also be opportunities for the EU?

This issue offers compelling analyses on the European health union, multilateralism and international co-operation, the state of the union, political alternatives to the narrative imposed by the right and much more!


DOWNLOAD HERE

Hans Böckler Stiftung Advertisement

The macroeconomic effects of re-applying the EU fiscal rules

Against the background of the European Commission's reform plans for the Stability and Growth Pact (SGP), this policy brief uses the macroeconometric multi-country model NiGEM to simulate the macroeconomic implications of the most relevant reform options from 2024 onwards. Next to a return to the existing and unreformed rules, the most prominent options include an expenditure rule linked to a debt anchor.

Our results for the euro area and its four biggest economies—France, Italy, Germany and Spain—indicate that returning to the rules of the SGP would lead to severe cuts in public spending, particularly if the SGP rules were interpreted as in the past. A more flexible interpretation would only somewhat ease the fiscal-adjustment burden. An expenditure rule along the lines of the European Fiscal Board would, however, not necessarily alleviate that burden in and of itself.

Our simulations show great care must be taken to specify the expenditure rule, such that fiscal consolidation is achieved in a growth-friendly way. Raising the debt ceiling to 90 per cent of gross domestic product and applying less demanding fiscal adjustments, as proposed by the IMK, would go a long way.


DOWNLOAD HERE

ILO advertisement

Global Wage Report 2022-23: The impact of inflation and COVID-19 on wages and purchasing power

The International Labour Organization's Global Wage Report is a key reference on wages and wage inequality for the academic community and policy-makers around the world.

This eighth edition of the report, The Impact of inflation and COVID-19 on wages and purchasing power, examines the evolution of real wages, giving a unique picture of wage trends globally and by region. The report includes evidence on how wages have evolved through the COVID-19 crisis as well as how the current inflationary context is biting into real wage growth in most regions of the world. The report shows that for the first time in the 21st century real wage growth has fallen to negative values while, at the same time, the gap between real productivity growth and real wage growth continues to widen.

The report analysis the evolution of the real total wage bill from 2019 to 2022 to show how its different components—employment, nominal wages and inflation—have changed during the COVID-19 crisis and, more recently, during the cost-of-living crisis. The decomposition of the total wage bill, and its evolution, is shown for all wage employees and distinguishes between women and men. The report also looks at changes in wage inequality and the gender pay gap to reveal how COVID-19 may have contributed to increasing income inequality in different regions of the world. Together, the empirical evidence in the report becomes the backbone of a policy discussion that could play a key role in a human-centred recovery from the different ongoing crises.


DOWNLOAD HERE

ETUI advertisement

The EU recovery strategy: a blueprint for a more Social Europe or a house of cards?

This new ETUI paper explores the European Union recovery strategy, with a focus on its potentially transformative aspects vis-à-vis European integration and its implications for the social dimension of the EU’s socio-economic governance. In particular, it reflects on whether the agreed measures provide sufficient safeguards against the spectre of austerity and whether these constitute steps away from treating social and labour policies as mere ‘variables’ of economic growth.


DOWNLOAD HERE

Eurofound advertisement

Eurofound webinar: Making telework work for everyone

Since 2020 more European workers and managers have enjoyed greater flexibility and autonomy in work and are reporting their preference for hybrid working. Also driven by technological developments and structural changes in employment, organisations are now integrating telework more permanently into their workplace.

To reflect on these shifts, on 6 December Eurofound researchers Oscar Vargas and John Hurley explored the challenges and opportunities of the surge in telework, as well as the overall growth of telework and teleworkable jobs in the EU and what this means for workers, managers, companies and policymakers.


WATCH THE WEBINAR HERE

About Social Europe

Our Mission

Article Submission

Membership

Advertisements

Legal Disclosure

Privacy Policy

Copyright

Social Europe ISSN 2628-7641

Social Europe Archives

Search Social Europe

Themes Archive

Politics Archive

Economy Archive

Society Archive

Ecology Archive

Follow us

RSS Feed

Follow us on Facebook

Follow us on Twitter

Follow us on LinkedIn

Follow us on YouTube