Klau on the eurozone mess

According to Thomas Klau, “the assumption that the coordination of 17 national policies backed up by rules and sanctions can deliver” is “patently false”: “the choice must ultimately be between discarding the euro or taking the plunge into a federal structure complete with Eurobonds,  a common set of core policies,  a bigger and more flexible EU budget, and so on.” If that really is the choice — and one can debate this of course — then my money is on the former, especially given the way the current banking and debt crisis is playing out in both core and periphery. You can read the full article here.

Why the euro is good for Germany

Adam Posen is always worth reading; his account of why a large, diverse eurozone is in Germany’s interests is available here.

Münchau on misdiagnoses

Wolfgang Münchau is in fine form in this morning’s FT. And this morning’s Eurointelligence provides further evidence along the same lines, with some alarming German comments about the forthcoming stress tests (or should that be “stress tests”?).

Dodgy banking assets and the viability of the IMF/EU deal

Colm McCarthy’s latest offering in the Sunday Independent is available here. Like its predecessors, it is a must-read.

Unintended consequences, academic edition

Colm Harmon has a nice little piece on some (possibly) unintended consequences of current government higher education policy here.