I find this story both extraordinary and inspiring.
Ms Fried’s article is published here.
Category: Economic history
Philippe Legrain points out that, far from creating the sort of European-level democratic space that would allow citizens to choose between political and economic alternatives, closer European political union is likely to place more even restraints on the power of politicians to respond to voters’ demands for alternative policies. This is because ever more rules proscribing what others can do, and made up by Germany, is what Germany wants (not that she has historically felt bound by rules when fundamental national interests are at stake, as inter alia the collapse of the EMS and the scrapping of the excessive deficit procedure inform us; and quite right too in my view).
But why does Germany want this?
Harold James has one view here.
And here is J.A. Hobson:
Moreover, while the manufacturer and trader are well content to trade with foreign nations, the tendency for investors to work towards the political annexation of countries which contain their more speculative investments is very powerful.
Paul Mason has a blog post and interview here, worth reading and watching. I am going to stick my neck out and assert that Manolis Glezos does in fact speak with a certain moral authority. But it is the German deputy finance minister’s constant insistence on obeying the law that prompts this post, along with its title. For German government use of the principle in the economic domain, see here (p. 188).
The latest in an important series of papers by Jordà, Schularick and Taylor is described here.
Although they don’t spin it this way (which is not surprising, since they don’t provide evidence about the impact of fiscal policy on housing booms and busts), the work suggests to this reader potential arguments (on top of the more standard ones) regarding the benefits of automatic stabilisers and countercyclical fiscal policy.
Since Paul Krugman and others are talking about the role of networks in economic history, let me throw this classic paper by our own Morgan Kelly into the mix (thanks to David O’Donnell for the link to the ungated version).