manny-jestem
07.02.11, 17:05
Uniofilom do przemyslenia.
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/04/AR2011020406833_pf.html
Germany, France push euro-zone policy changes to help stabilize regional economy
By Michael Birnbaum
Saturday, February 5, 2011; A09
MUNICH - Two top European leaders are backing plans that would push the countries that use the euro to adopt similar pension, health-care and other policies in an effort to keep their budgets in balance and the regional economy more stable.
The effort is being spearheaded by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and was endorsed Friday at a Brussels summit of European leaders by French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
The widely differing economic circumstances in the 17-nation euro zone have led stronger nations such as Germany to come to the rescue of two debt-strapped countries, Greece and Ireland. With bailouts potentially needed in Portugal and Spain this year, Merkel has insisted that further German support come with strings attached, in the form of closer coordination of spending and budgets among the countries that use the common currency.
Details are still to be worked out; German officials say they want proposals by March. If the common budget policies can be agreed upon, it could pave the way for critical German support to expand an existing emergency fund, a step called for by investors and outside analysts such as the International Monetary Fund.
Under the plan, euro-zone countries would be required to cede some sovereignty about taxation, budgeting and other policies to the European Union and would probably be pressured to keep their deficits in line with the German model.
Many economists have said the move would help the euro zone to function more cohesively and to ward off financial crises.
"We must adapt our structures so that all are going in the same direction," Merkel said in a statement.
The proposal's sweep is a shift for the leader of Europe's economic powerhouse. Since the beginning of the financial crisis, Merkel has often been cautious about addressing more than the problem at hand - first Greece's debt problems, then Ireland's.
But German government officials cited a growing feeling that broader cooperation among the nations that use the euro is crucial to the stability of the currency and the confidence of the markets.
The proposal raises the prospect that more countries would be expected to increase their retirement age - Germany's is 67 - and that the decisions would come from Brussels, not from their own capitals. Merkel also wants countries to set brakes on constitutional debt, as Germany does, by limiting their ability to spend significantly more than they take in.
"Behind this crisis, there's the fact that there's not enough real integration" in the European Union, said Jean Pisani-Ferry, the director of Bruegel, a Brussels-based economic think tank. Merkel's plan "goes really in the right direction."
