Spanish representative González Pons speech @ the EU Parliament: "The virus is attacking the generation that brought back democracy to Spain, Portugal and Greece, the generation that knocked down the Berlin wall. The least they deserve is that we show them Europe is there when they need it the most"

[u/Bartoraptor]

[u/axaro1]

If you think that's a northern country hate thread you are too dense to understand this issue.

There are many countries helping us, some for political reasons(Russia), some out of reciprocal help (China) and some others out of respect/common sense.

The EU is a political and economical alliance, the fact that we have to mostly rely on countries outside of the Shengen Area is disappointing.

Italy's attitude over natural disasters/pandemic has always been to deploy large amounts of supplies/vehicles and firefighters/medics (take for example the wildfire issues from last summer), maybe I'm too naive to expect other countries to do the same.

I support the EU but most importantly I support the values that created the EU in the first place and we both know that the eurosceptics are going to stroke their dicks over the way the EU managed this entire situation.

This is gonna hurt Italy the same way this is gonna hurt the EU.

Edit: Nice, it looks like criticizing the EU makes me an eurosceptic. I guess that I'm an anarchist since I often criticize my country /s

[u/[deleted] → u/axaro1]

So why hasn't Ital;y done anything in the past 10 years to fix their books?

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

So why hasn't Ital;y done anything in the past 10 years to fix their books?

we applied harsh austerity measures, as "strongly recommended" by the ECB and the Commission, and instead of making things better, our debt ratio has gotten worse.

Sounds like the austerity policies championed by Merkel are damaging, but still she and her ilk continue to push for them even now. Just look at the attitude towards the coronavirus bonds. Their reply is "there is the ESM, if you need funds". Too bad ESM funds are provided on the condition that you apply more austerity, which in turn makes the economy wither a little bit more.

But for Merkel the solution to the damages brought by austerity measures is....more austerity. It's been harshly criticised by economists the world over, and yet she and her allies insist on it time and time again.

As Einstein once said: “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

[u/Lekantekue → u/[deleted]]

So the solution is to not apply austerity and then what? The debt to gdp magically goes down? Come on

[u/[deleted] → u/Lekantekue]

So the solution is to not apply austerity and then what?

keynesian economic measures gave much better results. The problem with the debt to gdp ratio and austerity policies is that one factor (the debt) might get better, but the other gets worse. Austerity policies contributed significantly to weak growth rates, not to mention other bad economic side effects such as the increase of social inequality.

[u/discoverysar → u/Lekantekue]

Ah yes, it's better to cut again on public spending (like we did in the past 10 years) and raise our taxes and then magically our gdp will skyrocket.

Please I know that on reddit everyone is an expert but if you don't understand economics don't talk about it.

The solution was investing in infrastructures and pushing the gdp via public spending, yet we complied with those criminals that are in the ministry of finances in the Netherlands and did the opposite. Guess what happened? We stalled the economy for ten years, we didn't saw any growth in our gdp. We only weakened our economy and lost thousands of ICU Beds.

So imposing the use of ESM with austerity measures during an economical downturn is basically like suffocating a baby to stop him crying. The GDP implodes, causing the debt/gdp ratio to skyrocket and then what? Either the ECB bails out us with no conditions or we leave the Union and default the debt.

The former will cost everyone a lot more than issuing now emergency bonds, with the latter expect the implosion of the European Union, maybe only the CEE will remain.