Germany Pushes France to Toughen Bailout Stance

[alp227]

Source: The New York Times

BRUSSELS — Undeterred by the deepening crisis over the euro, Germany stuck to its guns Thursday in pushing to make private investors pick up part of the tab in any future bailout — and appeared to be winning qualified support from France.

In a speech in Berlin, Chancellor Angela Merkel said the euro zone would retain its existing state guarantees until 2013 and thereafter would impose “discipline.”

With the issue due to be discussed next month by European Union leaders, France seemed to edge closer to the German position on Thursday while retaining caveats.

Christine Lagarde, the French economy minister, told lawmakers that if any new system were to involve the private sector, it “should be applied on a case-by-case basis.”

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/26/business/global/26iht-default.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss&pagewanted=all

[pattmarty]

1. It is really weird that what, 60 years or so ago Germany was a............

............fascist, torturing, racist country and look at them now. Look at us now compared to then.

[JDPriestly]

2. Germans need to understand that economic unions rely on the strong

to support the weak.

California, for example, pays far, far more into the federal tax pot than it gets back. In a sense, we Californians support people in some of the poorer states. Those people don't even realize that is the fact, and they certainly don't appreciate the fact that, to some extent, Californians pay their bills for them.

But that is the way it works.

Germans love their vacations in Spain, Greece, Portugal and Ireland. They love them in part because it is inexpensive to travel in those countries. Greece, Portugal and Spain have much warmer climates than Germany, but far less industrial power. That is the reason for the economic disparities.

Either Germany really wants the European Union to survive or it doesn't. Germany by itself has not fared well in the past. It needs the good will of the rest of Europe to survive. Unfortunately, Angela Merkel and her party are too conservative to understand that people need each other, and Germany needs happy neighbors.