Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by SevenNation 1347 days ago
The article is really about something called the NGEU:

> ... Thus, as the pandemic raged, a novel form of European solidarity was agreed in the form of a €750bn bail-out fund, Next Generation eu (ngeu). The money is a form of redistribution: it is borrowed by the eu, but will in effect be paid back by its richest members while being doled out to its poorest. This gave fiscal capacity for southern Europeans to stimulate their own economies in the recovery.

I can't imagine something like this is on the table now. Germany's balance of trade, peaking at 2.5 trillion euro in 2015 is now almost zero. That's fine for a country that issues its own currency, but not one like Germany that doesn't. The days of German largesse are in the rear-view-mirror now. Europe will need to find a way to cope without its economic Willy Wonka.

https://tradingeconomics.com/germany/balance-of-trade

Also, the title in the article is:

> A German aid package revives calls for solidarity with poorer EU countries

which is not as sensational as the HN title.

2 comments

I don't think it's the NGEU, that was for Covid, but recently Germany just said it will borrow 200 billion Euro to be distributed to German businesses as help, and the article is saying that's not very fair.
Not too different from what happens in China or India.

The imbalances between the rich provinces and poor ones are much more than in the EU.