{"id":46949,"date":"2019-06-27T09:38:00","date_gmt":"2019-06-27T14:38:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=46949"},"modified":"2019-06-27T09:38:06","modified_gmt":"2019-06-27T14:38:06","slug":"europe-gives-up-on-sound-money-prepares-to-join-the-currency-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=46949","title":{"rendered":"Europe Gives Up On Sound Money, Prepares To Join The Currency War"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dollarcollapse.com\/europe-currency-war\/\">Europe Gives Up On Sound Money, Prepares To Join The Currency War<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Not so long ago, Europe seemed to have its financial house more-or-less in order. German government spending was actually falling. Industries that had been nationalized in the socialist 70s were being privatized. The European Central Bank \u2013 run by sound money advocate Jean-Claude Trichet \u2013 was smarter and more cautious than the incoherently rambunctious Bernanke Fed. The euro, for a while, was actually preferred by many over the dollar.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Then \u2013 gradually at first and now very quickly \u2013 everything went sideways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Mario Draghi took over for Trichet at the ECB and promised to do \u201cwhatever it takes\u201d to generate at least 2% inflation. Then he proceeded to deliver on that promise with massive asset purchases and negative interest rates.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Inequality \u2013 which, we\u2019re now coming to realize \u2013 is fed by low interest rates and easy money, rose to near-US proportions. Immigration was mishandled to the point that it became THE political issue. And populist parties opposed to the existing system attracted enough votes to rattle the mainstream parties.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The entrenched political\/financial class, shocked by the unwashed masses\u2019 effrontery, are now responding exactly as you\u2019d expect, with massive increases in social spending, promises of even easier money (Draghi actually claimed that there was \u201cplenty of headroom\u201d to cut rates from the current -0.4%) and, well, whatever else it takes to stay in power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Here, for instance, is Germany\u2019s government spending. Note the uptrend now that the Greens are contenders:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.dollarcollapse.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/German-government-spending-June-19.jpg\" alt=\"German government spending Europe currency war\" class=\"wp-image-25434\"\/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">From&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/articles\/europes-struggling-political-parties-promise-a-return-to-the-1970s-11561561071?mod=hp_lead_pos5\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\">today\u2019s Wall Street Journal<\/a>:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>To win voters lost to an anti-globalization backlash, Europe\u2019s mainstream parties are going back to the 1970s.<\/p><p>In Germany, the U.K, Denmark, France and Spain, these parties are aiming to reverse decades of pro-market policy and promising greater state control of business and the economy, more welfare benefits, bigger pensions and higher taxes for corporations and the wealthy. Some have discussed nationalizations and expropriations.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&nbsp;\u2026click on the above link to read the rest of the article\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Europe Gives Up On Sound Money, Prepares To Join The Currency War Not so long ago, Europe seemed to have its financial house more-or-less in order. German government spending was actually falling. Industries that had been nationalized in the socialist 70s were being privatized. The European Central Bank \u2013 run by sound money advocate Jean-Claude [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[124,281,282,426,7544,536],"class_list":["post-46949","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","tag-central-banks","tag-europe","tag-european-central-bank","tag-inflation","tag-john-rubino","tag-money"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46949","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46949"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46949\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46950,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46949\/revisions\/46950"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46949"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46949"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46949"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}