Tag Archives: Modest Proposal

The lean years are here again, to the apparent satisfaction of Germany’s Finance Minister, a Social Democrat.  The rate of growth of the budgetary surplus was declining, therefore restraining expenditure was the prudent attitude, the public must rest assured that over the next few years 25 billion euros will be saved, the chance of a mildly pro-cyclical switch to austerity will not be missed.  But such is the...

Last Friday, Yanis Varoufakis was in Italy to promote European Spring, a list of candidates standing across the continent in next May’s European election. The former Greek finance minister visited Rome just days after the European Commission had struck down the Italian government’s budget, sparking further rows over Brussels’ authority to curb member states’ spending. At his press conference, Varoufakis called...

ATHENS – Europe is at the mercy of a common currency that not only was unnecessary for European integration, but that is actually undermining the European Union itself. So what should be done about a currency without a state to back it – or about the 19 European states without a currency that they control? The logical answer is either to dismantle the euro or to provide it with the federal state it needs. The...

Στις 25 Μαρτίου, την επέτειο των 60 ετών από την Συνθήκη της Ρώμης, το DiEM25 παρουσίασε την πανευρωπαϊκή του ατζέντα οικονομικής & κοινωνικής πολιτικής στην Ρώμη.  Την προηγούμενη μέρα, σε συνέντευξη τύπου στο Κέντρο Ξένων Ανταποκριτών της Ρώμης, οι Γιάνης Βαρουφάκης και Lorenzo Marsili μίλησαν στα μέσα για την ατζέντα αυτή, που το DiEM25 αποκαλεί ΝΕΑ ΕΥΡΩΠΑΪΚΗ ΣΥΜΦΩΝΙΑ (European New Deal) και προανήγγειλαν...

In October 2015, I had the opportunity to debate, in Munich, Professor Hans Werner Sinn on the European Monetary Union and, more broadly, Europe’s economy . On 30 August 2016, at the Alpbach European Forum, I debated Professor Sinn’s successor as President of IFO, Professor Clemens Fuest. [Click here, or the image above, for video of the two keynotes and the debate.] This Alpbach Keynote Debate was organised along the lines of the following proposition/question “The market economy is the...

It was with great sorrow that I learned of Michel Rocard’s passing. Since 2013, when he wrote the Preface to our Modest Proposal for Resolving the Euro Crisis, Michel has been a valued interlocutor and supporter. Only a few weeks ago, we were planning to meet up in Paris in the Fall to discuss his further contribution to DiEM25. He will be missed. Michel Rocard’s Foreword to “A Modest Proposal for Solving the Eurozone Crisis” “A modest proposal”: I love this title. The proposal is...