Eurozone Recovery ? - no one should bet the farm

If the eurozone unemployment rate is still too high by the end of 2016, annual inflation remains well below the ECB’s 2% target, and fiscal policies and structural reforms exert a short-term drag on economic growth, the only game in town may be continued quantitative easing. But the ongoing weakness of the euro – fed by such policies – is fueling growth in the eurozone’s current-account surplus.

Indeed, as the euro weakens, the periphery countries’ external accounts have swung from deficit to balance and, increasingly, to surplus. Germany and the eurozone core were already running large surpluses; in the absence of policies to boost domestic demand, those surpluses have simply risen further. Thus, the ECB’s monetary policy will take on an increasingly beggar-thy-neighbor cast, leading to trade and currency tensions with the United States and other trade partners.

To avoid this outcome, Germany needs to adopt policies – fiscal stimulus, higher spending on infrastructure and public investment, and more rapid wage growth – that would boost domestic spending and reduce the country’s external surplus. Unless, and until, Germany moves in this direction, no one should bet the farm on a more robust and sustained eurozone recovery.

Read more at http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/eurozone-fragile-recovery-by-nouriel-roubini-2015-03#O7MCBJ4WaBTG24kh.99






Nouriel Roubini is an American professor of Economics at New York University`s Stern School of Business and chairman of RGE Roubini Global Economics