Instead of uniting Europe, the Euro may just tear a continent apart

As I cannot help following world politics, I cannot help having some thoughts regarding Greece and the financial situation the country finds itself in. On Friday, the Swedish Finance Minister called the Greece opposition 'criminally irresponsible' for not forming a coalition government with the ruling party.

Radio 4 reported this morning that a movement has started in Greece, calling for people to stop repaying their debts. With regards to their national debt and deficit, some politicians are calling for all debts to be written off.

The latter would make a lot of sense as Greece are finding themselves in a circle so vicious, that it will be very hard - if not impossible - to create the sustainable growth needed to move the figures back to black.

The problem with writing Greece's debt off is that the EU has to ask Portugal, Ireland and Spain to plug their fingers in their national ears whilst singing LALALALALA. In this situation, no matter what decision the EU will make, and no matter what they want other countries to think of it; the decision will be a precedent.

The EU is meant to be a union of sovereign states. The challenge with a single currency is that it is great when times are good, and not so great when countries find themselves in various depths of recession. Please forgive me, but Sweden is again a prime example of how a floating currency adapts itself to the macroeconomic environment.

Personally, I am in favour of the single market. However, in the light of the above I have to be sceptic to a single currency. Instead of uniting Europe, the Euro may just tear a continent apart.

Please let me know your thoughts.

Examples of further reading:
http://www.economist.com/node/18805503
http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2011/05/swedish_view_euro_crisis




Today Simon has:

Listened to Simple Plan in French: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxtfFoFwrmA

Read loads of profiles on LinkedIn

Noted that time flies