Whoever first came up with the idea of throwing different economies like Greece and Germany into one currency pot could not have been an economist, historian or philosopher, but must have been a political idiot with high ambitions. Since the major debt crisis in the eurozone in 2010 and 2012, one thing has been clear: the euro is too strong for southern Europe and too weak for the north, and it is immensely exacerbating the imbalances in the productivity of the major regions. It is the divider of European unification, which should above all have been a gradual cultural process and not a political project imposed under duress on half a billion Europeans. While Germany successfully managed a neo-mercantile business model until its self-induced d-industrialization, the south of Europe (Italy as a representant) is completely decoupled from any economic development. This will not get any better in the coming years.
I think they thought that everything would balance out. Then then UK decided it wanted to keep its own currency, and that threw a wrench in their plan. It doesnt help that they keep bailing themselves out every other year. (the banks) It is probably better if they get on the bitcoin standard, or just go back to their own currency.
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113 sats \ 2 replies \ @tolot 9 Apr
Having studied a lot the matter I can quite confidently agree with you on some of your hypothesis, with the "political idiot" being the most convincing. Overall the "idiocy" was probably well burried under the false hope that the economic parameters of all the countries could eventually converge towards a precise narrow range that european economists theorized.
Nonetheless Italy, Spain, Portugal and Greece parameters defined in some treaties (like Maastricht's) didn't actually fit into the required range at all. In fact, the evaluation that was done at that time focused on the "tendency of the countries to eventually achieve the Maastricht goals" rather than actually complying with them in order to be accepted in the monetary union.
The result was obviously false hope, terrible fiscal policy adjustments and a switch to the Euro currency that could even be considered a financial terrorism act on some countries. An italian politician even messed about for months telling people that "...with the Euro we will rest one day more for every week and earn the same purchasing power...". It's sad, it was basically a political illusion.
Fun fact: the Euro currency was created because was politically unacceptable to use the german Mark as the European Monetary Union currency. I queried some professionals back when I attended mainstream economics courses at university and most of them agreed that the Mark could have been a perfect choice, but was difficult to sell that to european people, so they proceeded with the creation of a new shitcoin.
Fun fact number 2: the switch between the countries own currencies and the Euro wasn't done organically at all...in some countries the currency switch caused a rise of prices sometimes close to 20-30%, because the forex exchange rate fixed polically was not reflecting the actual price levels in the countries.
All-in-all it's been a strange political experiment with no follow-up of any sort, thus the monetary union is not paired to an unique fiscal policy or even to a strong political unity. Not that I was hoping for it, but at least that could have shown some sort of planning in what has been done. No planning at all.
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42 sats \ 1 reply \ @TomK OP 9 Apr
Good summary. To me they are a political and economic zombie
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European Bretton Woods
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I always thought Spain, Portugal, and even Italy were nuts to go along with the idea of a euro. Italy could have handled it but for those lazy mezzogiorno people (I'm southern Italian, so I can say that)
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For me, the crisis is also reflected in the fact that over 35% of young adults live at home with their parents. there is no economic awakening here, young people have no future, nor has the interest in starting their own business been completely stifled by the socialist governments.
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We had exchange students from Italy and Belgium. These were very smart kids from successful families. They were all very pessimistic about ever finding good paying jobs.
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As an American, can you imagine that a gross salary of €35,000 is already tops here in Spain?
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Now I have to think the cost of living is lower, but probably not that much lower.
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A normal house/app here in the south (150 sqm) would cost You in the city 200-300.000. Rent between 650 and 900 euros/m. Food is relatively cheap, med treatment, too.
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Pretty cheap, but everything is relative.
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Belgians are pessimistic in general lol
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Europe had problems in the labor market before 1999.
Euro zone made it worse
I wonder why there was a backlash in Great Britain.
I wonder why Europeans are rethinking unfettered immigration.
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And Greece has and will always eat drink sleep their way to devaluation. And then they eat drink party after devaluation
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42 sats \ 1 reply \ @fm 9 Apr
They knew this before the issuance. The model of dollarization in South America gave us an idea of what was comming. Weak economies will be enslaved to germany speed.
Fuck the PIGS, and im not talking cops here :)
Edit: i forgot about Ireland.. its PIIGS
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But again: we have the better food in the south! (And the best vine in the f..ng universe)
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The irony of the Euro is it's justification came from the death and destruction of two world wars and those that preceded it
History may well look back on it as more destructive than all of Europe's wars combined
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Greek Crisis was the Das Experiment.
Lessons learned and insights gathered via a huge analysis of datasets led by Palantir.
Now everything is ready to be applied back to the Eurozone Experiment.
Expect the unexpected.
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To me the thing is dead. I am completely out of this failed exoeriment
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The original vision of EU was a common market, economic not political
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It changed into a control scheme
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I don't get the cognative dissonance here..
since Bitcoin's monetization will throw the whole world into one currency pot.
People/countries will just have to adapt, no?
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I think that social upheavals such as the change to a new currency or a new monetary system, which is also a deep psychopolitical intervention in people's thinking, develop like the slowing down of a mega-tanker on the high seas: incredibly slowly
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If ever only Eurozone wasn't formed, it would have only been limited to one or two countries but now the whole EU is feeling the approaching storm that will sink the whole fleet together.
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the euro is too strong for southern Europe and too weak for the north, and it is immensely exacerbating the imbalances in the productivity of the major regions
Somewhat OT, but in the spirit of SN: And then comes Bitcoin, too strong for the south and north alike.
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You see btc adoption? Where? Besides my fam?
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21 sats \ 0 replies \ @om 9 Apr
well nowhere but don't we want it? I do! And now you're saying that a currency too strong bad
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Edited while you replied...
It's easier to see if you look at the growth in adoption than the shrinking of non-adoption. I mean if adoption grows from 0.1% to 0.2%, that's a 100% increase in adoption, but only a ~0.1% decrease in the number of non-adopters.
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Yeah. That's correct
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In other words: if you look around (friends, family, colleagues etc.), you mostly see non-adopters and you don't see their numbers shrinking noticeably. To see how adoption is growing, look at online forums, real-life meetups, on-chain stats etc. And you'll see growth.
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hopefully you're right. the only thing i perceive is shitcoinerie
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The sad truth of continental Europe (and most of western Europe countries) is that there is a low perceived difference between Bitcoin and, say, Satispay (a fintech startup that has an easy to use mobile wallet). Europeans are (generally) able to pay in 4/5 different ways in every shop, very low "unbanked-rate" if compared with other economical zones. Bitcoin is mostly seen as a financial tool, if you are lucky you find someone that sees bitcoin as an economic edge, but commonly you'll find a shit ton of "cRyPtO iNvEsToRs" that cannot even perceive the difference between Bitcoin and, say, Solana(L).
At least this is my experience with regards to Europe.
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in my experience, Bitcoin is considered an absolute no-go here among Europeans! Mafia coin, useless, the euro is the best thing in the world anyway - for me it looks very bad here
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Here we go, same experience as you. Europe is basically the less evolved version of CCP with regards to money...and europeans just think that things cannot be changed because they've been always like that, despite the fact that 22 years ago Euro didn't exist and 22 years are really a blink of an eye in economic terms. I'm quite distrustful on what will be the perception of Bitcoin in Europe...only an extreme economic event could possibly change this situation, in my opinion.
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i assume that there will be a serious euro crisis at some point in the future. i still very much question whether Europeans will then turn to bitcoin. a small, perhaps growing minority certainly will, but the masses will remain firmly entangled in the clutches of green communist propaganda.
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Bitcoin doesn't need Europe. Other parts of the world may adopt it first and that's fine. The Europeans will adopt it at whatever the max pain level is for them. Maybe when Latin America overtakes the EU, for example.
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This would be a lesson!