California State Senate Approves Driver's Licenses For Illegal Immigrants | Main | Terrorists in Iran

June 03, 2005
Moronic Italian Minister Blames Euro for Economic Woe

This proves that politicians cannot be trusted with economic policy.

Italy should consider leaving the single currency and reintroducing the lira, Welfare Minister Roberto Maroni said in a newspaper interview on Friday.

The euro "has proved inadequate in the face of the economic slowdown, the loss of competitiveness and the job crisis," Maroni said.

In this situation, the answer is to give the government greater power to defend national industry from foreign competition and "to give control over the exchange rate back to the government."

This moron would blame Italy's dismal economic performance on the Euro rather than on Italy's own private-sector strangulation. He should know that it is economic policy, not currency, that dictates economic performance. Worse, he suggests economy-killing protectionism, which threw America into the Great Depression. To understand his total lack of knowledge, just compare Italy with Ireland. Ireland has adopted free market economic policies and has become a European dynamo while Italy has adhered to socialism, but both use the Euro.
Unemployment: Ireland 4.3%; Italy 8.6%
GDP growth: Ireland 5.1%; Italy 1.3%
GDP per capita: Ireland US$31,900; Italy US$27,700

Posted by Jonathan R. on June 3, 2005 04:00 PM

Comments

Jonathan

Actually they should scrap the euro and bring back the lira. The European Union has been a disaster. Now, the reasons for the change are quite different than what this guy spews but I'd like to see it anyway.

Posted by: CJ [TypeKey Profile Page] at June 3, 2005 06:05 PM

Have you read what Maroni said ? I did, and it's not what you're telling your readers.

First of all, it's important to bear in mind that Maroni represents the Northern League, whose electoral base are the small businesspeople of Northern Italy. Due to the terrible structural problems of the Italian economy (which have to do with a communist Central Italy and a welfare-dependent South), the only way for the economy of the North to stay competitive was by regularly devaluating the lira. The adoption of the euro deprived them of that possibility.

Second, Maroni made his remarks after attending another fruitless meeting of European ministers on certain reforms of labor law. Maroni and his party happen to be proponents of far-reaching reform of both social legislation and the tax code. They also happen to be the only proponents of these reforms in Italy, because even the party of Berlusconi, who campaigned on these reforms has given up on them.

Third, the protectionist remarks were aimed at China, which doesn't play by the rules. I'm all for free trade, but not if my competitors use slave laborers to lower the price of their products. Haven't the US slapped some tariffs on a number of Chinese products lately ?

Maroni is no moron. Seeing GOPBloggers echo the official EU line is disappointing.

Posted by: Peter at June 5, 2005 09:33 AM