Sometimes you find sensible answers.
"“Why haven’t these countries converged” with the rest of Europe? he asks. “It’s demographics. As populations age, there are fewer people in their 20s to 40s to buy new houses, so they save more. The younger a country is, the more dependent it is on credit to get growth.”
Germany, where the average age is 45 and rising even as the population is beginning to shrink, is a nation of savers, and public policy has encouraged keeping wages under control and building up export industries.
By contrast, the younger Greeks, Irish and Spaniards went on borrowing binges, driven in particular by rising demands for new homes and consumer goods that, in several cases, turned into housing bubbles before going bust. Wages were pushed up, encouraging spending but soon making it all but impossible for their industries to compete with the thrifty Germans, Dutch and other Northern Europeans.
Most economists, beholden as they are to their “promiscuous but essentially useless” economic models, Mr. Hugh rails, missed what he considers an easily predictable outcome. And that, he adds, “is why we are in such a big mess now.”"
Germany, where the average age is 45 and rising even as the population is beginning to shrink, is a nation of savers, and public policy has encouraged keeping wages under control and building up export industries.
By contrast, the younger Greeks, Irish and Spaniards went on borrowing binges, driven in particular by rising demands for new homes and consumer goods that, in several cases, turned into housing bubbles before going bust. Wages were pushed up, encouraging spending but soon making it all but impossible for their industries to compete with the thrifty Germans, Dutch and other Northern Europeans.
Most economists, beholden as they are to their “promiscuous but essentially useless” economic models, Mr. Hugh rails, missed what he considers an easily predictable outcome. And that, he adds, “is why we are in such a big mess now.”"
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