European Disunion

There's a room where the light won't find you
Holding hands while
The walls come tumbling down
When they do, we'll be right behind you
--Tears for Fears

Columbia professor Joseph Stiglitz is among the more vocal US economists with a socialist bent (I rank him up there with Paul Krugman of Harvard and Brad DeLong of Cal Berkeley). Stiglitz has long been an admirer of the 'social democracy' approach of Europe and, like many US 'intellectuals,' seems to think that we should move toward a similar model.

It appears that the problems now facing the European Union are even giving Dr Stiglitz cause for pause.

In past missives we've suggested the headwinds facing the EU. Expecting durable monetary and fiscal unity among sovereign nations with diverse needs and interests seems horribly flawed from the outset on a natural law basis. Blend in the underlying producitivity lowering and debt generating socialistic economic models of the sovereigns and you have a recipe for down-the-road fracture.

A decade or so later, it appears that we may be down the road.