The amount of poker chips in play keeps increasing though... But even if that analogy were fitting, would you say any major redistribution has taken place in the U.S since 1966? If not, does that signal that the Euro might go on another 40 odd years?
Agreed about more chips in play – but in the Eurozone it’s the Germans who are the only ones able to bring new chips to the table. So if you want to stay in the game, you have to borrow courtesy of the Germans, and if you want to ( indirectly ) borrow from the Germans, then you’ll have to agree to do whatever they tell you to do whether you like it or not. As my brother-in-law said to me at Christmas, and only half-jokingly -
All we Germans now own property abroad - it's called Greece.
As for the USA, I agree that, to the naked eye, there appears to have been no major redistribution since 1966, but only if we ignore the fact that in 1966 the US dominated the world economically whereas now Corporate USA is 50% owned by Asian and Middle East investors and US companies no longer dominate except in a few new industries which didn’t exist in 1966 such as IT and Social Media.
So, Yes, I think that there has been a fairly large redistribution.
On the other hand, I’d argue that the 2008 meltdown is what happens when credit eventually does run out – there’s only a limited amount of smoke and mirrors that borrowers and lenders can get away with until the shit really does hit the fan.
Which is full circle back to Germany – the Eurozone and the EU will continue for another 40 years and even longer but only as long Germany continues to get its own way and what it wants. If or when that stops, so does the EU. So all the other EU members have more or less a single choice – agree to Germany running the EU or quit the EU if your economy is strong enough to survive without constant financial support from the EU. In the UK’s case, it does and will continue to survive without financial support from the EU which is not the case for most of the EU’s Southern and Eastern European members such as Italy, Greece, Portugal, Slovakia, Romania, etc.
By 2025 not tommorrow. And defaulting on debt after leaving would cause retaliation that neither economy wiuld survive.
And the whole game won't stop. No other solvent country would be as stupid as the UK.
Run that one past me again….
Are you suggesting that by 2025 the Italian and Greek economies are going to change structurally and improve sufficiently well that they’ll no longer need to keep borrowing yet more and more from the ECB to pay off debts to other lenders as these debts mature between now and 2025 ?
Seems impossible to me, but maybe you’re right…..
As for the game not stopping, I think I’ve answered how and why I think it will continue or not continue in my reply to ABIZZ.
