I took a few articles, some monetary policy information (STRATFOR) and recent news about Europe and the Euro and have come to the conclusion that Germany has won. The euro is essentially gutting the European economic base because Greece, Portugal, Spain and Italy (in that order), each have done such a poor job of keeping their budgets under control and now they are flirting with debt defaults. All have grown fat and lazy off the cheap credit the euro brought them. Germany is a rich, technocratic, capital-intensive economy with strong credit markets and efficient workers. It is difficult for the poor, agrarian/manufacturing economies that have high labor costs and that are living off of the difference between the credit they received due to the euro and the credit they qualified for on their own merits. Slowly Germany is achieving by stealth what it failed to achieve in the past thousand years of intra-European struggles. In essence, European states are borrowing money (mostly from Germany) in order to purchase imported goods (mostly from Germany) because their own workers cannot compete on price (mostly because of Germany). In essence Germany is taking over control of all of Europe through monetary policy, they will want the Euro to survive as the Euro acts as a control mechanism for Germany against other countries, and the other countries would never want to leave on their own as they would be bankrupt and excluded from the Euro benefits.
Germany wins control of all European States by acting as the anchor to their monetary system.
Hail!, I mean way to go Germany..
