Word: deficits
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...Perhaps the worst part, however, is that deficits have risen the fastest in the euro-zone group, which requires members to limit their budget shortfalls to 3% of GDP. Many of these countries began exceeding that threshold before the financial crisis began and then went well above it after the crash. E.U. countries collectively spent $1.5 billion to save their vulnerable banking sectors and a further $200 billion in stimulus funding to revive their economies. Although the latter helped the 16-nation euro zone exit the recession in the middle of 2009, it also lifted already lofty deficit levels even...
...your borrowing - much less the principle - and you'll default," says economist Marc Touati, deputy director of the Paris-based financial-services group Global Equities. "We're not there yet, especially for all the nations of Europe. But there are several, including France, that simply must cut spending, deficit and debt dramatically, and soon - or things will get very ugly." (See the worst business deals...
...ugly? Greece is already scrambling to lower its deficit of nearly 13% to the E.U. ceiling of 3% by the end of 2012 under a European Commission plan to be endorsed on Wednesday. Spain is similarly promising to slash its deficit of 11.4% to just 3% by 2013, although the country - which is still reeling from the recession, with unemployment of nearly 19% - has been vague about how it will do that beyond proposing $69 billion in cost-cutting measures over the next four years. Last month, French officials somehow managed to sound proud when they announced that France...
...Under pressure from the E.U., France also said it would seek to bring its deficit to under 3% by 2013, although that is based on optimistic economic growth levels of at least 2.5% annually. Meeting those targets gets even more challenging with the tax cuts that President Nicolas Sarkozy keeps handing out - most recently to businesses worth over $10 billion annually - coupled with his call for all E.U. countries to continue pumping their economies with stimulus spending to foster growth. Even Germany, the E.U.'s most disciplined member, will see its 2009 deficit of nearly 4% rise to almost...
...stress about deficit spending - especially in the wake of the worst recession to hit the continent in a lifetime? Because the habit isn't new, and it is clearly harder to kick than governments pretend. Observers note that the borrowing kick has already lifted French public debt to nearly 80% of GDP - a level that Germany is within shouting distance of, and which Italy, Belgium and Greece are well beyond. (See pictures of the global financial crisis...