Hasta la fecha este es, para mi gusto, el mejor artículo de opinión que he visto sobre la conveniencia o inconveniencia de salir del euro :

Two deficits, two austerities, and quantities matter

The excellent Kindred Winecoff considers the troubled periphery of the Eurozone:


Winecoff makes an important point, but I think he needs to cut his analysis a bit more finely. Economies run two very different kinds of deficits, a government fiscal deficit and an international current account deficit. Although the two deficits are related, there is no mechanical connection between the two. They do not reliably move together.

A country that defaults on its international debt will find its paper shunned international capital markets for a while. In countries that have grown accustomed to running current account deficits — that is, countries whose citizens have grown used to consuming more imports than they pay for with exports — a forced return to international balance will undoubtedly be perceived as a form of austerity.

But Winecoff is wrong to claim that “[t]he government budget will have to be balanced almost immediately, and unless there’s a full default will likely need to run a primary surplus for many years”. As long as the country, post-default, issues its own currency, and as long as the country’s citizenry is interested in accumulating domestic currency and debt, the government can run a budget deficit after the restructuring. The capacity of a country to run budget deficits post-crisis will depend largely on the citizenry’s confidence in domestic institutions after the fall. (Countries can also employ controls to prevent capital flight and support domestic currency. But in cosmopolitan, habitually integrated Europe, I suspect that won’t work unless people have some measure of confidence in the project. Wise governments would implement technocratically credible monetary institutions and simultaneously encourage patriotic enthusiasm for the country’s newly independent scrip.)

Winecoff’s example of Iceland is a great case in point. Following its collapse and quasi-default in 2008, the Iceland ran a budget deficit of 9.3% of GDP in 2009 (a primary deficit of 6.6%), and has continued to run deficits since, gently drifting towards balance. Iceland has also been able to sustain large current account deficits as well for a while after the crisis, which helps to cushion the adjustment. Iceland received loans from the IMF and several European countries, which partially financed its continuing international deficit. Also, private citizens of Iceland may have had foreign asset holdings which they could pledge or sell to finance imports while the economy shifted towards international balance.

Iceland’s circumstances were, perhaps, unusually benign. Other crises (Argentina in 2002, Russia in 1998) proceeded much as Winecoff describes, with sharp, simultaneous moves towards fiscal balance and current account surplus. But would crises in the Eurozone look more Argentina or like Iceland? I don’t know, but I can make a strong case for Iceland. Savers in the Eurozone periphery inhabit a world of open financial borders, and have already been diversifying out of home-country bank deposits. (Importantly, this forces governments and the ECB to cover financing gaps left by fleeing depositors.) Argentine savers perceived dedollarization as expropriation, which was corrosive to the legitimacy of domestic institutions. Citizens of the Eurozone periphery, on the other hand, might support their governments’ bid to escape impossible foreign debt. The drawn out, slow motion nature of the Euro crisis has made it easy for private citizens to prepare for Euro exit by sending funds abroad. This practice shifts the costs of default to governments, who in turn can shift costs to external creditors. If domestic publics support the move and believe Euro exit to be a one-off event rather than the start of recurrent devaluation cycles, governments may well be able to run deficits and use Keynesian fiscal policy to smooth the aftershocks of Euro exit.

There may be important differences of institutional credibility between Greece and, say, Ireland or Spain. An Irish exit might be more Icelandic, while a Greek exit might be more Argentine. (It’s worth pointing out that, a decade later, Argentina’s default seems to have worked out very well.) As in Iceland, the (growing) foreign savings of private citizens might cushion the shift from international deficit. (Euro drop-outs could not expect the post-crisis IMF support that Iceland enjoyed, though.) There is a hazard that the furious Eurozone core would try to hold the private wealth of citizens of the periphery as security against the defaulted debt of sovereigns. But that would be a stronger violation of current norms than sovereign default.

Suppose that it will be possible for a drop-out to run a fiscal deficit, but as Winecoff predicts, a sharp shift to international balance proves inescapable. Winecoff is absolutely right to point out that


Undoubtedly, ending an era of persistent current account deficits will prove painful to consumers accustomed to cheap imports. However, that is not ultimately an incremental cost of leaving the Euro. After all, the purpose of staying and suffering austerity would be to pay down indebtedness, which is more costly than a shift to balance. Contrite borrowers have to pay interest on past debt and run (primary) surpluses. Deadbeats just need to pay for what they buy now. Quantities matter. Staying within the Eurozone offers the palliative of stretching the pain out over time, but increases the ultimate burden of the adjustment. Exiting front-loads costs, but reduces their size, as much of the work is done by the act of default. Undoubtedly, jilted creditors would punish “Euro deadbeats”, and exact non-financial costs, so the benefits of debt write-offs would be counterbalanced, at least in part, by new costs. There’d have to be some cost-benefit analysis. But the options are not, as Winecoff suggests, a zero-sum shift in how countries take their lumps. Countries may find they have a lot fewer lumps to take if they repudiate their debt than if they don’t.

Losing the capacity to run a current account deficit and losing the capacity to run a fiscal deficit have very different implications. Shifting international accounts from deficit to balance harms citizens in their role of consumers, but serves them in their roles as workers and savers. If you view the current crisis as driven by the challenge of maintaining consumers’ standard of living measured in tradable goods, then losing the ability to run current account deficits seems harsh. But if you view the crisis as driven by frustration within countries over insufficient opportunity and employment, then shifting to international balance or even to surplus helps. Losing the capacity to run a fiscal deficit has the opposite effect. Where current account austerity increases labor demand, fiscal austerity reduces it. So if you think that underemployment is the pressing problem in the Europeriphery, current account austerity plus continued fiscal deficit is a golden combination.

Lots of countries, obviously emerging Asia but also Germany, seem to prefer the social goods that come with full employment and financial security to the consumer purchasing power gains that accompany current account deficits. The countries of the Eurozone periphery have so far “chosen” the path of excess consumption, but it’s not clear whether that represents a genuine preference or a historical accident. This isn’t to minimize the pain and disruption that would undoubtedly attend import scarcity. Changing human habits hurts. But, as Joni Mitchell might say, something’s lost but something’s gained. This would not be a novel sort of transition. It would be a reprise of the aftermath of the Asian financial crisis.

Leaving the Euro would not be all bows and flows of angel’s hair. But it would not necessarily be catastrophe, and there is no fixed quantity of austerity that Europeriphery countries have to face one way or some other. These countries have difficult choices before them, and should think carefully about the tradeoffs and just what sort of outcomes they hope to engineer.

Note: I have very mixed feelings about any break-up of the Eurozone. This piece was not intended as advocacy of that. I do think the European core is being foolish and shortsighted in its dealings with the periphery. In a better world, the core countries would equitize their claims against the periphery by, for example, adopting some variation of Warren Mosler’s frequent suggestion that the ECB issue per capita grants to all member states, that surplus nations would use as they see fit but debtor states would use to reduce indebtedness.

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Interesante.

Gracias por el artículo.

The capacity of a country to run budget deficits post-crisis will depend largely on the citizenry’s confidence in domestic institutions after the fall.


...

If domestic publics support the move and believe Euro exit to be a one-off event rather than the start of recurrent devaluation cycles, governments may well be able to run deficits and use Keynesian fiscal policy to smooth the aftershocks of Euro exit.

Un par de condicionantes, digamos, muy optimistas.

Por cierto,

¿no es justamente lo contrario de lo dicho en el otro hilo?

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Es indudable que los PIIGS nunca debe haber entrado en el €, pero salir de el en medio del peor tormenta será un suicidio. Se sale cuando ha aminorado el tormenta, pero obviamente cuando ha menguado el tormenta los políticos cantaran victoria, y dirán que han salido gracias al € , olvidando que esto ha sido el base del problema.

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Continuemos desde el otro hilo (no me he leído el artículo entero original, lo dejo para otro momento con más paciencia): El gobierno podrá gastar lo que quiera (pero no se puede obviar que esa no es la ideología dominante, entonces hay cuestiones políticas que impedirán que lo haga), suponiendo que lo hace, a partir de éste punto pueden ocurrir dos cosas:
a) Que dicho gasto emitido (aka creación de dinero mediante gasto público) resulte en un crecimiento del output y una 'revitalización' de la economía.
b) Que dicho gasto acabe en políticas de mala calidad, sin un crecimeinto sólido a largo plazo, o en una transferencia de divisas hacia otros países (similar a lo que ocurre en USA, con la creación de crédito a granel, pero que en la práctica acaba en China).

En el primer caso, la inflación no se saldría de madre respecto al crecimiento y mejorarían en general los datos, incluyendo el empleo. En el segundo caso simplemente a largo plazo contribuiría en un mayor 'debasement' de la moneda con su correspondiente depreciación y pérdida de poder adquisitivo.

Supuestamente los estabilizadores automáticos deberían hacer su trabajo igual que el tipo de cambio flotante. El momento clave en mi opinión es la salida y el cambio a una nueva moneda, el manejo de la deuda contraída y la caída de flujos externos y el efecto sobre la economía interna que puedan tener (llevando incluso a una hiperinflación a lo Argentina). Igual descubrimos que grandes cantidades de dichos flujos externos eran prescindibles y la adaptación es posible o igual descubrimos todo lo contrario. Sólo cabe esperar.

Por otra parte la capacidad de liderazgo interno y responsabilidad, viendo la situación extrema, el desastre fiscal, etc. no da muchas esperanzas. Pero en malos tiempos se agudiza el ingenio, sólo falta ver de "que forma" se agudiza

P.D: En época de destrucción de liquidez en el sistema global, no está tan claro que el acceso a capital externo (y por capital no me refiero únicamente a dinero, sino a los bienes necesarios) vaya a ser el de otras épocas. Así que van a depender mucho más de su capacidad interna económica (muy poca) y su propia creación de capital financiero, con la dependencia pareja de poder de compra que tenga la moneda.


Ya, pero cómo se sale de la tormenta Esa es la cuestión, no hay salida (al menos indolora).

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Lo bueno de este artículo es que no está cuajado de lugares comunes que abundan tanto en otros textos bastante más maniqueos, que si PIGS, que si PAGS (me gusta más lo de Europeriferia) y diferencia claramente entre déficit por cuenta corriente y déficit fiscal, cosa que no suelen hacer demasiado a menudo los partidarios del Eurochantaje=falsa austeridad.

Para mí este es el párrafo clave:


Un encarecimiento de las importaciones junto a una eventual devaluación brutal de la nueva moneda serían dos de los limones amargos que tragar, lo que estaría por ver es si realmente este abandono del Euro a la desesperada pueda motivar un incremento de exportaciones y una cultura del ahorro en los ciudadanos de los paises ahora afectados: como sugiere el artículo, los políticos al mando de una maniobra como esta deben atesorar una gran responsabilidad y ser muy conscientes de la necesidad de trazar un plan a largo plazo, para no acabar como una república bananera de las de verdad.

En cualquier caso, y viendo a los extremos que nos estamos acercando, el coste social (recuperar empleo) es lo más importante: hay que priorizarlo por encima de lo que suponga perder posiciones temporalmente en el comercio internacional, pienso.

Una pregunta ¿Es posible que al reducir la dependencia de nuestros principales países importadores, como China o Alemania, pueda equilibrarse en parte el status quo comercial, al bajar los humos a los bullish producers ? Si tenemos en cuenta una hipotética salida en desbandada del Euro de varios miembros de la Eurozona importadores netos, adictos a estos bullish producers, pues...

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¿estoy entendiendo aquí que los ahorros de los spaniards depositados en bancos alemanes y franceses podrían sufrir corralito vengativo si nos salimos del euro?

Salir del euro, más que ganar cuota de exportaciones, que lo lograría hasta cierto punto, serviría para sustituir importaciones y reequilibrar las cuentas.

Eso si dejamos a un lado que el sistema financiero saltaría por los aires, iniciando un efecto en cadena que arrastraría a los bancos de media Europa.

No hagais caso a cantos de sirena, España NO puede salir del euro. Con el grado de deuda de nuestros bancos con sus pares internacionales NO ES POSIBLE.

Y a mí que me excita semejante posibilidad...son las cartas con las que jugamos los afectados por la banca alemana y francesa, principalmente.

El poder decirles en un momento dado "ahí os quedais" si aprietan demasiado es un buen arma, como han demostrado los griegos.

No sería una mala idea que los periféricos crearan una alianza política para defenderse más adecuadamente contra el chantaje del BCE y su chapucera integración fiscal y monetaria.¿Qué tal cuatro países saliendo al mismo tiempo de la Eurozona? Épico.

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El problema de España no es tanto su deuda pública como su deuda privada. El problema es que nadie se atreve a terminar con el despilfarro en ayuntamientos y CCAA. Nadie se atreve a realizar el ajuste que se tiene que realizar en gasto público superfluo. Con las políticas adecuadas se podría generar un fuerte superávit presupuestario y amortizar deuda rapidamente. Porque hay margen para ello.

Esto debería de ir acompañado con un plan de choque en materia de empleo.

Otro tema es la deuda privada de las familias. Que es el verdadero problema. Pero tratar de salvar el nefasto sistema político-administrativo, las redes clientelares, las administraciones paralelas.. haciendo un sinpa, arrasando el sistema financiero propio, el de terceros, multiplicando las deudas de las familias..