@stevep59 Oh no you are very right about this... But our current government is driven by an ideology that doesn't sit well with our own interests...
NB : The best proof in date is the CETA agreement that is probably going to ruin our agriculture by authorizing products that have unfair advantages (like the use of more chemicals and OGM) compared to our own...
So yeah France (well at least its government) is totally onboard with the "Germany rules" project... I was just pointing out that we ourselves (as a country, I'm not even talking about the people) do not benefit very much from it.
And yeah I was not implying that germany is really profitting from the collapse of southern Europe. But at least for now they are making the best of the current regulations in the eurozone.
The process of that success is very complicated and very long to describe... But it has to do with the fact that due to the southern collapse, the current euro has less value than the mark would have if spain, italy and even france had their own money, thus strengthening germany's exports throughout the world but most critically in europe. The other critical point is that Germany was the country that invested the most (well all the northern countries did, but germany is the biggest and wealthiest) in the south investments before the euro crisis so as long as the southern countries do not collapse completely, they have an influx of money coming from all that is produced in the south in the form of dividends and interests.
But as you said, if they indeed collapse completely, germany will be close to follow...
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@stevep59 Oh no you are very right about this... But our current government is driven by an ideology that doesn't sit well with our own interests...
NB : The best proof in date is the CETA agreement that is probably going to ruin our agriculture by authorizing products that have unfair advantages (like the use of more chemicals and OGM) compared to our own...
So yeah France (well at least its government) is totally onboard with the "Germany rules" project... I was just pointing out that we ourselves (as a country, I'm not even talking about the people) do not benefit very much from it.
And yeah I was not implying that germany is really profitting from the collapse of southern Europe. But at least for now they are making the best of the current regulations in the eurozone.
The process of that success is very complicated and very long to describe... But it has to do with the fact that due to the southern collapse, the current euro has less value than the mark would have if spain, italy and even france had their own money, thus strengthening germany's exports throughout the world but most critically in europe. The other critical point is that Germany was the country that invested the most (well all the northern countries did, but germany is the biggest and wealthiest) in the south investments before the euro crisis so as long as the southern countries do not collapse completely, they have an influx of money coming from all that is produced in the south in the form of dividends and interests.
But as you said, if they indeed collapse completely, germany will be close to follow...