EU Austerity Madness

EU Austerity Madness

EU policy is wrecking national economies to pay bankers.

by Stephen Lendman

European/American austerity assures a 1% wealth grab at the expense of all others.

Prioritizing banker payments causes debt bondage, human misery, economic wreckage, and eventual collapse. What can't go on forever, won't. It's not rocket science. It's fact.

Economies thrive on productive economic growth. It includes public sector infrastructure investment in transportation, research and development, roads and bridges, education, healthcare, and other vital areas. Sacrificing it for bankers and other vulture investors causes Greek-type crises.

Financialization highlights "the great problem of our time," says Michael Hudson . He defines is as "capitalizing every form of surplus income and pledging it for bank loans at the going interest rate, personal income over and above basic expenditures, corporate income over and above cash flow....and whatever government can collect in taxes over and above its outlay."

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Banker nirvana depends on securing all economic surplus as interest, says Hudson, or in hard times as bailouts. However, doing it "leaves nothing over for living standards and what (18th and 19th century) economists (called) human capital formation (training and education) required for labor productivity to rise."  Economies need it to thrive.

There's also "no cash left over for corporations to invest in new tangible capital formation, and no government spending for infrastructure or other social and economic needs."

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