The Paradox of the Creditor Debtor Relationship -- Germany the Creditor Nation

Dr. Heiner Flassbeck: Germany is asking debtor countries to repay their debts but at the same time preventing them from doing it

[annoloki]

Fractional reserve banking is fine, it's not fraud, when you get credit, you -know- it's credit, no one tells you it is anything other than what it is. You may feel deceived by it because it doesn't match your preconceived ideas of what money is, but you being mistaken doesn't make it fraud. Money is not wealth. Money is a tool to facilitate in the exchange of wealth. Without access to this accounting tool, productivity slows down.

[michaelemonds]

No, there has to be a write-down in the debts.

[Uisdean]

I think its totally different. The depts of WW1 and 2 are nothing like the problems we have now. Helping those deptor countries to increase their trade surplus to help them pay their depts wont help. Look at germany, even with the trade surplus we are a deptor country.... This world is limited in its space and ressources, growth has to stop. Cancel all the depts and its done. Dont spend more money than you earn and this wont happen again. Simple as that.

[jaymi]

From the 60s, you decided to socialize your nations and infantilize your adults. Govt, having little burden of providing defense to protect your sovereignty, decided to subsidize adulthood through welfare spending and institutionalizing socialism brought the drastic decrease in productivity of your workers, a drastic drop in birth rates etc. Germans figured this out at the turn of the millenium, and started restructuring their economy. the rest of Europe did not.

[floydstinkyboy]

in other words, democratic socialism ftw

[jaymi]

This is all irrelevant. The WW2 debt talk is nonsense because the US squared that circle. The Marshall Plan bailed out Western Europe, thus helping them reconstruct their countries. On top of that, America basically subsidized their defense spending by putting military garrisons all over Europe on the off chance the Red Army decides to cripple Germany and Western Europe. This brought about the prosperity that Europe enjoyed since the 60s.