Costa Piketty and with one voice. “Elections in Portugal and Spain … – Express

The Secretary General of the PS and the economist Thomas Piketty refused Monday to austerity as a model to promote competitiveness and reduce debt, with the French to blame Germany and France the situation in southern Europe.

This position was defended by both reporters after António Costa had received at the national office of the PS the renowned French economist, who delivered a copy in English of the macroeconomic scenario recently developed by a group of socialist economists, entitled “A decade for Portugal.”

“Portugal is an example of the fact that austerity does not solve the debt problem. After four years of austerity, with wage cuts and pension and tax increases, the truth is that today we have a debt 30 percentage points above that we had and with worse conditions in order to pay it. We must put an end to the policy austerity “, supported the socialist leader.

Thomas Piketty already before had been critical to the economic and financial direction of the EU, speaking even in” selfishness “of Germany and France in relation to Member States currently have greater financial difficulties, cases of Portugal, Spain and Greece.

“I think that the elections in Portugal and in Spain this year, can serve to make a difference, reorienting Europe. The European Union is making a grave error in holding that can reduce the high debt burden simply based on more austerity. When you have one hundred percent or more debt as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), we must also look at the history and what happened to France and then Germany to World War II, “noted Thomas Piketty .

According to the French economist, the route then followed by Germany and France in the post World War II not only passed by objectives of budget surpluses, “but also for more growth and some inflation “

” When you have zero inflation and a very anemic growth – the current situation of the euro zone – it is almost impossible to reduce the weight of a very high debt. History shows that deficit reduction is not made only by austerity and it is strange that countries like Germany and France, who have never paid the respective debts after World War II, are now to explain to countries such as Portugal, Greece and Spain they have to pay their debts to the last euro and can not have inflation or the respective restructured debts, “he warned.

But Thomas Piketty went further and more direct in their reviews:. “Germany and France have been very selfish in the European Union, but also very inefficient in its decisions”

“The current situation in the eurozone is rising unemployment and low growth, which makes it quite difficult to reduce the debt and the deficit. I think that Germany and France must take their share of responsibility for the bad situation in southern Europe. It is essential to reorient the European economic policy, “he said, before responsibility for mistakes made in the European Union and the conservative governments (such as Nicolas Sarkozy) or socialists (such as François Hollande).

In view of the journalists, the general secretary of the PS defended to overcome the current situation as the diversification of the Social Security funding sources in order to penalize less wages, and creating a tax on large inheritances.

“The issue of equality is now central to the economic development”, advocated the socialist leader, a compliment to the academic work of Thomas Piketty.