Beyond Public Debt - The hidden rapid erosion of EU governments’ balance sheets is a threat that should and can be stopped
Beyond Public Debt - The hidden rapid erosion of EU governments’ balance sheets is a threat that should and can be stopped

Author(s): Jorge Núñez Ferrer, Roberto Musmeci
Subject(s): Economic policy, Evaluation research, EU-Accession / EU-DEvelopment, Financial Markets, Fiscal Politics / Budgeting
Published by: CEPS Centre for European Policy Studies
Keywords: EU; debt; financial crisis; economic policies; treaties; governments response; taxes; GDP;
Summary/Abstract: Eleven years after the outbreak of the financial crisis, several countries are still crawling from the economic wreckage. While political tensions have led to much debate around the principle of fiscal prudence and concerns about ‘moral hazard’ enshrined in the debt and deficit criteria in the Maastricht Treaty as well as the ‘no bail-out’ clause in the Lisbon Treaty, not enough attention has been paid to the reasons why governments were so unprepared to respond.

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