Unless things start improving soon, 2010 might end up being the beginning of the end for the Euro.
The European Commission warns that public finances in half of the 16 euro-zone nations are at high risk of becoming unsustainable.
Governments will spend the next year and beyond balancing the urgent need to fix public-sector debt and deficits -- without imperiling what appears to be a feeble economic recovery.
Greece and Spain saw their ratings downgraded. Ireland and Portugal have been warned they could be next. Even broader downgrades threaten if other European governments don't shape up.
Fitch warns in a December report that particularly the U.K. (which isn't in the euro zone) and Spain and France (which are) risk being downgraded if they don't articulate more-credible fiscal-consolidation programs during the coming year given the pace of fiscal deterioration....
Budget deficits for the region as whole in 2009 swelled to 6.4% of gross domestic product from 2% the year before. The EU forecast sees that gap widening to nearly 7% in 2010 before the worst is over.
Greece came with a single credit rating of being in a full-blown crisis, and they aren't out of the woods yet.
More on Europe please
One thought I had was Europe is continually under attack for strong social safety nets and workers rights, so I'm wondering how bad this really is vs. the never ending attack to get at that money.
Similar to how the SS system has been "deemed" to be in "crisis" so we must "privatize" it mantra...
when the real issue is the for profit health sector, waste, medical costs.
The euro will survive
this. Turning back the clock isn't an option, and if you look at the history of the European union, it is during these periods of crisis that the organization moves forward the most. That's because it gives Brussels something to respond to that national governments often can not. The number 1 problem with the EU right now is the absence of an adequate social charter that provides protections for workers and the environment at the supra-national level. Increased action at the supra-national level is what's going to get everyone out of this crisis. If a pan European Left/Labor movement ever get their act together, the EU could be turned into a powerful agent for social protection.