Italy’s teetering banks will be Europe’s next crisis • Hacker News Board

Re: Italy’s teetering banks will be Europe’s next crisis

#181

Post by sievebrain » Mon, Jul 11, 2016, 3:29 PM UTC

vidarh wrote: post #175

sievebrain wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By that logic no law can ever be imposed, because you're free to try and secede. The EU makes it as difficult as possible to 'secede' as evidenced by their actions post-Brexit. Their minds are 100% focused on how to make it as painful as possible to reduce the chances of anyone else leaving. This is the mentality of a law enforcer, not a peer.

No, the difference is whether or not a member remains sovereign. While the EU may make it difficult to withdraw, e.g. under UK law the UK Parliament is sovereign. Laws can't be imposed on any UK Parliament. Likewise, any UK Parliament can revoke any law, including the European Communities Act, if Parliament wishes. In which case from a UK legal standpoint, the UK would cease to be a member of the EU regardless of wha…

Again, your entire argument is pointless lawyering. The European Communities Act 1972 specifically says that UK domestic law has effect "subject to" EU law, and that's been interpreted by the courts to mean EU law has primacy over domestic law:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Communities_Act_1972_...

British Ministers have spoken repeatedly about their frustration at finding out they cannot implement law changes wanted by their constituents because they conflict with EU law.

Yes, the European Communities Act can be repealed at any point as part of the process of exiting the EU. But until that happens, EU law has primacy over Parliament's own laws both by widely held legal understanding and social convention.

To reinforce it one more time: by your logic everyone is sovereign and can simply choose to ignore the state at any point. It's an intellectually useless argument because it ignores the behaviour of the courts, the existence of laws stating the opposite and the ability of the state to force you to comply (which may in fact be via fines rather than jail sentences).

Re: Italy’s teetering banks will be Europe’s next crisis

#182

Post by sievebrain » Mon, Jul 11, 2016, 3:33 PM UTC

kbart wrote: post #103

rubber_duck wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The EU needs a face, parties with cross-border support, democracy, mandate... You know what's funny - US is constantly railing about inequality - meanwhile median income between poorest and richest EU members is close to 10x - in the US it's ~2-3 between states. It's no longer "the 1% are exploiting us" narrative and "democracy will save us" - these are similarly sized countries where people are 10x richer in one co…

"meanwhile median income between poorest and richest EU members is close to 10x - in the US it's ~2-3 between states" That's comparing apples to oranges. Country != state.

Today, yes, but the ideological goal of the EU is to convert it into a US-style federal union (in recent times some of them try to deny this because reality is closing in, but it has always been there). Hence large transfer payments between EU countries in the form of "structural adjustment funds" and euro policy, etc.

Re: Italy’s teetering banks will be Europe’s next crisis

#183

Post by pliny » Mon, Jul 11, 2016, 3:33 PM UTC

slashcom wrote: post #164

gortok wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US is closing in on "Full Employment", if by Full Employment, you mean: January 2008 Labor Participation Rate: 66.2% July 2016 Labor Participation Rate: 62.7% 62.7% participation means 94 Million Americans are not working. (Source: http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/susan-jones/labor-force-... ) Full Employment only calculates people who are actively looking for work; anyone else is not part of that calculation.…

According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demography_of_the_United_State... 27.1% of the US is under 21 and 14.5% is over 65. I know 16 should be working but a good chunk should be getting education. That leaves only 58.4% even eligible for labor participation.

According to this[1] only 16+ year olds are counted for the purposes of determining labor force participation.

[1] http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000

Re: Italy’s teetering banks will be Europe’s next crisis

#184

Post by collyw » Mon, Jul 11, 2016, 3:34 PM UTC

danielvf wrote: post #3

Red_Tarsius wrote: post #2

The Economist has often badmouthed Italy. The title is way too sensationalist. The comment section also highlights this ethnic bias. I will never forget their insulting cover from years ago: http://static.fanpage.it/socialmediafanpage/wp-content/uploa... . Just clickbaits and provocations.

If not Italy, what do you think would be Europe's next couple economic crisis countries?

The UK while it still remains. They have managed to push housing affordability to levels not seen since the last crisis. Rather than try to solve the problem, governments have done everything they can to keep things like they were before.

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/mortgageshome/article-367...

Re: Italy’s teetering banks will be Europe’s next crisis

#185

Post by vidarh » Mon, Jul 11, 2016, 3:37 PM UTC

xorcist wrote: post #154

Hermel wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you saying the EU is basically a clever hack to get around constitutional restrictions?

Not really. Countries have different juridical systems, with governing bodies based on completely different principles. UK law text would be gibberish in a German context, for example. (Or Chinese, or Brazilian.) So international law is made by treaties to be implemented nationally. An EU directive specifies certain limits but the corresponding law differ from country to country.

If the EU had direct legislative powers, it would most likely be structured by letting it legislate EU law, not the national laws of the member states, the same was US federal law is interpreted under US federal law, not under the laws of individual states.

We already have experience with this, in that the ECJ is already the highest court for matters of European Union legal matters, such as the interpretation of directives, and national courts in EU member states will often need to interpret cases in light of EU law.

Re: Italy’s teetering banks will be Europe’s next crisis

#186

Post by sievebrain » Mon, Jul 11, 2016, 3:38 PM UTC

zakk wrote: post #115

legulere wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still haven't seen a good reasoning why the Euro is to blame for the economic problems in southern Europe. It certainly is a issue that those countries can't devalue their currency anymore, but devaluing is not a miracle cure.

Devaluation definitely worked for the Italian economy. This plot shows the difference between the Italian GDP per capita and the Eurozone average GDP per capita. The vertical blue line marks the day the exchange rates between European currencies were fixed. http://i.imgur.com/mmD8kP7.jpg

That is a fairly stunning graph. Thanks for the data.

One question that has always played on my mind is why these countries find it so much easier to lower their costs via playing games with the currency (e.g. printing more to devalue) than simply lowering prices. Italy could have kept its competitive advantage by simply lowering its wages and export prices, much as Germany has done, but never did.

Re: Italy’s teetering banks will be Europe’s next crisis

#187

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Jul 11, 2016, 3:39 PM UTC

slashcom wrote: post #164

gortok wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US is closing in on "Full Employment", if by Full Employment, you mean: January 2008 Labor Participation Rate: 66.2% July 2016 Labor Participation Rate: 62.7% 62.7% participation means 94 Million Americans are not working. (Source: http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/susan-jones/labor-force-... ) Full Employment only calculates people who are actively looking for work; anyone else is not part of that calculation.…

According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demography_of_the_United_State... 27.1% of the US is under 21 and 14.5% is over 65. I know 16 should be working but a good chunk should be getting education. That leaves only 58.4% even eligible for labor participation.

[deleted]

Re: Italy’s teetering banks will be Europe’s next crisis

#188

Post by sievebrain » Mon, Jul 11, 2016, 3:39 PM UTC

tetraodonpuffer wrote: post #162

zakk wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Devaluation definitely worked for the Italian economy. This plot shows the difference between the Italian GDP per capita and the Eurozone average GDP per capita. The vertical blue line marks the day the exchange rates between European currencies were fixed. http://i.imgur.com/mmD8kP7.jpg

do you think that the euro is the only reason? If you ask people on the street the real reason behind Italy's fall is the rise of China, Italy used to have a lot of small manufacturing businesses, which are now pretty much gone or dying, and leading to the issues you are seeing with the GDP as well as contributing to the bank problems (small businesses can try to stay afloat with bank loans for a while) It also didn'…

That may be the case but why does the change in direction of the graph line up with the Euro so neatly?

Re: Italy’s teetering banks will be Europe’s next crisis

#189

Post by dragonwriter » Mon, Jul 11, 2016, 3:42 PM UTC

sievebrain wrote: post #126

vidarh wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The larger difference is that the member state is free refuse to implement the law and choose to leave - the directive can not be imposed. You may consider that just playing with words, but it makes the difference between being legal, and being a violation of constitutional law of a large number of member states, and as a result it makes a substantial difference in how the EU can be legally structured.

By that logic no law can ever be imposed, because you're free to try and secede. The EU makes it as difficult as possible to 'secede' as evidenced by their actions post-Brexit. Their minds are 100% focused on how to make it as painful as possible to reduce the chances of anyone else leaving. This is the mentality of a law enforcer, not a peer.

> The EU makes it as difficult as possible to 'secede'

What? Its simple to secede from the EU. You just declare that you are doing it, and two years later you are out. In those two years, you may or may not be able to negotiate terms with the EU to provide for other-than-default relations after you leave, but its not at all difficult to leave, except insofar as by leaving you risk losing all the benefits you gained from being in the EU (but if you thought that you were getting a net benefit from being in the EU, presumably you wouldn't be electing to leave in the first place.)

Re: Italy’s teetering banks will be Europe’s next crisis

#190

Post by davidw » Mon, Jul 11, 2016, 3:42 PM UTC

sievebrain wrote: post #68

glenndebacker wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The Euro just seems like a complete failure. Giant economies are limping along with 20% unemployment, unable to recover 8 years after the recession. In contrast the US has managed an OK recovery, now closing in on full employment." You are aware that the problem with the EU banking reforms (or lack off) was also that the UK didn't wanted stricter rules with regards of the city of London... ? They even wanted an exem…

There is no intellectual dishonesty. Fixing the Eurozone's banking problems (assuming you believe those regulations would do the trick) is not the UK's problem and it's not the UK that blindly insists on a one-track, one-speed Europe: it's Germany and France that are wedded to that concept. They could easily have introduced new rules only in the countries that wanted them. But regardless, the problem in Italy is simp…

> But regardless, the problem in Italy is simply that not enough people are paying back their loans.

Bingo! Guy who "owns" apartment upstairs from ours in Padova stopped paying for it several years ago. He doesn't pay the apartment fees either, meaning we have to pay for him. He had his furniture and other stuff repossessed a few years back. In short, as far as we can tell, he's insolvent. And yet, he's still there, and the bank won't take action against him, because if they do, then it shows up as 'bad debt', rather than 'temporarily in arrears' or whatever.