Posted on 08/15/2003 9:41:50 AM PDT by knighthawk
BRUSSELS: With Germany, Italy and the Netherlands in recession and slim hope for recovery by the end of the year, the euro zone economy, burdened by its strong single currency, is falling farther and farther behind the US and Japan.
After dismal Italian numbers last week and the confirmation yesterday of continued contractions in the economies of Germany and the Netherlands, the European Commission underscored the gloom with a forecast of third-quarter growth in the euro zone at 0.4 per cent, at best.
The commission - the European Union's executive arm - did not even rule out the risk of stagnation and, for the final three months of the year forecast miniscule growth between 0.2pc and 0.6pc.
The news out of Germany for the second quarter alone is frankly depressing: According to the Federal Statistics Office, the euro zone's biggest economy remained in recession with a contraction of 0.1pc of gross domestic product from the previous quarter. On a 12-month basis, GDP fell 0.6pc.
Across the border in the Netherlands, the situation was worse as the Dutch economy shrank in the second quarter on a scale not seen since a major crisis in the early 1980s.
Dutch GDP plunged for the third straight quarter, by 0.5pc from the previous quarter and by 0.9pc from a year earlier.
In such a context, with Italy also mired in recession after 0.1pc declines in both the first and second quarters, the zero growth in the 12-nation euro zone announced yesterday by the EU's statistics office Eurostat hardly came as a surprise.
In fact, Laure Maillard, economist at CDC-Ixis, pointed out that "the available figures for the French economy suggest a GDP contraction of at least 0.1pc" in the second quarter.
Faced with the deepening chasm, European officials tiptoed around it.
"Clearly these aren't very good figures," a European Commission spokesman told reporters after confirmation that Germany, Italy and the Netherlands are all in recession.
"However, they are more or less what we expected. Growth forecast figures for the second half of the year are also in line with our expectations," he said.
But the most disturbing element for many economists now seems to be the gap, confirmed by Eurostat, in the growth rates of the euro zone and the United States.
The US economy, which grew by 0.4pc in the first quarter, accelerated to a 0.6pc pace in the second. On a 12-month basis, the US economy had expanded by 2.3pc at the end of June.
And a comparison with Japan is no longer flattering. The Japanese economy increased by 0.6 percent in the second quarter, after rising by 0.3pc in the previous quarter. The annualised rate stood at 2.1pc.
Also Signs the erosion in the US jobs market may have drawn to a close and a surprisingly sharp narrowing in America's trade gap offered fresh hope yesterday the economic recovery was gaining steam.
Initial claims for jobless benefits edged up slightly last week, but for a fourth straight week were below the 400,000 level many economists see as a dividing line between jobs growth and losses, the Labour Department said.
A separate report showed the US trade gap at a smaller-than-expected $39.5 billion in June, down from $41.5bn in May on the biggest surge in exports in three years.
If people want on or off this list, please let me know.
21st century Europe is where China was in the 19th century, when it was too decadent to prevent small European countries from carving out chunks of China for themselves, forcing the Chinese to adopt their laws, even preventing China from outlawing opium.
Contemporary Europeans cannot muster the strength, energy, or imagination to prevent a Muslim invasion that is well underway.
Europe is too decadent to save itself.
If "Liberals"/leftists/Democrats had their way, the United States would be as decadent as 21st century Europe or 19th century China and in a worse financial mess than California's.
"Liberalism" is decadence. The Democrat Party is the party of decadence.
--And this from a man whose parents and all grandparents were Democrats. If they were alive today, they definitely would not be. It is my duty to serve as their spokesman.
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