In his book Lord King predicts further Eurozone crises will trigger an ‘economic and political crisis’. He says, “Monetary union has created a conflict between a centralised elite on the one hand, and the forces of democracy at the national level on the other. This is extraordinarily dangerous”.
Lord King also says the struggling economies in Southern Europe can only become competitive again by giving up the euro. The only alternative is for richer nations such as Germany to keep handing over cash, “at great and unending cost to its taxpayers”.
He acknowledges that countries exiting the euro will entail its own difficulties but that, “leaving the euro may be the only route back to economic growth and full employment. The long-term benefits outweigh the short-term costs”.
People like me were saying that the euro would not work way back in 1999 when it was set up. You did not need to be an economics professor to know that different countries with differently performing economies could not prosper using the same interest rates and exchange rates.
Lord King is a very intelligent man. He would have known that the euro was doomed from the start and could only cause economic crisis when he was Governor of the Bank of England. But as a member of the establishment he would have been constrained from speaking out.
Thank goodness that he is able to speak out now. If only other current members of the establishment would speak out on the dangers of EU membership now before the Referendum.
