The ECU was initially the monetary equivalent of a free lunch. Germany benefitted enormously because it could circumvent currency and other barriers to export to member countries. The southern countries benefitted because they could borrow with a strong currency, ie at low rates.
Now the bill has come due, first for the debtors, who are learning that there are some big negatives to not having your own national currency. Of course, as the biggest winner, Germany has the most to lose and therefore is under enormous presure to subsidize their poor cousins. All the summits, etc are just the Germans trying to extract the best possible terms for the inevitable transfer of wealth from German taxpayers, which will be roughly as popular as raising taxes here to subsidize profligate welfare cheats.
The Brits are a bit of a special case, not least because they are not part of the ECU. The whole euro experiment has considerably less appeal in Britain as it does on the Continent. They see no reason why they should be expected to pony up to subsidize a currency system they are not part of. They see a not-so-subtle French-German conspiracy to undermine the one area in which they are more than competitve, financial services, no doubt as part of a larger plan to bring them to heel.
The answer to the OP's question is fairly simple. The debtor countries see a handout, even on onerous terms, as preferable to facing up to their problems. They probably know instinctively that welfare, once granted, is hard to take away. As europeans, they are used to being treated as livestock and cared for from cradle to grave, so losing some additional independence is not that big a deal to them.
Before we start feeling too superior, if some foreign government offered our citizens a 50% increase in all forms of government assistance in exchange for loss of sovereignty, do you really think they wouldn't get close to a majority?
Now the bill has come due, first for the debtors, who are learning that there are some big negatives to not having your own national currency. Of course, as the biggest winner, Germany has the most to lose and therefore is under enormous presure to subsidize their poor cousins. All the summits, etc are just the Germans trying to extract the best possible terms for the inevitable transfer of wealth from German taxpayers, which will be roughly as popular as raising taxes here to subsidize profligate welfare cheats.
The Brits are a bit of a special case, not least because they are not part of the ECU. The whole euro experiment has considerably less appeal in Britain as it does on the Continent. They see no reason why they should be expected to pony up to subsidize a currency system they are not part of. They see a not-so-subtle French-German conspiracy to undermine the one area in which they are more than competitve, financial services, no doubt as part of a larger plan to bring them to heel.
The answer to the OP's question is fairly simple. The debtor countries see a handout, even on onerous terms, as preferable to facing up to their problems. They probably know instinctively that welfare, once granted, is hard to take away. As europeans, they are used to being treated as livestock and cared for from cradle to grave, so losing some additional independence is not that big a deal to them.
Before we start feeling too superior, if some foreign government offered our citizens a 50% increase in all forms of government assistance in exchange for loss of sovereignty, do you really think they wouldn't get close to a majority?
