Bruno Hollnagel
Eurozone
AfD Kompakt, March 1, 2019
[Bruno Hollnagel is an
Alternative für Deutschland Bundestag member from the northern German state of
Schleswig-Holstein. He is an investment manager and author and is currently a
member of the Bundestag finance committee. He here responds to recent proposals
for a more centralized management of the European economy. Ludwig Erhard was a
post-war German chancellor and finance minister.]
… It is dangerous and treacherous when liability regulations are to
be softened. Evidently the Frenchwoman Christine LaGarde in her character as
chief of the IWF stands by the side of Macron to enforce French interests
against Germany. France vehemently demands in the name of a “general
coordination” a Eurozone budget and a European fiscal union. These would
however violate the Maastricht Treaty which expressly excludes a general
European liability. The assertion that a monetary system with a robust
super-structure would be more stable is fundamentally false. The exact opposite
is correct. Not the political “super-structure” but rather a more solid
“sub-structure”, consisting of the tried and true principles of Erhard’s social
market economy, is what is decisive. The leveling harmonization destroys the
“multi-colored variety” which, according to Erhard, was Europe’s strength, not
its weakness. France should remain with its centralized economic management and
not force us into this corset which in our view robs a free economy of the air
it needs to breathe.
In the Europe of the future, each country should be happy according
to its own fashion instead of prescribing to other countries how they are to
live. In such a Europe that breathes freedom, each state should be able to
fulfill its characteristics to the good of all and thus offer to all members an
added value.
{Translated by Todd Martin]
