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Joseph E. Stiglitz
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The Euro: And its Threat to the Future of Europe Hardcover – August 16, 2016

by Joseph Stiglitz (Author)
4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 419 ratings
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From Nobel Prize-winning economist and best-selling author Joseph Sitglitz, author of Globalization and Its Discontents, this is the essential, must-read guide to the future of Europe.

Solidarity and prosperity fostered by economic integration: this principle has underpinned the European project from the start, and the establishment of a common currency was supposed to be its most audacious and tangible achievement. Since 2008, however, the European Union has ricocheted between stagnation and crisis. The inability of the eurozone to match the recovery in the USA and UK has exposed its governing structures, institutions and policies as dysfunctional and called into question the viability of a common currency shared by such different economies as Germany and Greece.

Designed to bring the European Union closer together, the euro has actually done the opposite: after nearly a decade without growth, unity has been replaced with dissent and enlargements with prospective exits. Joseph Stiglitz argues that Europe's stagnation and bleak outlook are a direct result of the fundamental flaws inherent in the euro project - economic integration outpacing political integration with a structure that promotes divergence rather than convergence. Money relentlessly leaves the weaker member states and goes to the strong, with debt accumulating in a few ill-favoured countries. The question then is: Can the euro be saved?

Laying bare the European Central Bank's misguided inflation-only mandate and explaining why austerity has condemned Europe to unending stagnation, Stiglitz outlines the fundamental reforms necessary to the structure of the eurozone and the policies imposed on the member countries suffering the most. But the same lack of sufficient political solidarity that led to the creation of a flawed euro twenty years ago suggests that these reforms are unlikely to be adopted. Hoping to avoid the huge costs associated with current policies, Stiglitz proposes two other alternatives: a well-managed end to the common currency; or a bold, new system dubbed 'the flexible euro.' This important book, by one of the world's leading economists, addresses the euro-crisis on a bigger intellectual scale than any predecessor.

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  1. Print length
    496 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Allen Lane
  4. Publication date
    August 16, 2016
  5. Dimensions
    6.38 x 1.65 x 9.45 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    9780241258156
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0241258156
  8. See all details
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Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ 0241258154
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Allen Lane (August 16, 2016)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 496 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 9780241258156
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0241258156
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.72 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.38 x 1.65 x 9.45 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 419 ratings

About the author

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Joseph E. Stiglitz

Joseph E. Stiglitz

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Joseph E. Stiglitz is a professor of economics at Columbia University and the recipient of a John Bates Clark Medal and a Nobel Prize. He is also the former senior vice president and chief economist of the World Bank. His books include Globalization and Its Discontents, The Three Trillion Dollar War, and Making Globalization Work. He lives in New York City.

Customer reviews

4.2 out of 5 stars
4.2 out of 5
419 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Pierre Marie Boisson
5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent and very instructive book, among Mr Stieglitz numerous masterpieces!
Reviewed in the United States on November 6, 2019
Verified Purchase
I very much like the detailed and very professional assessment of why so different countries such as those of the Euro area, with so different development levels, can’t share the same currency. The authors brilliantly demonstrate how using a too strong currency affect competitiveness and growth of LDC countries, hence reducing welfare and fiscal revenue, leading concerned countries to borrow in order to boost consumption and incur unsustainable trade deficit and indebtedness. The author also correctly points out that austerity and structural adjustment policies advocated by IMF and Germany are ineffective and conducive to divergence rather then the convergence among Euro countries, one the expected benefit of the single currency adoption.
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Athan
4.0 out of 5 stars Broad clear and thoughtful, but biased
Reviewed in the United States on September 9, 2016
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There are two Joseph Stiglitzes: the brilliant economist and the repetitive polemicist.

Unlike “The Price of Inequality,” a book wrapped by Stiglitz the rambling, Nobel-flashing celebrity blogger around the nucleus of a very incisive article written by Stiglitz the brilliant economist, this forward-planned, structured book is 100% the work of the brilliant economist. To be sure, he is starting to sound a lot like his alter ego, but the transformation is far from complete and what we have here is a genuinely exhaustive, if not amazingly deep, treatise that has a beginning, a middle and an end.

The book is divided in five sections (that are however grouped in four parts):

• First a “you are here” section that lays out the author’s views of where we stand and how we got here
• Second, a three-part expo on (i) how currency unions are meant to work, (ii) where the Euro diverges from this ideal and (iii) the (negative) role of the ECB
• Third, a long whine against the Troika’s work in Greece and (less so) Ireland
• Fourth, the Stiglitz manifesto of how to (semi-centrally, you have been warned!) run an economy, mischievously mis-branded “Creating a Eurozone that works”
• Fifth, a daring and provocative “what next” section

A quick read through chapter 9 (the manifesto) may be the best starting point for the reader. Read that and you will calibrate how much to the right you are of the author (or to the left for the 5% of the human population who are thus inclined). Agree or disagree, you are now reading the book with the author’s ideal world in mind and that’s how you will get the most out of it.

The bits I thought were unparalleled in the literature were the section entitled “Internal devaluations and external imbalances” (pp. 97 to 110) that nestles inside the already very strong chapter on “When can a single currency ever work,” the entire chapter on how the ECB was conceived, how it thinks and whom it serves (brilliant, brilliant) and the final section of the book that takes you through how we can go about executing on “more Europe” or “less Europe,” as opposed to muddling through to assured destruction.

That said, the final section will make your stomach turn if you are German, and you will be right to object. If Europe was the only economy on earth, I can see how perhaps Germany could pay its workers more / restrict its trade surplus / whatever. I’m not saying I buy it, I’m just saying I can see it. But it’s competing with Japan, China and South Korea, to say nothing of the US. Not Italy. Not Spain. Not even France any more. Most certainly not Greece. I’d say it has the most luxurious setup for its workers from all of its competitors. Hell, Angie picked up 20% of workers’ wage bills at the depths of the crisis to keep them employed. And the unions have board seats in most major employers, as often does the state. Stiglitz knows all this (and it bothers him when it comes to German companies buying Greek state assets, for example) but is selective about when he remembers it.

Also, the book sets the ambitious goal of explaining that Europe is suffering from poor policy design rather than from having muddled through too long without engaging in structural reform. This the author fails to do, entirely. The treatment of structural reforms is not worthy of a high-school essay.

I won’t even bother going into the arguments, just count the number of pages dedicated to looking at structural reforms and draw your conclusions.

But I’ll cite two examples where the author’s judgement on specifics is almost as awful as his judgement on macroeconomics is brilliant:

1. The author sides with the pharmacists in my country (full disclosure, my mom’s a Greek pharmacist) who are plainly one of many extractive agents in an economy that is full of extractive agents. Suffice it to say Greek pharmacists went on strike, citing the Hipporcratic oath, when the troika threatened to break their stranglehold on baby formula. You heard that right, it was (and may still be, I’ve stopped following) illegal for a supermarket in Greece to sell baby formula. You’ve got to pay up and buy it at the pharmacist. Just an example.

2. The author mentions more than once that George Papandreou was crusading against the press-owning oligarchs. Point of information: George Papandreou was a third-generation prime minister. Both his grandfather George and his father Andreas have served as prime minister, multiple times. Look it up on Wikipedia, some crazy percentage of the time since WWII the prime minister or the head of the opposition in my country was called Papandreou. If you think a political clan can maintain that position and not be in cahoots with the oligarchs you know nothing about Greece. You probably know nothing about planet earth. Or you are blinded a bit by your views, perhaps…

So this book is not without its foibles. Overall, however, it does a tremendous job of laying out a view and it is the only book currently in print that covers so many facets. And it is not afraid to shout from the rooftops that the emperor has no clothes.

It makes excellent background reading for my favorite book on the Euro, the one by the FT’s Martin Sandbu. Sandbu goes deep, and if you want the skinny on his “straw man” you’ve got it right here!
43 people found this helpful
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Edoardo Angeloni
5.0 out of 5 stars A very important opinion of a Nobel Prize.
Reviewed in the United States on December 17, 2017
Verified Purchase
By a last analysis this book looks like very negative in relation to the formation for the UE. In fact Stiglitz explicates many arguments against the UE, but he doesn't arrive to affirm the paradox which it would be better to leave the single states with an its money. I think that the Nobel considers ugly the deep differences between the several States, but probably the unity of those States has been the less important evil. We should admit that, if there were errors in this process, the possibility of the money of flowing in all Europe is something of truly important. If some States are remained more poor, it needs structural reforms in a different way, but without being against the UE in its complex.
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Elle
3.0 out of 5 stars Although there is plenty of great information and charts in this book
Reviewed in the United States on September 7, 2016
Verified Purchase
I was looking for a factual and historic view of the Euro and objectively presented solutions for how the European economy could function going forward from one of the world's leading economists. Although there is plenty of great information and charts in this book, and many points that I agree with, it is wrapped in a wholly pedantic and emotional wrapper, which makes it tough to get through (and I admit I couldn't) without feeling like someone is forcing you to buy a used car. The italics, the constant headlines in all caps, the emotional language, and accusations are a little too much for me.
10 people found this helpful
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randomvar
5.0 out of 5 stars Good reasons for Britain getting out of the Common Market
Reviewed in the United States on December 30, 2019
Verified Purchase
Stiglitz is an impressive economist and writer.
There are times when I disagree with his prescriptions
but there is no denying that he speaks with thoroughly
thought out positions, This is no neophyte like the
economist i took courses with in macroeconomics that
stepped right into it when he brought up the mathematical
construct of Borel Sets in which the poor man thoroughly
disgraced himself.
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georges ugeux
4.0 out of 5 stars Why a US Nobel Price does not understand Europe who loves him
Reviewed in the United States on January 23, 2020
Verified Purchase
This book is most interesting in its demonstration of the failure of Europe and the Euro. But the assumption is basically wrong. Europe does not function only on money and its humanism is a deliberate choice for a world where other values play a role. Joseph Stiglitz has always been a fierce critic of the Euro and announce its death a few years ago. He might be well inspired to write about that analyzes why the Euro and the Eurozone, for all their weaknesses according to the textbooks, survived all odds, including his.
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D. Hurley
5.0 out of 5 stars What happened the European Dream?
Reviewed in the United States on January 7, 2017
Verified Purchase
Spot—on analysis. Up to the minute — includes coverage of Brexit and the rise of Donald Trump. I'm just an average citizen looking for a basic understanding of the factors that are having such a big effect on our lives as European citizens. I feel I've got that from this book. There are plenty of footnotes for anyone wishing to engage in further study.
One person found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

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Zoltan
5.0 out of 5 stars Easily digestible for non-professionals
Reviewed in Germany on February 12, 2020
Verified Purchase
Surprisingly this is not a difficult book for people without finance background. I particularly enjoy not just the part, which is dissecting the problem and describing a full blown autopsy of the Euro crisis, but more importantly getting a view on possibilities for feasible solutions. Solutions, which can be within our reach if we would first focus on political integration through solidarity and not forcing a narrow minded monetary solution, which most probably only favorable for a small minority.
One person found this helpful
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Ernesto Carrión
2.0 out of 5 stars Lack of proofs
Reviewed in Mexico on September 16, 2017
Verified Purchase
It is not so good. It has a lot of claims, but claims requires deep arguments or proofs. This book lacks of proofs, so it has not a rational background. Do you will to accept it in this field?
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Filya
5.0 out of 5 stars Un libro epocale
Reviewed in Italy on June 22, 2018
Verified Purchase
Stiglitz, in una presentazione di grande chiarezza spiega i problemi associati all'uso dell'euro. Si rende conto delle difficoltà associate ad una rinuncia alla divisa europea, e propone varie misure che salvarlo. Il libro ci chiarisce le varie leggi intese nella dinamica di attività economico-finanzieria. Nello stesso tempo, Il testo andrebbe aggiornato tenendo conto degli sviluppi economici degli ultimi due anni.
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frankiethepunk
5.0 out of 5 stars Really interesting and readable book by Joseph Stiglitz. Prof ...
Reviewed in Canada on December 1, 2016
Verified Purchase
Really interesting and readable book by Joseph Stiglitz. Prof. Stigliz writes in a style that is accessible to everybody. His conclusions are startling and his prescriptions to the problems confronting the EU are definitely something that should be considered by policymakers.
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Paciozed
5.0 out of 5 stars Entender adonde vamos
Reviewed in Spain on December 20, 2016
Verified Purchase
Creo que mucha gente/politicos deberían leer este libro. Ayuda a entender los fallos y propone soluciones y lo hace con muchos ejemplos y referencias.
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