Correct on a per capita bases Portugal has been growing much much faster then Germany. The simple truth it that Germany is not benefiting from austerity either. What should happen is that the German government massively increases spending. This would turn Germany from a net exporter, to a net importer. That allows the PIIGS to export products to Germany paying down the debt, but it also stimulates the economy. Germany profits from the increased spending as well.
The simple truth is that German life expectancy is declining since a couple of years(being below Spain, Italy and Portugal btw). Median wealth of Italy, Spain and Portugal is higher then that of Germany, which is only slightly higher then that of Greece. Real wages in Germany have gone up by 3.8% over the last decade(not annually but the entire decade).
The only ones who really profit from this austerity are the super rich. Other then that it is as bad a policy for Germany as it is for Italy, Portugal, Spain or Greece.
The life expectancy is falling all over Europe (welcome to Neoliberalism were only the life expectancy of the rich goes up and deregulation cause all sorts of problem for people who can’t afford prime products and living in their own mansion outside of the polution of cities).
As I said, in absolute money terms Portugal isn’t actually growing all that much because it’s coming from a much lower base: 2.3% on a country with an average anual wage of €20k a year even if perfectly distributed (which that growth is definitelly not since Portugal is pretty bad in terms of income inequality) are a great whooping extra €430 a year (notice that I’m mixing nominal salaries with real GDP growth, which is an approximation and why I didn’t mention salary growth losses due to inflation), which would at best see Portugal catch up with the €45k average anual wage in Germany, if the last did not grow at all and in the absence of further economic crashes (I explain this last point further below), by the end of the century.
The only reason why Portuguese growth in money terms still exceeded that of Germany in 2023 is because that year the German economy actually shrank, otherwise a 2% GDP growth in Portugal is in absolute terms the same amount as a less than 1% GDP growth in Germany, because the German GDP per-capita is more than twice that of Portugal, so Portugal wil never catch up to Germany unless it has more than twice the German growth in percentage terms.
Since Portugal’s Economy is heavilly dependent on volatile industries like Tourism and hence prone to deep dives whenever there is a Crash which wipe out a significant proportion of previous growth, it’s highly unlikelly that the country can sustain a growth of more than twice the German on in percentage terms for the next 60 years.
I do agree that Germany itself has to change what it is doing, even just for Germany’s sake.
Personally I think that the choices of Mutti back in the post 2008 Crash were not the ones best for Germany and Germans, but the ones best for a certain section of the German Elites, namelly financeers and large Asset owners (i.e. the very rich). It just so happens that given the influence of Germany (and that Germany wasn’t the only country choosing to save the Asset owners on the backs of the rest) her choices hurt a lot more than just the Germans, with some people - namelly the Greek - being very purposefully sacrificed even more than the common German person all for the good of Deutsche Bank and large german investors.
Correct on a per capita bases Portugal has been growing much much faster then Germany. The simple truth it that Germany is not benefiting from austerity either. What should happen is that the German government massively increases spending. This would turn Germany from a net exporter, to a net importer. That allows the PIIGS to export products to Germany paying down the debt, but it also stimulates the economy. Germany profits from the increased spending as well.
The simple truth is that German life expectancy is declining since a couple of years(being below Spain, Italy and Portugal btw). Median wealth of Italy, Spain and Portugal is higher then that of Germany, which is only slightly higher then that of Greece. Real wages in Germany have gone up by 3.8% over the last decade(not annually but the entire decade).
The only ones who really profit from this austerity are the super rich. Other then that it is as bad a policy for Germany as it is for Italy, Portugal, Spain or Greece.
The life expectancy is falling all over Europe (welcome to Neoliberalism were only the life expectancy of the rich goes up and deregulation cause all sorts of problem for people who can’t afford prime products and living in their own mansion outside of the polution of cities).
As I said, in absolute money terms Portugal isn’t actually growing all that much because it’s coming from a much lower base: 2.3% on a country with an average anual wage of €20k a year even if perfectly distributed (which that growth is definitelly not since Portugal is pretty bad in terms of income inequality) are a great whooping extra €430 a year (notice that I’m mixing nominal salaries with real GDP growth, which is an approximation and why I didn’t mention salary growth losses due to inflation), which would at best see Portugal catch up with the €45k average anual wage in Germany, if the last did not grow at all and in the absence of further economic crashes (I explain this last point further below), by the end of the century.
The only reason why Portuguese growth in money terms still exceeded that of Germany in 2023 is because that year the German economy actually shrank, otherwise a 2% GDP growth in Portugal is in absolute terms the same amount as a less than 1% GDP growth in Germany, because the German GDP per-capita is more than twice that of Portugal, so Portugal wil never catch up to Germany unless it has more than twice the German growth in percentage terms.
Since Portugal’s Economy is heavilly dependent on volatile industries like Tourism and hence prone to deep dives whenever there is a Crash which wipe out a significant proportion of previous growth, it’s highly unlikelly that the country can sustain a growth of more than twice the German on in percentage terms for the next 60 years.
I do agree that Germany itself has to change what it is doing, even just for Germany’s sake.
Personally I think that the choices of Mutti back in the post 2008 Crash were not the ones best for Germany and Germans, but the ones best for a certain section of the German Elites, namelly financeers and large Asset owners (i.e. the very rich). It just so happens that given the influence of Germany (and that Germany wasn’t the only country choosing to save the Asset owners on the backs of the rest) her choices hurt a lot more than just the Germans, with some people - namelly the Greek - being very purposefully sacrificed even more than the common German person all for the good of Deutsche Bank and large german investors.