If Germany’s economic model is the future of Europe, we should all be quite troubled. But that is where we seem to be going. The apparently successful re-election campaign of Angela Merkel, the Christian Democrat chancellor, promises “Germany’s future in good hands”. More, in other words, of the same. The policy response to the eurozone crisis is likely to remain a programme to induce member states to follow Germany’s path to competitiveness: cutting the cost of labour. Make no mistake; that has been the basis of the nation’s export success in the past dozen years; and exports have been its sole consistent source of growth in that period. But low wages are not the basis on which a rich nation should compete.
如果德國的經濟模式是歐洲的未來，我們都應為此感到非常擔憂。但看上去我們正在朝這個方向前進。正在競選連任的德國現任總理、基民盟(Christian Democrat)黨首安格拉?默克爾(Angela Merkel)眼下似乎勝利在望。她在競選中承諾，“將妥善把握德國的未來”。換句話說，默克爾將確保未來跟現在差不多。德國對歐元區危機的政策回應可能仍會是，勸服歐元區成員國追隨德國取得競爭力的道路：降低勞動力成本。但別搞錯了。盡管降低勞動力成本一直是過去12年里德國的出口大獲成功的基礎，出口也一直是那段時期德國唯一穩定的增長來源，但一個富裕國家不應將競爭力的基礎建立在低薪之上。