Passing the Buck & Losing

... by imposing the cost of the Green Deal on Europe's insecure 99%

In this short interview segment I talk about two issues I’m really passionate about.

First, Europe’s epic failure to raise finance for transformation - because its politically stupid, sadistic finance ministers - I’m looking at you Christian Lindner - have blocked the EU’s power to raise finance through shared borrowing. Instead of financing the Green Deal in this way, Europe’s ‘northern’ finance ministers - who self-righteously dub themselves the ‘frugal four’ - have imposed the cost of the green transition on to the shoulders of Europe’s economically insecure, squeezed middle and working classes.

The consequences were well predicted. Voters in Germany gave the far-right AfD the best national result in the party’s history in the European elections on Sunday (9 June), surpassing the social democrats of Chancellor Olaf Scholz - who appointed Lindner as finance minister.

It should come as no surprise that voters have turned to far-right authoritarian parties for ‘protection’ from out-of-control market forces that promise only insecurity, falling real incomes, a cost-of-living crisis and rising house prices.

Back in July, 2020 and in order to save the Union from the catastrophe of a plague, finance ministers (including reluctant German and Dutch ministers) united behind the Corona bond - a form of collective debt issuance which financed the €750bn Covid-19 recovery plan - later dubbed ‘Next Generation EU’.

Four years later, Europe is coping with polycrises - including climate breakdown, making the Green Deal essential to the future security of EU citizens.

But responsibility for Europe’s security was ducked, with the Green Deal facing a financial cliff-edge in 2026. The only beneficiaries of this political and economic cowardice are the extremist parties of the far-right.

My second beef is with the epic failure of Green politicians in Germany and elsewhere to target and tax the continent’s Big Bad Polluters - the top 10% - corporations, private jet and superyacht owners included. If the top 10% of global emitters were required to slash their annual carbon emissions to that of the average EU citizen, other things being equal, that would cut global emissions by around 1/3 - and would be FAIR.

Instead, the Greens and other policy-makers imposed the cost and delivery of decarbonisation on to the shoulders of millions of insecure, low-paid Europeans enduring a cost-of-living crisis.

Both Lindner and the Greens share an obsession with taxation as the one and only means of paying for ANY public service or investment.

A truly bizarre obsession when every day of the year individuals, households and firms borrow to finance investment.

European states have far more collateral and guaranteed revenue streams than any household and corporation and yet are forbidden - by ideologues posing as economists - from borrowing collectively.

And so the centrists and Greens grant the gift of ‘squeezed middle’ insecurity and despair to far right, racist and authoritarian political parties.