While some countries have succeeded in achieving and maintaining sound budgetary positions, a significant number of others have not, including the larger ones. The prospect of a determined return to balanced budgetary positions is rather bleak. In the meantime, euro area governments’ indebtedness as a percentage of GDP of has again increased.
In fact, I believe that it was only realisable in the face of the financial and sovereign debt crises and the vulnerability of the common currency area that was revealed as a result. We experienced banks that were “too big to fail” and needed to be rescued.