German Reunification: The role model?
But it isn’t quite that easy. More integration doesn’t necessarily mean that economic imbalances would disappear as a result. No one understands this better than the Germans, who had similar experiences with the monetary union between the two Germanys about 20 years ago. Effective July 1, 1990, the deutschmark became the official currency of East Germany. It was largely exchanged for the former East German mark at a ratio of one-to-one. The East German states joined the Federal Republic of Germany only three months later. It was the model case of a monetary union that was accompanied by a political union.
But anyone who believed that rapid unification would lessen the economic shock of the monetary union between the two Germanys was soon disappointed. In fact, the economic imbalances in reunified Germany became entrenched after that. Thousands of companies in the former East Germany went out of business, because they were unable to bring productivity up to Western standards.
The unemployment figures exploded, and financial transfers between the two parts of the country soon exceeded the trillion mark. To this day, the former East German states still lag behind the former West German states in terms of economic strength, productivity and income.
German reunification did nothing to change this. It merely helped to financially cushion the negative consequences of the monetary union. The states of the former East Germany were incorporated into the West German inter-state fiscal adjustment system (under which money is transferred from richer to poorer states) under favorable terms, and the former East Germans were suddenly given access to the blessings of the generous West German social system.
Such a model would in any case be incompatible with the European treaties. New agreements would have to be negotiated and ratified by all national parliaments, and perhaps even approved in referendums. It is a compromise or a necessity that EU will ultimately have to live with.
En die spraken dan nog de dezelfde taal , laten we hopen dat de grieken de boel opblazen .