Peer Steinbruck
Peer Steinbruck
Peer Steinbrückis a German social democraticpolitician. He was the SPD candidate for Chancellor of Germany in the 2013 federal election. From 2002 to 2005 he was the 8th Minister President of North Rhine-Westphalia. From 2005 to 2009 he served as German Federal Minister of Finance in the cabinet of Angela Merkel. He was nominated by his party as opposition candidate for Chancellor on 28 September 2012. He is generally considered a member of the more conservative wing of the party...
NationalityGerman
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth10 January 1947
CityHamburg, Germany
CountryGermany
The U.S. will lose its status as the superpower of the world financial system. The world will become multi-polar.
Europe is difficult to coordinate, and our main deficit may not even lie in this area of finance and economics, but in foreign and security policy. We have a leadership problem because we are still 27 different members who have still not decided on how to work with each other based on what we used to call a European constitution.
There's no more place in the euro zone for well-meaning laxness when dealing with deficits and failings. If the demands on Greece aren't taken seriously, we'll get stuck in quicksand. In the worst case, this would make it acceptable for one tranche to not be paid out. It is in the Greeks own interest not to test that.
But I would bet that the euro continues to exist and that its importance as a global currency will likely increase.
There are still deep-seated structural problems that threaten the economic balance in the world: Between the United States and China, for example, but also within Europe. We have taken a few steps toward taming the financial markets, but we haven't come nearly far enough to rule out a repetition of the crisis.