January 27, 2012
This grotesque map of the world, depicting Europe as a bloated balloon, caught my eye this week, and powerfully illustrates one of the factors in Europe's debt crisis. It depicts the countries of the world sized according to the amount of government spending.
In the words of the World Bank, which published it in a report issued this week ("Golden Growth: Restoring the lustre of the European Economic model", here), Europe is the world's “lifestyle superpower”. As opposed to America, which spends almost as much as the rest of the world put together on defence, Europe spends more than the rest of the globe combined on social policies.
In many ways this is an admirable aspect of Europe's economic model, which combines high living standards with high standards of social welfare. The trouble is, such spending is helping to bankrupt governments—not least because those very same caring policies ensure that Europeans live longer, requiring more expenditure on health care and the payment of pensions for more years.
Anybody who wants to understand the strengths and weaknesses of European economies in this time of crisis would do well to read the report (the overview is here).
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