4.- La mort du pacte de stabilité européen.
Le "Pacte de stabilité" de l'Union Européenne établit que les états membres ne doivent pas avoir un
déficit budgétaire supérieur à 3 % du PIB. Selon l'article de "The Economist" ci-dessous, le pacte est
maintenant mort après que l'Allemagne et la France ont décidé de ne pas l'obéir. Lisez l'article et
répondez aux questions qui suivent.
Unpicking the fiscal straitjacket
Nov 27th 2003
From The Economist Global Agenda
France and Germany have escaped punishment under the stability pact for their
big budget deficits. The pact itself may not escape a long-awaited demise
NEVER has a straitjacket seemed so ill-fitting or so insecure. The euro area’s “stability
and growth pact” was supposed to stop irresponsible member states running excessive
budget deficits, defined as 3% of GDP or more. Chief among the restraints was the threat
of large fines if member governments breached the limit for three years in a row. For
some time now, no one has seriously believed those restraints would hold. In the early
hours of Tuesday November 25th, the euro’s fiscal straitjacket finally came apart at the
seams.
The pact’s fate was sealed over an extended dinner meeting of the euro area’s 12 finance
ministers. They chewed over the sorry fiscal record of the euro’s two largest members,
France and Germany. Both governments ran deficits of more than 3% of GDP last year
and will do so again this year. Both expect to breach the limit for the third time in 2004
(see chart below). Earlier this year the European Commission, which polices the pact,
agreed to give both countries an extra year, until 2005, to bring their deficits back into
line. But it also instructed them to revisit their budget plans for 2004 and make extra
cuts. France was asked to cut its underlying, cyclically adjusted deficit by a full 1% of
GDP, Germany by 0.8%. Both resisted.
Under the pact’s rules, the commission’s prescriptions have no force until formally
endorsed in a vote by the euro area’s finance ministers, known as the “eurogroup”. And