General idea
Who would have thought… Europe, leaving behind world powers such as the USA, China, and even, if I dare say it, a country like England. How and above all why, you may ask, well, today I will try to answer this.
Future scenario
If we take as a reference the first world economic power (which is still the USA), it has been the country where the unemployment rate has multiplied the most, in a totally catastrophic way, reaching unimaginable figures at the beginning of the crisis, which has led thousands of middle class families to have to resort to charity canteen services, with kilometric queues as we have been able to observe throughout these days.
I am not saying that, for example, in any country in Europe this has not happened, of course it has, and I wish we could say no to this dramatic situation for many, but it is not so.
What we can say is that, if we compare both data, with European figures to U.S. figures, we can see how there is strong evidence, proving true the analysis that the U.S. middle class (and that of other countries) had been losing purchasing power and the socioeconomic weight they previously had for years.
The consequence of this last argument is the basis that the U.S. normal-middle class, in particular, barely had enough resources and savings to be able to overcome the slightest bump in the road or economic contingency.
To this, we must add that the full employment that was said to exist in the USA (as in the case of England) was far from being real, they were simply imprecise figures, which were not adapted to measure the economic reality in which they found themselves, mainly because there, part-time work is excessively inflated, and the sufferers of these do not count as unemployed, so at the moment of truth, when companies have been forced to have to lay off thousands of workers in order to survive, their reality has been seen.
On the one hand, we have seen the case of the United States and England, and we can speak (although it is true in minor strokes), the case of China, which, close to being really the first world economic power, has handled the management of the crisis much better than, for example, its direct rival.
I have to say that, if any country has the right to get rid of blame, it is China, since they were the first to suffer from the pandemic, and did not have as much leeway as Europe or the US to fight it, so, in a certain sense, we can take the blame for the crisis they have faced away from them.
But undoubtedly, as bad as the situation we are in looks right now, it has been old Europe that has shown the most economic vitality. How is this possible? You may ask again, well.
Recently, Bloomberg published the daily activity index figures that the current economic recovery is showing, after the lifting of confinement, and surprisingly, the differences are striking.
It is now when the traditional dynamism generally offered by the Anglo-Saxon orbit in the economic recovery is conspicuous by its absence in both the US and the UK, with Japan in the middle ground and finally, to the great surprise of some (myself included), continental European countries, in order, France, Italy, Germany and Spain (yes, you read that right, Spain), are clearly leading the recovery over the other capitalist countries.
It is true that Spain is the one that lags a little behind, but compared to the other countries, it is the fourth country in terms of recovery, despite the forecasts of the ECB and other studies, with the greatest upward trend in economic terms.
And it is not at all thanks to the masterful management of our government, since it has not been by far what it should have been, with measures that were imposed and repealed the next day, with one of the worst socioeconomic management… in short, we could spend a long time giving arguments as to why we have not been one of the models to follow, but there are a thousand articles circulating on the Internet which explain very, very well what has happened here in Spain.
Conclusion:
What has become clear is that it will turn out that Europe was not as bad a system as some painted, it is a middle ground between capitalism and centralism, which is good because it does not reach one extreme or the other, and although there are plenty of economists who can defend one position or another, the problem is that some want to take us out of the lane because the viability of the European system does not suit either one or the other: it is the fate of the center, which is always attacked from both extremes.
