Not much of a surprise here, but former Bank of England member and prolific blogger Willem Buiter is poised to make a big push today for the UK to join the eurozone.
Buiter is joining 31 academics and financial figures, including BP Chairman Peter Sutherland, and publishing a pamphlet entitled “Ten Years of The Euro — New Perspectives For Britain.” It’s out at 11:30 a.m GMT.
There’s something of a preview in the shape of a very short Bloomberg interview with Buiter out this morning:
“The British always join European projects in the end, reluctantly,” Buiter said in an interview. “The problems of being a country with a large international banking sector and a currency that’s not a reserve currency have been revealed for all to see.”
Of course, joining the euro (assuming the UK actually meets the criteria for membership) may look quite appealing given sterling’s recent tumble, but we would imagine there’s a trade-off. For one, it would make the BOE’s process of quantitative easing and competitive currency devaluation impossible (duh), not to mention the public pushback it would likely to entail.
Update: The pamphlet is out and available here.
Related links:
LSE lecture: Should the UK join the euro? - YouTube video
European central banks face hurdles to quantitative easing - WSJ Real Time Economics
We can collapse our own currency thank you very much - FT Alphaville
Commense sense by Thomas Paine - UShistory.org
