Thomas Fazi

Paschal Donohoe, the Irish finance minister and president of the Eurogroup, has written a preposterous article in the Financial Times claiming that the budgetary response of the EU and US to the pandemic has been more or less similar. In this article I debunk such claims, showing that the fiscal responses of the EU and US are not even remotely comparable. The truth is that throughout the pandemic the UE/euro area has proven once again to be utterly dysfunctional, in macroeconomic as well as in organisational terms (as testified by the vaccine mess). 

In his recent budget speech, British finance minister Rishi Sunak continued to spread dangerous fiscal myths about the alleged ‘strains’ faced by the UK’s public finances and the government’s need to ‘balance its books’.  

In this article I explain why such claims are completely unfounded. As a currency-issuing government, the UK government can, and indeed does, simply create the money it needs out of thin air (effectively self-financing itself). Hence, it can always make good on any promise to repay bondholders, without the need to raise taxes (or cut back spending, for that matter) to ‘pay back’ the public debt, as Sunak implies. 

Don’t be fooled by the EU’s sham ‘recovery fund’. It offers a pittance to struggling member states, but will allow Brussels to assume yet more control over their economic policies. Europeans will still be made to endure austerity. Me for spiked.

My lengthy review of Thomas Piketty’s latest 1,000-page-long tome, Capital and Ideology, for American Affairs. It’s an interesting book, with some radical theses (few authors nowadays dare to openly challenge private property), which unfortunately is led astray by the author’s globalist biases, which blind him to the fact that transnational democracy, let alone transnational socialism, is absolutely unworkable, even if it were necessary (which it isn’t, as I argue). 

Mario Draghi is literally the bodily incarnation of the neoliberal political-economic model that has ruined Italy. He is the problem, not the solution. My take on the new Italian government for Unherd.

Hey everyone, I’ve redesigned the site and taken down the old posts. Here’s a selection of articles of mine from the past few years:

• “Saving Europe’s Bankers, Not Its Workers”, Jacobin – on Mario Draghi’s eight-year mandate at the ECB
• “The revenge of the elites”, Spiked – on the change of government in Italy
• “For MMT”, Tribune – a response by Bill Mitchell and I to a slanderous article by James Meadway
• “French colonialism lives on in Africa”, Spiked – article about the CFA franc
• “The European Union Is an Antidemocratic Disgrace”, Jacobin – self-explanatory
• “The Left Case Against the EU”, E-International Relations – my review of Costas Lapavitsas’ latest book
• “Lessons from the Italian budget crisis”, Brexit Blog (Rosa Luxemburg Foundation) – on the standoff between the Italian government and the European Commission
• “Sacrificing at the Altar of the Euro”, Jacobin – article on why the euro should be dismantled
• “Italy’s Organic Crisis”, American Affairs – on the results of the March 2018 elections in Italy
• “Why the Left Should Embrace Brexit”, Jacobin – self-explanatory
• “Tax havens must be closed, but not for the reasons you think”, Green European Journal – on why we don’t the rich’s money to provide top-quality public services (but we should tax the rich anyway)
• “The EU cannot be democratised – here’s why”, Brave New Europe – self-explanatory
• “Italy’s elections: what do they mean for Europe?”, Green European Journal – an explainer on the then-upcoming 2018 Italian elections
• “The reforms that Europe doesn’t need”, Green European Journal – on the EU’s dangerous plans for “fiscal integration”
• “Make the Left Great Again”, American Affairs – a summary of our latest book Reclaiming the State 
• “What Is Needed Is A Progressive Vision Of National Sovereignty”, Social Europe – another summary of Reclaiming the State 
• “Against supranationalism: in defence of national sovereignty (and Brexit)”, Pluto Press blog – pretty self-explanatory
• “Everything You Know About Neoliberalism Is Wrong”, Social Europe – read the article to find out
• “Germany’s dystopian plans for Europe: from fantasy to reality?”, openDemocracy – on Germany’s hegemonic project in Europe
• “Public Debt In The Eurozone: A Political Problem”, Social Europe – on the political use of public debt in the eurozone