Right on the Money: Doug Casey on Economics, Investing, and the Ways of the Real World with Louis James

Chapter 3

Doug Casey on the Collapse of the Euro and the EU

January 25, 2012

Louis: So Doug, a lot of readers are concerned about what’s going on in Europe. Is this the beginning of the proverbial “it”? Or can the Eurozone be saved?

Doug: In brief, the answers are “yes,” then “no,” and a “good riddance” to both the Eurozone and the euro. But most people think the old order should be maintained at almost any cost. That would include George Soros, who recently penned an article called “Does the Euro Have a Future?”

Now, I don’t normally look to Soros for economic commentary, despite the fact that he’s one of the shrewdest and most successful speculators in the world. He does, however, represent the way the Davos people, Eurocrats, and the ruling classes in general think. But just because he’s made a lot of money doesn’t make him an expert in economics, any more than financial success is proof that Ted Turner, Bill Gates, or Warren Buffett know anything about economics. They’re all idiot savants, a bit like Dustin Hoffman’s character in Rain Man. But that’s another subject.

Soros writes: “The political will to create a common European treasury was absent in the first place, and since the time the euro was created the political cohesion of the European Union has greatly deteriorated.” He’s absolutely right about that and goes on to say that to create a common European treasury, the EU would have to have the power to tax. So, he’s saying that the euro should be preserved, and that ...