The Euro has been in existence for a decade and it appears to be more successful and powerful that either its architects or detractors could suppose. Today the euro is circulated in 15 countries and used by approximately 320 million people.

According to The International Herald Tribune, the euro has fulfilled its primary mandate.

It has fulfilled its primary mandate: keeping inflation in check. Over the last 10 years, prices rose an average of 2.1 percent a year, even with the recent spike in food and energy prices. No politician has made a serious effort to undermine the bank’s independence. And despite the discomfort of a single monetary policy, no country has seriously mulled an exit.

From the very day of its birth, opinions expressed about the success of the euro were rather pessimistic, but time has shown them to be incorrect.

“We always knew that a one-size-fits-all would cause problems,” said André Szász, a former Dutch central banker and negotiator of the Maastricht Treaty, which in 1993 laid the founding rules of monetary union. “What we hoped for was flexible nonmonetary policies,” he said – work and labor rules, for example.

“With benefit of hindsight, this was not a realistic expectation,” he acknowledged.

Photo: © Drhaggis

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