Europe’s New Message: My Way or the Drachma Highway

Jacob Kirkegaard

Jacob Kirkegaard

Peterson Institute for International Economics and German Marshall Fund

Jacob Kirkegaard is a Senior Fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics and German Marshall Fund.

Greece’s call for a referendum on the bail-out has been rescinded. The next tranche of funds for Greece from the IMF appears to be safe. According to his essay Europe’s New Message: My Way or the Drachma Highway, Dr. Jacob Funk Kirkegaard, Research Fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics and frequent AGI contributor, argues this was the goal behind Greek Prime Minster George Papandreou’s call for a referendum. However, his potentially term ending move may have had another, more lasting effect: the threat of kicking member states out of the monetary union is now officially on the table.

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