欧洲经济还没有走出危险区

    过去一年，我们总是听到，全球经济增长和股票市场将受到欧洲逐渐复苏的大力推动。

    确实，近期爱尔兰和葡萄牙重返债券市场，市场接受度良好，希腊政府也宣称很快将发行债券。主权债券的收益率保持相当低的水平，走势稳定。毋庸置疑的是，欧元区已经重现平静。

    但平静不等同于增长，欧盟统计处（the Statistical Office of The European Union）5月15日发布的GDP数据令人惊醒。2014年第一季度，由18个成员国组成的欧元区经济体仅增长了0.2%，只有经济学家预测值的一半。

    和以往一样，德国一马当先，增长了0.8%。问题正是出在那些所谓正走在复苏路上的国家：曾经危机四伏的欧洲南部国家以及失去了如虹气势的爱尔兰。

    最新数据印证，这些国家的经济大多数根本就没有改善。2014年前三个月，意大利经济收缩了0.1%，与前三个季度的平均值持平。2013年第二季度曾经增长0.6%的法国经济出现了零增长。连续9个月保持正增长的葡萄牙经济收缩了0.7%。希腊和爱尔兰虽然没有第一季度的数据，但这两个国家哪个也没有显露出改善的迹象。去年第四季度希腊GDP下降了2.5%，而爱尔兰微增了0.2%。

    唯一一个呈现经济持续增长（尽管增幅温和）的国家是西班牙。2013年后9个月基本持平后，西班牙2014年第一季度增长了0.4%。

    在德国出生并接受教育的芝加哥大学（University of Chicago）经济学家哈拉尔德•乌利希针对当前的欧元区风险给出了较为平衡的观点。乌利希认为，很重要的一点是要理解自1999年引入欧元以来德国和南欧国家选择的不同道路，以及这些政策为什么导致了这些国家今天不同的经济境遇。“通胀曾经一直是南欧的一个大问题，”他说。“利率高，并带有高风险溢价，因为你不知道各个央行会不会做出些疯狂的举动，继续推高通胀。”

    欧洲单一货币制度导致类似于德意志联邦银行(Bundesbank)的欧洲央行成立，欧洲央行以严密、可预见的方式设定货币政策。“然后，利率降低，政府和消费者支出猛增，推动高增长，”乌利希表示。他指出，人们这时往往忽略了一点，那就是，德国没有加入进来。“当时的德国是欧洲的病人。不同于南欧国家，欧元的引入对它是一个冲击。”21世纪第一个十年初期，德国公布的GDP数据非常糟糕，而当时爱尔兰、希腊和西班牙都在高歌猛进。

    然后，德国开始转变，现在来看这个转变非常关键。德国总理格哈特•施罗德(任期1998-2005年)力主改革，希望大大提升劳动力市场的灵活性。“他的榜样是美国，”乌利希说。“在那之前，我在德国不断听到那些不愿改革的领导人们（说着）你们现在在南欧听到的话：只要未来5年我们有更多增长，我们就会消除失业问题。但增长一直没有出现。”

    施罗德决定降低养老金和失业金，给予公司更多的招聘裁员灵活权。为了实施这场欧洲当代史上最为大刀阔斧的劳动力市场改革，施罗德付出了沉重代价。“他本应获得嘉许，却受到了狠狠地惩罚，”乌利希表示。

    2005年，施罗德失去了总理的职位，让位于安格拉•默克尔。他的改革成效直到2006年才浮现，德国经济一跃成为欧洲最强，迅速走出了金融危机。

    依赖高额支出的南欧工资以及生产率增长无法持续，西班牙和法国的单位汽车或钢铁成本增速快于德国或美国，暴露了南欧和爱尔兰的竞争力差距。国际客户日益减少从南欧进口的高价商品。

    那么，现在这些国家能做些什么?“解决方法有两个，”乌利希说。“一是退出欧元，这样新货币成本将相比其他国家下降。二是提高生产力，降低劳动力成本。这是一条更好的出路。”

    他说，问题是，那些危机国家没有怎么行动起来，按十年前施罗德的改革路线来解放劳动力市场。

    For the past year, we've been hearing that global growth, and the world's equity markets, will get a major lift from a gradual recovery in Europe.

    Indeed, Ireland and Portugal recently returned to the debt markets with well-received offerings, and the Greek government claims it will soon be in a position to issue bonds. Yields on sovereign debt remain remarkably low and stable. It's indisputable that a mood of tranquility has returned to the eurozone.

    But tranquility is not the same thing as progress, as the GDP figures released on May 15 by the Statistical Office of The European Union (Eurostat) alarmingly demonstrate. The 18-nation eurozone expanded by just 0.2% in the first quarter of 2014, half the figure economists were projecting.

    Germany, as usual, was the leader, posting a gain of 0.8%. The problem spots are precisely the places where the comeback is supposedly underway: the beleaguered nations of Europe's southern tier, as well as that tamed tiger, Ireland.

    The latest figures confirm that most of these countries aren't improving at all. Italy's economy shrank by 0.1% in the first three months of 2014, matching the average of the three previous quarters. After expanding 0.6% in Q2 2013, France recorded zero growth. Portugal shrank 0.7%, following positive numbers in the preceding nine months. While figures weren't available for Greece and Ireland in Q1, neither country is showing progress. Greek GDP dropped 2.5% in the final three months of last year, and Ireland limped ahead at 0.2%.

    The lone nation demonstrating a sustained upward trend, however modest, is Spain. It grew at 0.4% in the first quarter of 2014 after pretty much flatlining for the last nine months of 2013.

    Harald Uhlig, a German-born and educated economist at the University of Chicago, provides a balanced view of the current risks to the eurozone. For Uhlig, it's crucial to understand the divergent courses taken by Germany and the southern nations since the euro's introduction in 1999, and how those policies have led to the disparate economic outcomes in these nations today. "Inflation had always been a big problem in southern Europe," he says. "Rates were high, and they also carried a big 'risk premium' because you couldn't be sure that the separate central banks wouldn't do something crazy, causing more inflation."

    The institution of a single currency in Europe led to the creation of a Bundesbank-like European Central Bank that then and now sets monetary policy in a rigorous, predictable fashion. "Rates dropped, and government and consumer spending exploded, driving high growth rates," says Uhlig. What's often overlooked, he notes, is that Germany didn't join the party. "Germany was the 'sick man' of Europe. It suffered when the euro was introduced, in contrast to the southern countries." Germany posted miserable GDP numbers in the early 2000s, while Ireland, Greece, and Spain all roared ahead.

    Then, Germany made a turn that, in retrospect, seems astounding. Chancellor Gerhard Schröder (who served from 1998 to 2005) championed reforms designed to create a far more flexible labor market. "His model was the U.S.," says Uhlig. "Before that, I kept hearing from leaders in Germany who didn't want to reform, [saying] what you hear now in southern Europe: 'If we only have more growth in the next five years, we'll get rid of the unemployment problem.' But growth never came."

    Schröder decisively lowered pension costs and unemployment compensation, and he gave companies more flexibility with hiring and layoffs. Schröder paid a heavy price for securing the most dramatic labor market reforms in modern European history. "He should have been rewarded, but he was brutally punished," says Uhlig.

    Schröder lost the chancellorship to Angela Merkel in 2005. The fruits of his reforms didn't surface until around 2006, when the German economy emerged as the strongest player in Europe, as demonstrated by its resurgence from the financial crisis.

    Big spending inflated wages in southern Europe, and productivity gains couldn't keep up, meaning labor costs in Spain and France for each unit of autos or steel produced grew at a faster rate than in Germany or the U.S. The crash exposed the competitiveness gap in southern Europe and Ireland. Global customers bought less and less of pricey exports from southern Europe.

    So, what can these nations do now? "It can be solved in one of two ways," says Uhlig. "One is exiting the euro so that costs decline in the new currency compared to costs in other nations. The other is a combination of productivity gains and labor cost reductions. That would be the far better course."

    The issue, he says, is that the troubled nations have done little to unshackle labor markets along the lines of Schröder's reforms of a decade ago.