Shouldn't life get easier after this...

[scotttswan]

free trade is not the primary cause of the europe crisis, cheap credit is... cheap credit to allows the Irish to build more homes than the entire demand of Ireland or future generations

Ireland was ridiculous. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8653949.stm

There are 621 ghost estates across the Irish Republic now, a legacy of those hopeful years. One in five Irish homes is unoccupied.
If the country immediately used them to house every person on the social housing list, there would still be hundreds of thousands left over.

 

[sesamosinsal]

free trade is not the primary cause of the europe crisis, cheap credit is...

Cheap credit just made things move faster. Whether it's cheap or not is irrelevant in terms of predicting the inevitable: If a country spends more than it makes, it will go bankrupt. The U.S. is in the unique position that it can print the currency for international trade, so it can just continue to devalue the dollar through monetary expansion until people refuse to sell their exports in the U.S. dollar. But for everyone else, the only way to keep your head afloat is to export more than you import. Look at Germany's trade balance versus most of Europe, and it becomes quite apparent what the problem is.

Without credit--cheap or otherwise--free trade isn't possible.