Wolfgang Schäuble, The Trust Troll

Paul Krugman invented the term “confidence fairy” to characterize the belief that all that was needed for growth to resume after the Global Financial Crisis was to restore “confidence”. Impose austerity and the economy will not shrink, but will instead grow immediately, because of the boost to confidence: don’t worry: spending cuts may hurt, but the confidence fairy will take away the pain. “The idea that austerity measures could trigger stagnation is incorrect,” declared Jean-Clau...