Economics
Nightmare Haunting Euro Founders May Be a Reality With Italy
- Sustainability depends on European support, economists say
- Italian debt is on track to reach or exceed 150% of GDP
Photographer: Thomas Lohnes/AFP via Getty Images
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Two decades since the euro began, one of the principal worries of its founders is materializing as the coronavirus rages through the region’s third-largest economy.
The longstanding suspicion that Italy’s profligate borrowing could ultimately become the whole of Europe’s problem was the recurring nightmare of German finance officials throughout the 1990s.