The eurozone crisis

   Yesterday when talking about the innovativeenvironment of Finland, we mentioned that Finland experienced serious contraction during the eurozone crisis. Today we are going to introduce the eurozone crisis.

　昨天在談芬蘭的創新環境時，我們提及芬蘭在歐元區危機時經歷了嚴重的緊縮。今天我們就要來介紹歐元區危機。

   Eurozone crisis is the issue of excessive borrowing by ill-disciplined government. Private sectors take out loans with low interest easily. In southern European countries, such as Greece and Italy, the interest rates were even fallen when joining the eurozone.

　歐元區危機乃是紀律不彰的政府過度放款的結果。私人企業體能輕易地以低利率進行借貸。南歐國家像是希臘與義大利，當他們加入歐元區時，利率甚至還進行調降。

   The money flow of these countries is not balanced – input is smaller than output. After years of overspending, the debt level reached the point that the country was unable to bear. When there is a recession globally, the budget deficit is inevitably out of control.    

　這些國家的金錢流並不平衡－收入小於支出。經過數年的揮霍後，債務程度超出政府可以負擔的程度。當全球經濟蕭條時，此預算赤字便無可避面地失控了。

   However, Spain is in another situation. Spanish government has relative low debts. The origin of the crisis is its domestic house price. During 2004-2008, the house prices rose 44%. After this housing bubble burst, it has faced a circumstance of contraction and unemployment.

　然而，西班牙卻是另一種情形。西班牙政府的債務相對地低。國內房價乃是其危機的源頭。在2004-2008年間，房價漲了44%。房價泡沫化後，西班牙便面臨了緊縮與失業的處境。

   The problem of booming house price exists in Taiwan as well in recent years. Taiwanese government has carried out the luxury tax act since 2011 in order to cope with this issue.

　近年臺灣也存有房價飛漲的問題。臺灣政府已經於2011年起課徵奢侈稅，以處理此議題。

Reference:

*BBC News: Eurozone crisis explained 

*財團法人國家政策研究基金會 臺灣課徵奢侈稅對房地產市場的影響 (NPF Research Report, National Policy Foundation)