ready for obliteration
If you live in the EURO zone there is a lot to worry about. First of all this:
up for annihilation?
The Euro is what the Germans call a Fehlkonstrukt. It was introduced mainly for political reasons, on January first 1999. My grandmother remembers this as the day the prices doubled. Indeed there were grocery stores where I lived at the time that just replaced DM by € and left the price as it was.
Many people on youtube are quite active predicting the coming dollar crisis. The debt bubble, the bubble of everything, negative interest and so on and so on. Will it actually come soon? For now EU citizens must think twice before visiting the US. Their currency is tanking much more than the dollar...
What is wrong in the EU? Nothing, except that it is falling apart and is ruled by a political class that is not very focused on solutions.
"The lower EURO rate is good for exports." You hear that all the time when the slogan "We need a strong and stable currency" sounds silly because every day life shows the EURO does not qualify as such.
Twenty plus countries with different sales tax (VAT) rates, different wage tax systems, different wealth tax systems, different pension systems and so on: to bully that all into the same regulation and currency of course is at least a challenge. By now the conclusion is that it doesn't work and only still exists because of political power. Fiat comes from the barrel of a gun.
The good for export argument always works. In the EU however wages drop far behind the US and the share holder wealth of export companies is created by the wealth decline of populations.
The EU had a kind of thinking that at best can be understood by the law of communicating vessels. In the propaganda the East and South would rise to the level of the West. Of course that did not happen - the West impoverished and the East and South only had a consumption boost based on long term Euro debt. Nominally richer but forced in massive over spending. As a whole the EU tends to look at China. Low wages, no rights, no middle class. Just a Giant Permanent Underclass kept happy by consumption and ruled by an overregulating bureaucracy and non elected politicians. It is a kind of Planeconomy hybrid Soviet style. The EU is not a state, but acts like one. There is a lot of resentment about that (Brexit is not an isolated thought) and the reaction on that is also Soviet Style. Germany proposes and enforces all kind of laws that makes it very tricky to even make fun of the EU circus. Repression of free speech is always an indication a system is utterly failing. Germany, the Euro and the EU are failing - but in denial and unable to do the necessary to reverse negative trends.
The European establishment believes two things: after Trump the economy switches back to normal and even TTIP will get done & BREXIT will be reversed as soon as Boris Johnson is gone. Buying time.
Living in the EU and getting paid in EURO calls memories to Russia in the 90's. When people got their salary, they immediately converted what they could into cash dollars. Holding a slowly evaporating EURO at negative interest on saving accounts is not very attractive option. Here crypto, with it's stable coins generating interest, comes in handy.
And the dollar? Well. I guess all fiat currency sucks - but as long as it is run by systems that can lock you up when you don't use it, it will retain some value. That being said, it is wise to have value outside that system. Devaluation is one thing, but an overnight currency reform another. That happened before. You can even see the EURO as such. Nobody was asked.
For the moment it is likely dollar and euro (meaning: the system build around it) will survive some more decades. Let's see.
