Spending more than we make

A ghost from the past, the current account deficit, has come to the fore again, on the occasion of the European Commission's spring forecasts, which calculated it at an alarming 11.8% of GDP in 2022, but also the strong warning by Bank of Greece Governor Yannis Stournaras on this specific issue.

The central banker actually highlighted the other side of the balance of payments deficit: negative savings. "The public deficit must be greatly reduced, it must become a surplus, and national savings must also increase," he said in an interview with Naftemporiki newspaper last week. "We don't need measures that reduce national savings."

Indeed, this deficit in addition to the lag of Greek exports compared to imports also reveals another dimension: the lag of state and private sector savings compared to investment. In other words, Greeks' savings are not enough to finance the...