Former Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi advocates investing twice the amount of the Marshall Plan

The European Union (EU) has suffered an economic decline relative to the United States and should issue new common debt to improve its productivity and strengthen its security, a “existential challenge”Mario Draghi warned on Monday 9 September in a highly anticipated report. After the success of the historic €800 billion post-Covid recovery plan, the EU should “continue to issue common debt instruments to finance common investment projects aimed at increasing the competitiveness and security of the EU”said the former Italian Prime Minister, stressing the “ditch” economic ties that have grown with the United States.

The EU has been mired in economic stagnation for a year and a half. It has weathered the crisis caused by the pandemic in 2020 less well than the United States, as was already the case with the financial crisis of 2008. This decline can be explained by “mainly by the more marked slowdown in productivity in Europe” and represents a threat to its social model, stressed the former president of the European Central Bank during a press conference in Brussels (Belgium) in the presence of the president of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen.

“The investment needs are enormous,” he hammered home, insisting on the need for a “radical change” In the European approach, he presented some of his “170 proposals”. Among them, the idea of ​​issuing common debt again. According to Mario Dragi, the necessary investments represent more than twice the Marshall Plan ($13 billion at the time, or 150 billion in constant euros), which served to revive the economy after the Second World War, reports Politico.

During his press conference, the Italian stressed first of all the need to mobilize private capital to finance innovation through the creation of a real “Capital Markets Union”. “Real disposable income per capita has increased almost twice as much in the United States as in Europe since 2000”warned Mario Draghi. The report should inspire the work of the new European Commission for the next five years.