The fascinating thing here is, of course, that nothing has changed. In many ways, this is because the issues haven't changed. Keynes said that the whole complex problem of European currencies and trade in the 1920s could be reduced to one question: how much of France's war debts would be paid by workers and how much by savers, whether through taxation or through inflation. The answer would set the price level and hence the exchange rate, and how much of a trade surplus Germany could run, and therefore how much of Germany's war debts could possibly be paid.

Similarly, in 1992 the questions was how the costs of German reunification would be split. Taxation was chosen over inflation, capital was privileged over income. Now, arguably, the question is how the cost of the Great Bubble will be split, and you guessed it. Portes is damning on the reasoning behind this: