If new euro coins were to be made, what designs would you want to appear? What symbolism? You can vary it by country or give the general/common obverse, and post designs if you have any in mind or have made any.
Administrateur du catalogue, référent de nombreuses nations antiques et de la Lorraine.
Catalogue administrator, numerous Antique nations and Lorraine referee.
Regarding coins, I would have preferred if some countries made better use of their cultural heritage in their euro coin designs. The Dutch ones are a missed opportunity in my opinion. For example, they could have limited the king's portrait to the bimetallic ones and use more of the coat of arms in the other ones. Plenty of other examples for other countries as well.
Politically and monetary-wise the Euro is treacherous waters, so I can understand that the Czechs rather stick to their Koruna. Although I really support the idea of a European monetary union, the way the Euro was designed was a recipe for disaster, and as a result we have some of the most ludicrous monetary policy in history with some regions clearly overheating because exchange and interest rates are way too low (suffocating the pension funds and life insurances) and other regions still stagnating because they should not have joined the monetary union at that early stage in the first place.
This monetary union would have worked without any problems if it would have included only Germany, the Netherlands, Austria and perhaps Denmark, but that would have been too regional. France had to be in because it was a European project. But France did not want to be the weakest link in the monetary union and wanted Italy in. As Germany did not want to mutualise the debt some patchwork of rules was created trying to limit risks and promote budget discipline.
Now France and Germany were both the first to break these budget rules in the early 2000's. Countries with classically high interest rates and weak currencies were suddenly booming because they could tap more capital than ever, but as they ran structural deficits this made them vulnerable to downturns. Germany was actually capable of running some budget deficits because it has massive trade surpluses which ensures its currency will be in demand regardless of its budgets. When the crisis hit in 2008 the weaker countries started running huge budget deficits and reminded the Germans they did the same in the early stages of the Euro. But investors and speculators started moving against these weak countries refusing to buy their debt. This in turn forced the ECB into buying debt in order to transmit its low interest rates to the weaker countries.
Now we have a situation where southern Europe is still struggling and wishes to devaluate more to bring down their debt load and people in northern Europe are losing confidence in their currency and are exchanging it for property, shares and foreign deposits, leading to a situation that screams for higher interest rates but those are not expected until Draghi leaves. The ECB is totally cornered and knows it.
So the Czechs are wise to stay out, because the Euro's problems are far from over and a new Euro crisis is just a matter of time.
Quote: "chomp-master"An easy one: the Czech lion.
Czech is not in the Euro, and thats better for them haha, wouldnt recomend to go over to the euro
They're not yet but if finally they will decide to join, when they will, I would see it.
Administrateur du catalogue, référent de nombreuses nations antiques et de la Lorraine.
Catalogue administrator, numerous Antique nations and Lorraine referee.
Czechs decided to keep Koruna because some mafia wanted to keep their influence in the national bank... and they given some petty excuses. Slovaks managed to tale Euro soon and easily.
