ce serait une strategie dangereuse pour la france face au risque d ’ un choc de taux d ’ interet ou a celui d ’ une nouvelle crise conjoncturelle exogene. mais nous pouvons ecrire un film plus heureux pour echapper a ce scenario tendanciel. il combine trois ingredients : le temps – ne commencer a se desendetter qu ’ une fois sortis economiquement de la crise covid, apres 2022, et se donner une strategie sur dix ans – ; la croissance – qui apportera des recettes mais pas de miracles – ; et enfin une meilleure maitrise et efficacite de nos depenses publiques. une croissance nulle – une stabilisation, donc – des depenses totales en volume a fiscalite constante ferait baisser la dette a environ 100 % du pib en 2032. une croissance des depenses en volume ramenee a 0, 5 % par an diminuerait la dette a environ 110 % du pib. beaucoup de reflexions actuelles page 7 sur 14 en france – dont celles recentes de la commission arthuis – avancent le principe d ’ une telle norme de depenses, a juste titre. mais il faudra en fixer le niveau, ce qui releve du debat democratique : les exemples chiffres que je viens de citer peuvent l ’ eclairer. c ’ est un objectif exigeant mais accessible : nombre de nos voisins europeens y sont parvenus. b. our macroeconomic policies? the lack of macroeconomic policy coordination has long been the “ usual suspect ” for the weakness in our economic union. this was true during the euro crisis : monetary stimulus, whether powerful enough or not, was not sufficiently supported by fiscal policy, which was tightened too early. this lesson has not been forgotten in this crisis. along with my colleagues on the governing council, i personally will never forget that night of march 2020 when, locked down in our homes, we took, in less

( 75 % ii ). third, our common social model combines a lower level of inequality with a higher level of public services – let ’ s call it soziale marktwirtschaft in german, and pay tribute to social democracy as well as to christian democrats. this model is more and more environmental, page 2 sur 14 and in this respect, europe is clearly ahead. the world in this 21 st century, starting with its youth across the different continents, needs our european values. but do we have the power to project these values? power is, in physics, the multiplication of weight by speed : we collectively have the former, but we lack the latter. so, i will now focus on our structural lag in terms of growth. it is most obvious with china, but the united states is more comparable with europe. allow me to explain my approach with a quote from alexis de tocqueville : “ it is not ( … ) merely to satisfy a legitimate curiosity that i have examined america ; my wish has been to find instruction by which we may ourselves profitiii. ” tocqueville wrote these words two centuries ago and he was comparing democratic institutions. today, we europeans can be proud of our democratic traditions. however, over the past 20 years, the growth gap between the united states and the euro area has been widening : cumulatively between 1999 and 2019, the real gdp gap amounts to 20 percentage points. regarding gdp per capita, the cumulative gap is 7 percentage points over the same period. before the covid crisis, the gap was also pronounced in employment : page 3 sur 14 on top of that, the share of the euro area in global gdp has been declining over the past 20 years, owing to demographic changes and the catching - up of emerging economies, although, this has been a common problem for all advanced economies. the growth gap between the united states and the euro area has mostly widened during crises, in 2008 and in 2011, and more recently with the covid crisis. there is a painful paradox : the 2008 financial crisis started in the united states and the 2020 pandemic crisis started in china and yet, each time, it has been europe that has suffered the most. in 2020, us gdp fell by 3. 5 %, while euro area gdp fell by 6. 6 %, almost twice as much. in the face of a similar health shock, the number of cases and deaths, relative to the total population, is higher in the