"...some countries irresponsibly spent more money than they had, and are now in debt?" German (and French) banks provided loans which inflated bubbles in the p

"...some countries irresponsibly spent more money than they had, and are now in debt?" German (and French) banks provided loans which inflated bubbles in the periphery. The profligate countries had to borrow from someone. This is largely absent from the discussion of the bailouts. No bubbles, no painful contractions. So the "core" isn't entirely blameless. It's a little unfair to lump Ireland and Spain into the "PIIGS" group. Both countries are being blamed as if they ran up huge public expenditure deficits during the good times, when most of the problems lie with their banks going mad with construction loans. In Ireland for example, our debt to GDP ratio would be something like 80% (high without being utterly unsustainable) without the bank bailouts, and it's 120% (unsustainable) including the bank bailouts. It's not like the ordinary people see any of the bailout funds either, just our banks. We do get austerity though. At least the Spainish had more sense than to lump the bank bailout debt in with their sovereign debt: http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2012/0611/breaking30.html http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2012/0611/break...