---
title: "The EU and the Euro Recovery Package | Sami Metelinen and Toni Vuorinen | Negotiator 89"
titleOriginal: "EU ja euron elvytyspaketti | Sami Metelinen Toni Vuorinen | Neuvottelija 89"
episodeNumber: "89"
guest: "Sami Metelinen, Toni Vuorinen"
datePublished: 2021-07-09
duration: "47:35"
youtube: "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M"
originalLanguage: "fi"
topics: ["geopolitics","finnish_economy_policy"]
subtitleMethod: "none"
provenance: "Owner page assembled from YouTube metadata, the neuvottelija.fi episode record and the publisher's own chapter marks, translated one for one. The marks are genuine: twenty-two of them, with gaps from 57 to over 250 seconds, tracking the recording rather than a grid. No transcript is published here — the channel has no English caption track for this episode and the Finnish one is YouTube's automatic track. One guest wrote the euro report of a think tank that argues for a smaller state, both are euro-sceptical, and no one defending the recovery package or the institutions described is present; the ECU-2 basket model discussed is the host's own proposal. The scenarios are forecasts made in July 2021 and none of the monetisation described has occurred."
fiCanonical: "https://www.neuvottelija.fi/fi/episodes/101-eu-ja-euron-elvytyspaketti-sami-metelinen-toni-vuorinen-neuv"
canonical: https://www.neuvottelija.com/podcast/episodes/ep89-eu-ja-euron-elvytyspaketti-metelinen-vuorinen/
---
# The EU and the Euro Recovery Package | Sami Metelinen and Toni Vuorinen | Negotiator 89

English subtitles are not available on this page. This is an episode summary, not a curated transcript.

## Chapters

- [00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=0s) Opening teaser: the recovery package as a path to national currencies
- [01:38](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=98s) The first multi-guest episode, and ultra vires
- [03:40](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=220s) Was the treaty already broken during the support packages
- [04:42](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=282s) The ECB's purchases: the package did not rescue Italy
- [05:45](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=345s) Building the federation, and the EU's power to tax
- [07:11](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=431s) Vuorinen's hypothesis: burying the debts in the ECB's balance sheet
- [10:12](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=612s) If the experiment succeeds, member state debts are monetised at zero interest
- [10:55](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=655s) The ECU-2 basket currency model, with the IMF's SDR as the example
- [13:27](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=807s) Metelinen: the euro is part of a federal dream going back to the 1970s
- [15:55](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=955s) Vuorinen: a federation cannot be built on top of the present euro
- [18:25](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=1105s) The EU's own resources, the plastic levy and customs duties
- [19:39](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=1179s) Is the EU bluffing? The 2012 Greek haircut as a lesson
- [21:46](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=1306s) Comparison with the United States: tax rate, debt and no bailout
- [25:08](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=1508s) Rescuing the Italian banks, or a monetisation experiment
- [27:02](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=1622s) A bailout is being created through the central bank all the time
- [28:33](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=1713s) German ordoliberalism bent to the French line
- [30:04](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=1804s) The current account surplus and Target2 claims as Germany's interest
- [32:29](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=1949s) Finland's borrowing, and the ministry's 260 per cent debt projection
- [34:02](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=2042s) The good sides of the recovery package, and parallel currencies
- [38:36](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=2316s) A workable federation: the Swiss model and a minimal state
- [41:15](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=2475s) The future of fiat money, cryptocurrencies and digital currencies
- [43:59](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M&t=2639s) Public goods, citizens' support, and closing words

## Summary

The channel's first multi-guest episode: the journalist Sami Metelinen, author of Libera's euro report, and the economic analyst Toni Vuorinen ask what the EU's 750 billion euro recovery package is really about. Vuorinen advances the hypothesis that the package is an empirical experiment — the European Central Bank buys the joint debt and converts it into a zero-coupon perpetual, and if nothing follows, the same is done to member states' debts; the end point of his scenario is a return to national currencies via an ECU-2 basket model. Metelinen considers it possible but unlikely: he sees a federal objective running back to the 1970s, and the over-indebted countries have no interest in returning to their own currencies. Both reject the claim that the package is an Italian rescue, since ECB purchases keep Italy funded regardless.

## What both of them rule out

Two guests who disagree about almost everything else agree that the package is not an Italian rescue, and their reason is mechanical: the central bank's purchases already keep Italy funded. That agreement is more informative than either of their forecasts, because it rests on how the system works rather than on where it is going.

## A hypothesis with a test in it

Vuorinen's claim is that joint debt on the ECB's balance sheet is an experiment, and that success would be followed by doing the same to member state debt. Whatever one thinks of the conclusion, stating it as a sequence makes it checkable — and four years on, the sequence has not run.

## Intent against mechanism

Metelinen's counter-argument is of a different kind: a project with a federal objective reaching back to the 1970s does not terminate in national currencies, however the arithmetic works. The episode is at its best where the two kinds of argument meet and neither dissolves the other.


## Watch

The recording lives on the Neuvottelija channel: [EU ja euron elvytyspaketti | Sami Metelinen Toni Vuorinen | Neuvottelija 89](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC-691O_Z7M).
A Finnish edition of this episode is published at [www.neuvottelija.fi](https://www.neuvottelija.fi/fi/episodes/101-eu-ja-euron-elvytyspaketti-sami-metelinen-toni-vuorinen-neuv).

## In depth

The Neuvottelija AI editions carry a long-form write-up of this episode:
[English](https://www.neuvottelija.com/ai/ep89-eu-ja-euron-elvytyspaketti-metelinen-vuorinen/) · [suomeksi](https://www.neuvottelija.fi/economy/ep89-eu-ja-euron-elvytyspaketti-metelinen-vuorinen/).

## Explore the ideas in depth

- [Negotiation Strategy, Leverage and Power: Reading the Counterparty You Actually Have](https://www.neuvottelija.com/guides/negotiation-strategy-leverage-and-power/): A negotiation guide from the co-author of Neuvotteluvalta — the sources of leverage, BATNA and anchoring in practice, using information asymmetry, breaking deadlocks, and what to do when the counterparty negotiates on power rather than consensus. Grounded in Neuvottelija conversations and two decades of negotiation writing.

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Cite as: Sami Miettinen, Neuvottelija — The EU and the Euro Recovery Package | Sami Metelinen and Toni Vuorinen | Negotiator 89, https://www.neuvottelija.com/podcast/episodes/ep89-eu-ja-euron-elvytyspaketti-metelinen-vuorinen/, 2021-07-09. For quotes include episode 89 and timestamp.