The Fiscal Policy Implications of European Economic and Monetary Union and its Implications for Great Britain

[From the Introduction]. With only two more years to run on the European Community's (EC) 1992 single market program, European leaders have been seeking for the last several years to develop and specify a range of extensive proposals to enhance the benefits of an integrated market. One principal direction in which the Community has embarked has been to set the course for economic, monetary and political union. While political union probably will have the most visible impact on the face of Europe as we know it, any real progress seems light years away. No one in Europe is prepared to make the hard decisions required until some concrete evidence of the success of the single market is apparent. For the moment the most visible movement toward any substantial kind of union is in the realm of economic and monetary affairs (EMU). Originally intended for furthering the benefits already obvious from a decade's experience with closer currency cooperation by locking in the cross rates between member countries, EMU, even in the draft stage, is taking on a much larger significance for the economies of each member state.