Structural reforms are back. Call the cops!

Judging by the recent economic news, the real culprits in the crisis have finally been identified. In Italy, Matteo Renzi is putting a lot of his political capital in a labour market reform bill. In Frankfurt, Brussels and a few other important places in Europe, the ECB’s Mario Draghi, ‘senior’ Commission officials and captains of industry and finance (yes, the bright lights who brought you the crisis in 2007-08), including a smattering of Goldman Sachs executives and ex-executives, have all discovered the persistent need for structural reforms. The ECB, thus the complaint, cannot do all the heavy lifting in the European economy. Governments and workers have to do their bit by accepting painful but necessary constraints. Banks are, supposedly, impossible to control in this sense, since they can relocate if regulated too tightly — which probably also explains why so few bankers (none, in fact) have ended up behind bars despite rather spectacularly bad behaviour: being too strict with them would undermine the competitiveness of the financial sector.