The euro zone's governments remain trapped between the sterile alternatives of Keynesian spending and fiscal austerity.
So the burden of restoring confidence must fall on fiscal austerity, a rare commodity in Brazil.
Cut off from foreign funds, the country would be forced into still tighter fiscal austerity.
Meanwhile, tough economic times and fiscal austerity have crimped sales in US and Europe.
The rich countries also seem to underestimate the risks that fiscal austerity poses to domestic demand.
And the European Central Bank (ECB) should counter the fiscal austerity with a looser monetary policy.
The first is on the wider European debate about the impact of fiscal austerity.
And the talk in Washington - and across Europe - is all of fiscal austerity.
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Mr Bush, for his part, has an election to fight and fiscal austerity wins few votes.
The creation of this ministry is intended to make fiscal austerity more politically palatable.
With the economy still struggling to find its footing, even modest fiscal austerity seems myopic at best.
German taxpayers are footing the biggest bailout bill and want fiscal austerity, central budget review and compliance.
Even with fiscal austerity programs under way across Europe, no one has articulated a credible long-term solution.
However, Sweden is sticking to a fiscal austerity program that has coincided with a rapidly growing economy.
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As I have noted before, fiscal austerity has been happening in the U.S. economy since about mid-2010.
But the prescription that politicians want is for fiscal austerity and trade surpluses, at least for European countries.
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An extended period of economic depression and fiscal austerity can trash the balance sheet of the healthiest bank.
But if America's slowdown persists, they too will flag, particularly as fiscal austerity kicks in (see article).
They note the broad welcome for his plan to add pro-growth measures to the euro zone's fiscal austerity.
In most rich countries the detailed plans for fiscal austerity contrast sharply with a lamentable lack of microeconomic ambition.
"The government's fiscal austerity is kicking in and hitting the economy hard, " says Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Analytics.
Berlusconi has criticized Germany and its program of structural reforms that looks to raise taxes and impose greater fiscal austerity.
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But even if Mr Cardoso succeeds in making fiscal austerity stick, Brazil is clearly facing a hard year in 1999.
The economy still faces the problems of heavily indebted consumers, moribund home sales, and fiscal austerity at all levels of government.
Mr Papandreou and his finance minister, George Papaconstantinou, talk up the need to balance fairness and social peace with fiscal austerity.
In the long run bold productivity-enhancing reforms will do more to boost the rich world's growth prospects than short-term fiscal austerity.
Instead of a virtuous cycle where fiscal austerity leads to greater confidence and better prospects, the opposite dynamic will take hold.
One answer that economists might give is that European policy makers are conflicted on the subject of fiscal austerity and growth.
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The years of fiscal austerity and social turmoil that followed, writes Mr Priestland, contributed to the militarisation of Germany and Japan.
But it can't make the recession go away, and it can't take away the need for many more years of fiscal austerity.
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