© Hannelore Foerster/Bloomberg Mario Draghi, president of the European Central Bank, called for a “ growth compact” consisting of structural changes and improvements in competitiveness to enhance the fiscal pact.
With Spain's largest unions leading marches involving thousands of protesters in 55 cities yesterday, Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's government battled to prevent Spain from becoming the next country to seek bailout aid. In France, the final round of presidential elections on May 6 and the prospect of victory for Socialist candidate Francois Hollande steered debate toward whether a focus on budget cuts worsens the crisis.
"Watching Spain now is exactly like watching Ireland around October 2010 before Ireland was forced into its bailout," Megan Greene, a senior economist at Roubini Global Economics LLC, told Bloomberg Television's "Street Smart" on April 27. "The government can't win no matter what it does."
