In Europe, widening doubt over austerity hits politicians hard - by Edward Cody

With economic growth stuck near zero and unemployment rising, Europeans are becoming increasingly impatient with the budget discipline imposed as part of the European Union’s showcase anti-crisis pact.

In France, the doubts have spread to President Francois Hollande’s own Socialist Party and government, with officials suggesting the debt-ridden continent needs to stimulate growth at all costs — even more debt — if it is to climb out of the economic and financial crisis that began unfurling in 2008.

But conservatives, with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in the lead, have objected that abandoning the efforts to pare back deficits could lead to a renewal of pressure on the euro, the European Union’s common currency, and revive the sense of impending disaster that gripped the continent two years ago. Interest rates have stayed low for the last six months, they warn, but that could change again fast, with uncontrollable consequences for heavily indebted governments.

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