German policy makers and voters believe the story. The policy lesson learned by the most powerful (and solvent) European state was that policy failures by governments, not financial markets, make crises. Consequently, the policy "success" of 2008—the return of the master and his stimulus measures—was seen by the Germans and their allies at the ECB as a policy disaster waiting to happen whose consequences would only become all too apparent in future inflation. Present debt increases were just the canary in the coalmine. Given this, the Germans were not about to sign on to any more stimulus efforts, regardless of pressure from the United States.

Mark Blyth, Austerity, loc. 166