Businesses want EU leaders to stimulate growth

[one...two...tree 2,762]

PARIS (AP) -- While Friday's European summit received a measure of approval from markets for committing to belt-tightening, some businesspeople are worried the accord might further choke growth.

They want to remind their leaders: It doesn't matter if you fix the debt crisis, if you break the economy to do it.

And a deal on debt doesn't address the regulations and bureaucracy that can hold back businesses and entrepreneurs.

While European leaders have repeatedly been criticized for acting too slowly and haltingly to calm financial markets, there is some praise for Friday's deal, which commits governments to balanced-budget laws and tougher scrutiny of their spending from European Union officials. The aim is to convince bond markets that Italy and Spain will be able to pay their debts, so they can borrow affordably and avoid financial collapse. High borrowing costs forced Greece, Ireland and Portugal to take bailouts from other eurozone countries, but Italy and Spain are regarded as too large to bail out -- and a default would mean another financial crisis.

Wilbur Ross, who has about $1 billion invested in Europe, praised the deal and said he was surprised that the countries moved this far as quickly as they did.

"Look back a few months ago," said Ross, the chairman and CEO of a private equity firm, WL Ross & Co. "Nobody would have thought there would be any real centralization of fiscal control over individual European countries, yet that's the direction they're moving in."

Read more: http://www.azcentral...l#ixzz1gHApyV88