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They are called the PIGS -- Portugal, Ireland, Greece, Spain. What they have in common is that all are facing deficits and debts that could bring on national defaults and break up the European Union.
What brought the PIGS to the edge of the abyss?
All are neo-socialist states that provide welfare for poor people, generous unemployment, universal health care, early retirement and comfortable pensions. Most consume 40 percent to 50 percent of their gross domestic product annually, a crushing burden on the private sector.
Dying populations is a second...
The Bankrupt PIGS of Europe
China has its own problems including the same population decline bomb that will hurt Europe and Japan.
The one-child policy has slowed China's growth to below replacement and with the distortion in the boy-girl ratio, the decline will only quicken over time, but that leaves millions of the elderly on top supported by less and less workers on the bottom and the millions of bare branches (men who'll never marry)is a recipe for social unrest and this doesn't even cover the environmental problems, the maldistribution of income, peasant and urban poor unrest, the shaky banking sector and a host of other issues.