In homage to Swede from Estonia...

This article from Bloomberg talks about the economy of Estonia and how it could inform a recovery in the USA.
No basketball news at all, but I found it quite interesting. BTW, when in Latvia once I attended a game between the Latvian and Lithuanian national teams played in our version of a high school audtorium. Spirited play, some good big men, but the best players were ex-pat Americans trying to keep their skills intact and make some money playing the game they love.

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-07-19/krugmenistan-vs-dot-estonia#r=read

I very much respect the estonian people and their governments way to manage their finances and politics in general.

That article misses a few key factors though that made it possible and "have to" happen.

The kroon was tied to the euro in a currency fund, devaluing really wasnt a choice and would have been pretty much pointless anyway for them.

The unemployment did rise severely but the possibility and willingness of the people to go out of country for labor (and the rich neighbour northern countries) made it possible for them in practice to devalue without devaluing.

The hard line on finances and cutting back on expenses, the US might be able to pick up some of that. They can not do what Estonia did when it comes to unemployment though since they can not exactly go to Mexico for work.

Estonia has a population of 1 million give or take some and "some unemployment" could easily be absorbed by the northern countries which total 20+ million. A lot of them came to Sweden/Finland and did manual labor/construction and to a large degree "untaxed".

I really liked Estonia though and I clicked really well with the people, now I am back in Stockholm where I to a large degree feel like I belong less with the people. The home team of the city/school that I was at in Estonia had a rather good basketball team and their games were big happenings in style with european soccer games.

Thanks so much for the feedback, Swede. I really liked Latvia too.