Editing Angela Merkel (section)

===Social expenditure===

At the [[World Economic Forum]] in Davos, 2013, Merkel said that Europe had only 7% of the global population and produced only 25% of the global GDP, but that it accounted for almost 50% of global social expenditure. She went on to say that Europe could only maintain its prosperity by being innovative and measuring itself against the best.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.bundesregierung.de/ContentArchiv/DE/Archiv17/Reden/2013/01/2013-01-24-merkel-davos.html |title=Bundesregierung {{pipe}} Rede von Bundeskanzlerin Merkel beim Jahrestreffen 2013 des World Economic Forum |language=de |publisher=Bundesregierung.de |date=24 January 2013 |access-date=24 February 2016 |archive-date=10 October 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171010140150/https://www.bundesregierung.de/ContentArchiv/DE/Archiv17/Reden/2013/01/2013-01-24-merkel-davos.html |url-status=live }}</ref> After this, the comparison became a central element in major speeches.<ref>Among others, in her speech on the occasion of her honorary doctoral degree at the [[University of Szeged]] in Hungary, see {{cite web |url=http://www.bundesregierung.de/Content/DE/Rede/2015/02/2015-02-02-merkel-budapest.html |title=Rede von Bundeskanzlerin Merkel anlässlich der Verleihung der Ehrendoktorwürde der Universität Szeged |publisher=Die Bundesregierung |language=de |date=2 February 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171010140512/https://www.bundesregierung.de/Content/DE/Rede/2015/02/2015-02-02-merkel-budapest.html |archive-date=10 October 2017 }}</ref> The international financial press has widely commented on her thesis, with ''[[The Economist]]'' saying:

{{Blockquote|If Mrs Merkel's vision is pragmatic, so too is her plan for implementing it. It can be boiled down to three statistics, a few charts and some facts on an [[A4 paper|A4]] [[ISO 216#A series|*]] sheet of paper. The three figures are 7 percent, 25 percent and 50 percent. Mrs Merkel never tires of saying that Europe has 7 percent of the world's population, 25 percent of its GDP and 50 percent of its social spending. If the region is to prosper in competition with emerging countries, it cannot continue to be so generous.<ref name="economist.com">{{cite news |url=https://www.economist.com/news/special-report/21579144-germanys-vision-europe-all-about-making-continent-more-competitive-merkel |title=The Merkel plan |newspaper=The Economist |date=15 June 2013 |access-date=24 February 2016 |archive-date=23 March 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160323014928/http://www.economist.com/news/special-report/21579144-germanys-vision-europe-all-about-making-continent-more-competitive-merkel |url-status=live }}</ref> ... She produces graphs of unit labour costs&nbsp;... at EU meetings in much the same way that the late [[Margaret Thatcher]] used to pull passages from [[Friedrich Hayek]]'s ''[[The Road to Serfdom|Road to Serfdom]]'' from her handbag.<ref name="economist.com"/>}}

The ''[[Financial Times]]'' commented: "Although Ms Merkel stopped short of suggesting that a ceiling on social spending might be one yardstick for measuring competitiveness, she hinted as much in the light of soaring social spending in the face of an ageing population.<ref>{{cite news |last=Peel |first=Quentin |url=http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/8cc0f584-45fa-11e2-b7ba-00144feabdc0.html |title=Merkel warns on cost of welfare |work=Financial Times |date=16 December 2012 |access-date=24 February 2016 |archive-date=24 March 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160324134929/http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/8cc0f584-45fa-11e2-b7ba-00144feabdc0.html |url-status=live }}</ref>