"The author argues that Margaret Thatcher's free-market arguments highlighted the economic shortcomings of Keynesianism and socialism and paved the way for a significant realignment of the Conservative Party and re-thinking of British economics."

Since unification, the debate about Germany's poor economic performance has focused on supply-side weaknesses, and the associated reform agenda sought to make low-skill labour markets more flexible. We question this diagnosis using three lines of argument. First, effective restructuring of the...