I Hayeks lille bog, Denationalisation of Money: The argument Refined, fra 1990, hvor Hayek gør sig til talsmand for at opmæve myndighedernes monopol på pengeudstedelse (afnationalisering), så der kan opstå en fri konkurrence mellem konkurrerende penge, ikke blot mellem lande men internt i hvert land, skriver Hayek på side 23-24 nogle næsten profetiske ord om en fælles europæisk valuta.
Hayeks skrift er udgivet ni år, før euroen blev etableret i 1999, men Delors rapporten, der formulerede grundlaget for det kommende eurosamarbejde var allerede udgivet i 1989, så Hayeks kommentar kan forstås som en direkte kommentar til et monetært system som euroen:
“(…) the utopian scheme of introducing a new European currency, which would ultimately only have the effect of more deeply entrenching the source and root of all monetary evil, the government monopoly of the issue and control of money. (…)
Though I strongly sympathise with the desire to complete the economic unification of Western Europe by completely freeing the flow of money between them, I have grave doubts about the desirability of doing so by creating a new European currency managed by any sort of supra-national authority. Quite apart from the extreme unlikelihood that the member countries would agree on the policy to be pursued in practice by a common monetary authority (and the practical inevitability of some countries getting a worse currency than they have now), it seems highly unlikely, even in the most favourable circumstances, that it would be administered better than the present national currencies. Moreover, in many respects a single international currency is not better but worse than a national currency if it is not better run. It would leave a country with a financially more sophisticated public not even the chance of escaping from the consequences of the crude prejudices governing the decisions of the others. The advantage of an international authority should be mainly to protect a member state from the harmful measures of others, not to force it to join in their follies.”
