U.S. Animal Spirits Since ’07 Proves Superior to EU Slump

America’s aggressive strategy for tackling its financial and economic ills is working better than Europe’s go-slow approach -- and investors are taking notice.

Even amid the weakest recovery in modern history, the U.S. economy is outperforming the euro area and soon may break higher. More than a year after U.S. gross domestic product returned to its pre-crisis level, Europe still has to make up lost ground and is back in recession. While America’s unemployment, at 7.5 percent, is 2.5 percentage points higher than at the start of the recession, it’s below the 12.1 percent rate of the euro zone -- and the gap is the most since 2000. Manufacturing is shrinking in the 17-nation bloc; U.S production is expanding.