Sloppy stereotypes

We could be in the days of Queen Victoria. Journalistic religio-racial stereotyping here from The Daily Telegraph: the myth of  hard-working northern Protestants versus shiftless, lazy Catholics / Orthodox from the South, the sort of people who are always going to confession (as if) and who know how to have a good time.
Sorry, no.
"The Protestant north" hardly describes the reality of modern Germany and quite fails to take into account the fact that much of western Germany, the old Federal Republic, the powerhouse of European economic recovery after World War Two, is traditionally Catholic, not Protestant at all. (It also doesn't quite explain the economic success of northern Italy either) We have to look elsewhere than our historical prejudices for the real causes of the present crisis in the Euro-zone.